h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

You can buy cheap stuff or you can buy good stuff cheap. There's a world of difference between the two.

There's a chain of stores here that uses the slogan "Good stuff, cheap!" Ollie's gets most of their merchandise from rejected shipments - maybe the tractor trailer was in an accident and some of the boxes were damaged, or maybe there was a leaky roof in the warehouse and some of the boxes got wet, so they had to wholesale it cheap and take a loss on it. Of course, no mall store would consider buying the stuff in damaged boxes, even though most of it was still perfectly ok, so Ollies buys it for their stores.

I wonder if there's a similar kind of store in Austin... I can't bring one to mind.

I put down that previous post because it's something I've been trying to get across to Mrs Gosho for ages. She likes to buy cheap stuff and replace it when it falls to bits or stops working, but I like to buy the best I can afford and look after it, making it last. Sometimes I like to buy something that's a little more expensive that I can afford

Our toaster is a $20 piece of from some discount store which worked properly for a couple of months, but now always burns the damn toast because bits of the mechamism went wrong not long after it was bought. Mrs Gosho would probably go out and buy another one like it, have it go wrong after a while, put up with it for a while longer, then go out and buy another one like it... and so on.

I'd like to get a better, more expensive one, a good quality one which might cost $40 or $50 and would work right and last longer, but she can't understand the expense. Actually, I'd really like to get a Dualit toaster
http://www.dualit.com/index2.htm
http://www.dualit.com/content.asp?page=/catalogue/productRange.asp?categoryCode=15
To get one here in America would cost upwards of $100, but it would last a lifetime if looked after.

I gave up on toasters long ago... they either burn the bread beyond all recognition, or leave it so pale you think you're just eating stale bread.

We have a toaster oven - one that dings when the toast is done. It makes marginal toast, but we've already had it a few years, and it's predecessor lasted about 10-15 years.

One site I've found helpful is epinions.com. I generally only read the negative reviews, because I want to know what goes wrong with something after they've had it a while, not the glowing reports most people give to an item they've just bought. (Yes, there are far too many people who will post their opinion of an item within days after purchase - but what's it gonna be like 6 months down the road?)

Anyhow, when we needed to buy a toaster for Lord Scott's mother one time, I studied their reviews. It was no surprise, but the cheapest toasters didn't toast properly and didn't hold up for very long. What was the surprise was that some of the relatively expensive ones didn't rate very highly either. I don't think the toaster you pointed out was on their list.

I'm not surprised - it would be like expecting to find a Rolls-Royce listed in a survey of family cars.

You know what though? There's something much more deep in this discussion - it's about not denying yourself good quality things just because you think you can't afford them or don't deserve them. It's about not thinking you should only have cheap, shoddy goods just because you're relatively poor and in what is generally regarded as the lower end of society. You don't have to do that, you deserve all the dignity that wealthier people have.

"Good stuff cheap" is also the motto of a Boston-area chain of stores called Building 19. They buy the same kind of stuff as Ollie's.

There is a limit to what you can actually *afford* to buy though. I don't mean overall, but individual items, like a decent toaster, or shoes that actually don't hurt your feet.

Those of us on the lower end of the earning scale may not be able to afford a lot of worldly goods, but of the items we *do* buy, we shouldn't have to settle for junk that ends up costing us more in the long run. (because we have to replace them so often)

I've gotten good service from my toaster ovens. I'm making apricot nut bread in mine at the moment.

Mine isn't big enough for that sort of thing. It's just big enough for 2 slices of toast.... Well, maybe 4 slices of a commercially produced bread. But they'd have to be jammed so close together that they wouldn't toast very well.

I'd like to get a toaster oven - I haven't had cheese on toast since I got here and the broiler thing in the oven is... well, the words sledghammer and nut come to mind

I have loaf pans that are exactly the right size for toaster ovens.

I bought a toaster the other day for about £20. I was down at CostCo today and saw another toaster on sale for £120. For a toaster??? What a con. I hope it does the bread a perfect uniform golden colour each side, 100% of the time. Of course, it was the name - an expensive brand - which the customer was paying for. Anyone who pays that amount for a toaster needs their head examining.

How come you never see Jodie Foster and Brad Dourif in the same room? Watch 'Silence of The Lambs', particularly the scene where Clarisse is walking into the room with the open coffin - she walks in through double doors and there's a close-up full face shot of her. Tell me that ain't Brad Dourif in a wig and makeup!

Okay, Gosho, I'll be glad to oblige.

that ain't Brad Dourif in a wig and makeup!

I'm glad you appreciated that.

i would make a comment about a toaster, but that would imply that i've been reading backlog, and i would never insult gosho like that

brad dourif?

Brad Dourif.

I've seen him in 5 movies, including two of the "Lord of the Rings"
episodes. The others were "Blue velvet," "Dune," and "Ragtime."