a fool and his money are soon...

...PARTED! I am by nature an easy-going person. I like to do things in my own time, unhurried and maybe dilly-dally when I can. However, when it comes to buying stuff, i am always in a hurry. I don't really know why. Yesterday i went out on another matter and along the way i saw this new baby shop opened along the coastal highway that a salesgirl from another shop had recommended to me in glowing terms. Once inside i was disappointed for i had been led to believe that this shop would have most products anyone would need for babies. This one was in fact poorly-lit and looked like a small shop. Behind the counter was a pleasant Malay lady and her 2 -year old daughter. I asked for breast milk storage bottles and she showed me what her shop stocked. I looked at her product and immediately knew that this wasn't what my wife had in mind when she asked me to buy some breastmilk storage bottles. But against my best instincts and seeing as there was nary a customer in that shop, seeing that lady and her little girl and that little shop, i was moved to buy something from her to support her little business. And so i bought the product and sure enough later that night my wife having examined and opened the package told me that she couldn't use it. The storage cups were too wide/impractical and the mouth wouldn't fit in with the breast pump she was using. Incidents such as these have happened to me before and yet i never seem to learn. I'm a lousy shopper, I admit. Only i hardly shop for stuff other than books for myself and some clothes come the Chinese New Year. I do not have the eye for good products but i do know instinctively when something is a bad deal. And yet i go ahead and buy it for all the wrong reasons. This made me feel really stupid and small last night. My wife told me that money was hard to earn and i couldn't agree more with her. It wasn't a lot of money, but it was a bad deal. Is it because spending money makes one feel good? Shopping for relief? I thought that only happened to women. I'm like a deer surrounded by lions whenever i go out in search of something to buy. Very bad decisions. I need the gift of discernment in this. It is a real puzzle to me why i do some things the way i do them. Human beings can be irrational but surely we learn from our mistakes? What the heck is the matter with me??