Love, not Chocolate

We've just passed one of the major North American consumer frenzies, Fathers Day. It is packed away for another year and the stores are counting their winnings.

From the Fool's point of view, everything is geared towards efficient extraction of cash from the pockets of the working classes, I'll probably miss quite a few in the list but just for an example we have Christmas, Valentines Day, Mother's Day, Easter, Father's Day, Secretaries Day, Halloween and Thanksgiving, not to mention all the other religious events, birthdays and anniversaries.

It seems that as soon as one is over the store flyers are touting the next.

I can see why the advertising is aimed at the younger people as most of societies elders have shunned the idea of buying more crap to fill their cupboards, whereas the young thirst for novelty and gadgetry. I'm stuck in the middle as I still want the stuff, but am too cheap to shell out brass. If we weed out the days associated with chocolate giving, there are still quite a number of opportunities to justify a major purchase as a reward for the horrors of working life.

The good lady and myself have adopted a regime of visits to the Keg steakhouse on these occasions, replacing the unwanted stuff with Steak, Mushrooms and Wine and a good long chat. It's working very well for birthdays and anniversaries, but it didn't work so well for Valentines Day as we just ended up waiting three hours in the bar with a couple from Liverpool who just wanted new friends.

It sounds like the fool has a good handle on all of this, sounds like he's a master of his own domain and is successful in resisting the rampant consumerism, yeah, right. All I have to do is stand in the kitchen at a party and tell my friends I'm in control and one by one they all jump in and point out the holes in my plan, showing me just how much of a consumer I am and that I'm worse than any of them.

They could be right, but at least I'm trying to change......pass me that flyer!