The Christmas season always reminds me how much I dislike and avoid shopping when I can.  I especially avoid retail stores and do my best not to enter a mall. 1 2  If there’s something I’m interested in, I’ll typically window shop for ages. 3  This process, much like the process of me researching my MakerBot Cupcake, takes forever while I read basically everything published online4 , including the manuals, raves, complaints, any every little thing about it.

I’d say about 80% of the time I’ll window shop and then just decide I can live without whatever it is I was fawning over.  About 10% of the time I’ll try to build or make one of whatever it.  And, that last 10% of the time I’ll eventually pull the trigger.

1. I think I’ve entered a mall thrice this year – once for some appliance I can’t recall, once for a new pair of sneakers, and once to take my kid to see Santa. [↩]
2. Who the hell says “thrice”?! [↩]
3. I guess, technically, it’s Windows shopping since I’m doing this online. [↩]
4. Wait, people can publish offline?! [↩]