The Dolphins Make Me Cry.com - Forums

Reddit had a thread about this today, and I thought I'd ask it here.

What do you see people do that you think is a big waste of money?



For me, it's Fireworks.  I just can't bring myself to spend money on that.  They're relatively dangerous, they're expensive, and they're over quickly.  They're a mess to clean up. 

It's just the closest thing you can get to literally lighting your money on fire without actually doing it.



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To a lesser extent, bottled water.  It's wasteful.  It's money for something you can get for free.  Sometimes, in a pinch, I'll buy one just to get the bottle, but it's very rare.  My wife will pick up some once in a while for hurricanes (which end up not coming) and then I feel like I dingus when I drink it.

I am with you on the fireworks...waste of money, makes a ridiculous amount of noise...useless.

Gym membership, exercise can easily be done for free.

Any sort of virtual currency that has no value.  Reddit coins, bits for Twitch, microtransactions for mobile and video games.

Interesting.

The only thing that I buy that would fall under this is that occasionally, I will buy V-bucks (the Fortnite currency), which I then use to purchase in-game challenges and expansions and stuff.  I just consider that a cost to play, enjoy, and support a game.  You can't "do" anything with the money though, outside of that environment.

Have to agree with the fireworks, although I always cave to the kids. We don't spend much, though.

In-game purchases of any kind, especially on lootbox style crap (which should be classified as something like gambling, IMHO).

I agree with the majority here.  Fireworks and in game purchases on your phone.  Although the latter could be attributed to playing games at the video arcade back in the days.  

Another waste for me is K-Cups.  They're more expensive than traditional ground coffee and don't last long.  I have my own at home mesh K-cup contraptions that fit in the Keurig coffeemaker.  I fill them with coffee grounds and they will last for at least 3 cups of coffee if done back to back to back.  

The lottery. I have a brother in law that spends $100 a day on the lottery and he's slowly giving away millions of dollars of inheritence that his dad earned in the Oil industry.

I am not immune to this one, but drinking at bars....depending.

I understand that there is a premium to having a beer served to you vs. having a beer at home.

But certain things (like shots) and hard drinking...it's crazy.  A $15 cocktail chaps my ass.  I don't really fall into this anymore, except the very occasional fancy night out with my wife at a play or something.  ...or when I'm on vacation or a sporting event where I just say "fuck it" because I need the drink to enjoy the social aspect.

I'm past the point in my life where I'm going to for stuff like that, but when I used to go out with friends and have a $50 bar tab because I picked up a round...that sucked.

A lot of you guys seem to think entertainment is a waste of money.

$50 bar tab is light for me. I barely drink at home. That just seems sad to me unless I am around other people.

I'm with you on this one.  You pay $7 to $9 for a six pack at the grocery store as opposed to $4 to $6 for one single beer at a bar.  I used to like going to happy hour with friends after work when I was in my 20s but it doesn't have the appeal it once did.  I don't really drink that much to begin with although I do keep liquor stocked in my house in case a friend comes over. 

i'm not a fan of bar drinking .. but i do like going to breweries and getting the stuff they don't put into cans and sell in the supermarket

I rarely drink at bars.  But when I lived outside of NE I always found it less expensive to go to a sports bar than pay for NFL ticket and buy beer for home.

Hoodie, if you live in Massachusetts, maybe you can answer a question for me.   One of my co-workers is from Boston and tells me that happy hours in the state of Massachusetts are illegal.   So are drinks in bars expensive all the time or cheap all the time?  Or both depending on which bar you visit?

Yes that is true, Happy Hours are illegal in Mass. Prices for a particular drink must remain constant.  Some bars are more expensive than others.

 I don’t know if this is still the case but decades ago a bar near my college would buy only 2 kegs a week of their least expensive beer with delivery occurring around 6 pm on Thursday, and would sell out of that brand around 7:30 or 8 pm thus creating a defacto happy hour.  The city was trying to come up with a way to stop this legal workaround.

What was the thought process behind laws like that?

Seems like prohibition with more steps.

It's pretty easy to google.  Basically, a drunk driver killed some people in the 80s due to happy hour drinks at a bar earlier.  It's also why they raised the drinking age from 20 to 21.

That may have been a small piece but the federal government forced states into raising the age to 21 by threatening to withhold highway money.

Drinking age went from 18 to 21 in the ‘80s across the country to stop drunk driving.  While technically state law, the feds tied highway funds to raising the drinking age and all the states complied, ironically DC was one of the last places and that was done at the fed level.  The banning of happy hours was truely state law.

I don't see drinking at a bar any more wasteful than eating at a restaurant.  You can make a burger at home for about a buck, or you can go to Chili's and get one for $9.  Plus tax and tip.

People go to bars to drink for the social aspect.  Its to hang out with buddies and have fun.  Of course you could go to the bar and have a glass of water and drink your Bud Light Limes when you get home, but frankly that's not why you went to the bar.

Like Dan said above, entertainment has value.  Spending quality time with friends has value.  That's what you're paying for...

Fireworks are a complete waste of money and annoying to your neighbors.  Knock it off.  Let the pro's do the "big" fireworks at city parks and big 4th of July parties and leave the bottle rockets and roman candles alone.  People think that the louder the "boom" they can make in a sleepy neighborhood, the cooler they are.  In reality everyone around you hates you.

When I go to a restaurant I don’t typically order food I make at home. I order food that I don’t know how to cook or I am too lazy to make.  Paying someone to do the work required to prepare french onion soup is different than paying someone to pour me a beer or mix rum with coke. 

As I see it going to a restaurant rather than eating at home I am paying for someone to do the cooking and cleaning.  Going to a bar, rather than having friends over to drink I am paying to avoid needing to straighten up the house beforehand and vacuum and clean up afterwards. The difference in work vs cost analysis is quite different.

Right there with you on both of those paragraphs. 

I do not share this experience.  I can't make a burger for a buck.

In fact, a burger specifically, is one of the more expensive things to make because of all the ingredients and how much would go to waste, if you do it right, with tomato and onion and sides and all that.

Sure, it's more expensive in a restaurant...but what?  Twice as expensive?  And the burger at a restaurant like Chili's is probably going to be tastier than your stuff at home, just because of the kinds of spices and ingredients they have on hand.  They're costing you more, but they are also using economies of scale.

A beer, the literal same product, will be 5 times a much to be opened in front of you by someone else.

Your responses are all related to beer.  Sure I agree beer at bars is a waste of money.  But mixed cocktails (more than just rum and coke) are not really stuff you're gonna make at home.  Y'all get out the quarter-ounce jiggers and mix up your old fashioned with 2 dashes of bitters?  no one does that at home.

Besides the point isn't about what you buy at the bar, it was about the additional social aspect. 

i would make my own old fashioned at home .. it's hard to find a good one out in the wild