An Extreme New Year's Resolution

Everyone make's New Year's Resolutions, right? And everyone breaks them on January 2nd - also correct?

Well, I've been good with mine to date, but it's a bit harsh and it's going to get a lot worse before it gets better. My New Year's Resolution is to spend $0.00 on electronics or electronic media in 2005. Let me explain what this includes : TV's, stereo's, computer parts, DVD's, CD's, video games (that's the one that hurts the most), and pretty much anything else with any kind of electronic circuitry in it or media that plays on it.

Here's what led me to this resolution : In 2003 and 2004, I over spent, big time.

In 2003, we moved into a new larger house and I made a deal with my wife that I would buy a big screen TV if we did, something I've always wanted. The house turned into a real lemon - we had to replace 8 windows, lay down a new layer of shingles on the roof, repair plumbing damage, not to mention all of the painting we had already planned. Suffice to say that the money I had set aside for the TV was not really there when we needed to pay for it. We actually tried to sell it and found that the secondary market for big screen TV's is almost non-existant.

I should also mention that we had to purchase a new stove for this new house, and since we had a good chunk of money from our previous house (at the time), we bought a nice one.

I'm also something of a PC hobbyist, although less so as of late. I used to run a small LAN in my house of 3 PC's plus a couple laptops and I would buy new parts for the best PC and pass down the old parts to the older PC's. Big expense item number 2 was a flat panel monitor (which I'm looking at right now) which was also budgeted with house money. Again, when the bill came, it was difficult to pay it off. I also had purchased numerous smaller upgrades like an ASUS motherboard and a hard drive.

Finally in 2003 we bought an $800 laptop and a PS2 (which I actually sold at a profit and bought an XBox). Needless to say, we had a ginormous Best Buy bill.

Then I took a break as we paid off the Best Buy bill slowly but surely (and painfully I might add). Then at the end of 2004, I went back at it again.

I bought a new car stereo plus four new speakers.
I upgraded my Archos Jukebox that I had bought earlier that same year to a larger hard drive.

Then, the final straw : I had been getting hyped up for two releases in 2004 : Halo 2 and Mech Assault 2 : Lone Wolf. I was a huge Mech Assault fan, and I had unrealistic expectations for MA2. So high, in fact, that I completely ignored the launch of Halo2 and stuck it out until MA2 came out. I bought two copies the day it came out, one for myself and one as a Christmas present for my brother.

What a mistake. Mech Assault 2 was easily the buggiest game I have ever purchased and I had missed out on Halo 2. (My mother did bail me out of that jam 3 months later by getting me Halo 2 for my birthday - thank you, mom.) I was mad at myself like you couldn't believe. Hence, the New Year's Resolution for 2005.

I am happy to report that as of today, I have spent exactly $12 on electronics and electronic media in 2005. The only reason I spent the $12 is that I had the week of July 4th off and I had just joined 2old2play.com. So, basically, if I wanted to play Halo at all with my friends, I had to buy the maps.

Now comes the hard part : the launch of XBox 360 and what do I do about next year? I have a ton of pent up demand but it would be somewhat pointless to go back to my previous spending habits. It sort of defeats the purpose of what I have worked so hard on this year.

Hence my dilemma, which is not a good one for a video game addict. At least I still have Halo 2.

PS : Next year, I am swearing off all electronic entertainment for Lent. What can I say? I'm a glutton for punishment.