Cows on Venus

Garage sales are great!!! There's nothing quite better (perhaps a slight exaggeration) than finding that perfect thing that you need at a great price. Used, new, some strange combination of the two, garage sales provide ample opportunity to find that perfect thing you've always needed, though you likely just realized its true importance in the master plan of your life. I love getting a great deal. Just yesterday, I saw a small Texas Instrument calculator for $25. No, that's not the great deal . . . it reminded me of a couple of weeks ago when I did find a great deal. It was another TI calculator. Not some dinky, mostly useless one, this was a TI-85 Plus graphing calculator. This baby retails for about $95 dollars! They were asking $1!!!!! But I, a seasoned veteran of the garage sale, was not satisfied with that. I got the calculator, along with $2 dollars worth of things my wife also wanted (dare I say needed), for $2 total. That's right, I got the calculator for free!!!

Which brings me to my main point. People quite often have their priorities quite mixed up! You see, at the same garage sale, there was this neat, little rocket launcher toy that, when controlled by your computer, would turn and fire a rocket. It was probably a $20-$30 toy for which they were asking $5. Strangely, it was not something I needed, like most garage sale finds, but instead, something I only wanted. So I came back at the end of the day and made them an offer I knew they could refuse - $1. Not surprisingly, they said no.

But then I was surprised. Back in the car, my wife pointed out, "Well, you can see where his priorities are." This young man was willing to basically give me a $100 dollar calculator, but he was unwilling to part with his toy at a low price. I guess the main point is that we often miss the true value in things, while assigning too much value to others simply because the entertain us. It makes me wonder how many things (and I know there are many, many, many) I have overvalued in my life. More telling, how many things have I undervalued in lieu them. That's probably something I should work on!

And that's why there will never be cows on Venus.