The Best Things I’ve Spent Money on This Year
In 2018, I plan to accumulate my emergency fund and set aside my vacation money separately – in fact, this is the exact opposite of what I did this year. I spent a lot of money in 2017, some are worth every penny, others are less.
Here are the best things I’ve spent money on this year:
- Cast iron skillet and Dutch oven – only $ 38 and now I have mastered frittats, shakshuka and bolognese.
- 10-foot lightning rod – $ 15 per set of four lightning cables of different lengths, including a 10-foot, which I highly recommend.
- Tattoos – $ 200 for two tattoos – one of my grandfather’s initials, the other – the symbol of infinity (or lemniscate, as the tattoo artist told me) – which I love and have thought about for more than five years.
- Trip to Maine – $ 200 for a trip to Maine with some friends which, despite being jammed in the back seat of a car with two other people for eight hours and suffering from a migraine-inducing toothache, I would take again in an instant eye.
This is not the best thing I have spent my money on this year:
- Makeup Organizer – $ 10 for a makeup / skin care organizer from Amazon that doesn’t have the right sized compartments for my storage needs. This is what I got when I decided to go in for cosmetics this year.
- Books. Some of the books I bought were very good, some were not. Another downside to Amazon Prime is that it’s so easy to buy a bunch of books for $ 1 and think it’s not that much of a drain on my savings account. I need more to the library. Some of them I recommend: Water Chronology by Lydia Yuknavich, Bluets by Maggie Nelson, Her Body and Other Parties by Carmen Maria Machado, and Too Much, Not Mood by Durga Chu-Bose. Some of them I just could not understand: ” What Alice Forgot ” by Leanna Moriarty , “Girl is a Half-Shaped Thing ” by Aimer McBride, ” Endless Joke ” by David Foster Wallace.
- White sheets – $ 30 for white sheets like I live in a hotel or something. I use them, but I am always nervous that they get dirty. About a week later, I ordered the same dark gray set that I use more often.
- Dinner. I spent so much money on lunches at work because I am lazy. So so much money.
And much more that I am omitting because I don’t want you to judge me any more than you already do.
My main takeaway is that experiences, or things that helped the experience, such as a cast iron skillet, were actually more dear to me than the random material items I thought I needed, which is consistent with almost every study on this topic .
This is a good reminder of the new year.
How about you – what purchases did you make this year that were most – and least – worth the money?