splooge

I've kinda splooged money away this last week.

To be fair, it's not entirely my fault as such. And they are things I need or have to get. Plus I have managed to hold back on going totally nuts with spending.

What am I on about?

Well, basically this year my Dad turns 65. So this is something of a special birthday anyway and on top of that we, the family, have got a special trip planned (more on that at a later date). So as part of that it seemed an opportune time to get him a particular gift that's special to the event and his birthday.

Me and my sister are going halves on it, but I've actually bought the items in question, so that was big pay out number one. Actually technically, it's not finished as we need to get some supporting bits, but I think I'm going to shop around in the "real world" as I think I need to actually see them up close to some extent.

Now really my Dad's birthday isn't until October and we've also decided to use the money we would normally spend at Christmas as well. However, because of when the trip is, we needed to get the stuff early and I'd noticed some good deals (credit crunch seems to be having some benefits :/) so I took the plunge this week.

The other big spend was one I had to make. Well, actually, I didn't have to get what I did - I could have spent a lot less - but it seemed daft taking a step down from my current model if I was getting a new one.

Not sure why I was being so cryptic there - unlike the present I'm perfectly free to tell you I got a new monitor for my computer. What I got was a 24 inch widescreen LCD monitor.

It's really rather spiffing, although I had a Dickens of a time getting the base on. I ended up having to grease the attachment bit so it would slip on, but before that I think I pulled a muscle in my arm I was pushing to hard to get it on :(.

The monitor is really bright and clear - almost painfully so in a dark room with it up high. I had to turn it down quite a bit to make it comfortable. Also, the big thing I was worried about with it was colour reproduction.

There seems to be something of an issue with LCD/flat panel type monitors in that the colour reproduction varies wildly. On some monitors what can appear to be a dark red just becomes black on another. However, in my experience, colour on Samsung monitors is really good, so I got one of those and I tried it out and I can't tell any difference in colour with my old monitor.

Yes, my old monitor does still technically work, but here's the thing - it's started making a really loud "squeaking" noise. It's like a really high pitched buzzing - I'm sure you've heard electrical equipment make such noises. The problem of course is it becomes staggeringly annoying when you're sat working at you pc for hours and it's squeaking like that. Especially since it's not constant - it goes up and down in volume and pitch.

So that's why I got the new monitor. I got a really big widescreen one because they're dirt cheap. This one literally only cost a smidge over £200 - for a 24 inch widescreen monitor! It's 1920 & 1200 res - that's huge, and for only two-hundred quid! Marvellous.

My real problem, though is I still have lots more expenses coming up.

Firstly, it's my sister's 30th this year (I know - my Dad's 65th and my sister's 30th all in one year. How poor timing is that?) and so I'll need to spend a good couple of hundred on that.

Plus the other problem is this trip - I need to get loads of stuff for that. I never really go on proper holidays, so I don't even have a suitcase, for example. Plus I want (or need, since these ones are scratched) some new glasses for then and they're not cheap. Well, the frames are okay, it's lenses that are expensive as I have a high prescription and have to get the special glass to make them thin or it looks like I'm wearing double glazing.

And on top of that in March car stuff will be due - car tax, insurance and service. Service won't be so bad as the deal I had was to get that for free for 3 years, but I'm pretty sure my car will need a new set of tyres and those certainly won't be free.

But also, like some sort of idiot-that-doesn't-actually-have-the-money-but-is-going-to-spend-it-anyway I've a hankering to buy the latest versions of Photoshop and painter, as well as upgrade to Vista.