How many purchases are still in the box?

[Anonymous]

I can count four purchases that never made it out of the box. We really wanted them, but somehow lost interest or forgot about them.

Then there are all those unread books …… 🙄 it’s really hard for me to walk or drive past a bookstore without going in. I’ve been pretty good for the past 6 months but it’s a real distraction and addiction for me.

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[nellie]

Oh wow – that happens to me a lot. Usually impulse purchases for DIY projects that never get done.

And books – well can’t even go there! We did some renovations about 3 years ago and I had to empty out my library – 35 boxes just my own not counting the kids books – must have been another dozen or so boxes there, can’t remember. Anyway, in an attempt to force myself to get rid of some I purposely did not return one of the book cases ( wide with 5 shelves) to the room and replaced it with another piece of furniture so I wouldn’t be tempted. I had intended to get rid of what didn’t fit however it proved to be overwhelming and they are still in the boxes in the basement. I’ve been trying to force myself to get rid of them over the last several weeks and currently have quite a few boxes on the stairs to bring away. I have been buying less though over the last 6 months – although I did “discover” kindle on my ipad recently, which is great for the space issue but very tempting and makes it far too easy to spend money.

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[Anonymous]

Yes, true, they are usually impulse purchases but sometimes they are purchases for things we think we’ll do but never get around to, so there is a fair amount of thought involved before buying. There are indeed a lot of DIY projects with purchased supplies but they never seem to get off the ground. I started a list about 6 years ago and the list items are still there

We moved here with half a ton of books (went from a 2 br apt to a house) and kept buying ….. I really love books and can’t imagine buying an e-book reader!

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[Patte Rosebank]

I recently saw a play, in which a character says that the only way to stop wanting all that extra stuff is to buy it, because as soon as you possess it, you no longer want it. Unfortunately, he notes, this method is so expensive that very few people can afford to do it.

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[Anonymous]

LOL, that’s true!

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[nellie]

no_dopamine,

ok here’s one, the piano. Now it made it out of the box but no one has played it in years. My daughter when she was little wanted to play ( I took lessons as a kid but never really developed any talent) so I said ok if she took lessons for a year I’d buy one. Obviously she couldn’t practice in between lessons but I found a teacher who agreed to it. Anyway I figured she quit after a month or so but for some reason she stuck with it. So after a year ( too my extreme surprise) she was still interested and I bought the piano. Kid you not 2 weeks later she lost total interest in taking lessons! Tried different teachers but to no avail. Now the kid is very musical so it’s quite annoying. Afterwards my to other daughter and I took lessons but didn’t stick with it. SInce I had to move it to the basement to make room upstairs no one has touched it at least 3 years and I’m sure it and the treadmill have a pity party every week

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[Anonymous]

Keep it and let your grandchildren play on it! (the piano, not the treadmill). My mom had a great photo of my niece and nephew playing a duet (banging away, not music!) when they were small, and then she retook it when they were in their late teens. She also bought a portable digital keyboard (with lots of different sounds) and they liked to bang away on that too. The piano is gone now, it was a baby grand that belonged to my grandmother, and fortunately it sold to the son of someone whom I knew from the youth orchestra days. I have the digital keyboard, part of my musical arsenal

I’m the only one who inherited the musical genes in my family and I wanted to play everything when I was a kid. I eventually learned to play the piano, violin (my main instrument), clarinet, trumpet, trombone, viola, cello, double bass. Wherever there was a need for someone to fill in on an instrument in an ensemble, I learned it.

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[shutterbug55]

All the boxes are opened, because I can’t remember what I bought. Many of the boxes were returned, because I can’t remember WHY I bought the stuff. The rest of the stuff sits on the shelf unused, because I have moved on to the next thing. LOL I love ADD!!!

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[Anonymous]

We usually lose the receipt so we can’t return stuff. But it typically sits for at least 2 years before we go “why did we buy that?”. I am getting better at asking that question a lot harder before I leave the store “do I really need it? what’s driving me to buy this?”

My husband’s response to whether or not he’s read all of the books in his bookshelf is: “some of them twice” 😉

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[nellie]

Oh yeah forgot about the lost receipt thing Done that a lot too! Actually quite often i’ll put the bag on the front door handle too make sure I don’t forget to take it back to the store. But eventually it just blends into the surroundings and somehow gets assimilated back into the house when I have to do a real clean up for company coming over

no_dopamine, lucky you for being so musical! My younger daughter actually will probably inherit it – she actually has the patience to play it and is currently learning violin. I’m sure she’ll re-enter a piano phase at some point. Although not ADD she has those traits of jumping from one interest to another!

Loving ADD Shutterbug? Yeah, I guess in a way it always keeps me laughing at some of the stuff I do I like to think I see the humour in it all but wonder if the people around me see it that way ?

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[Anonymous]

LOL, Nellie, you described our house to a “T” when you said “it blends into the surroundings”. We use post-it notes a lot to remind us, and I usually put one on the bathroom window and on the front door if it’s something really important. I used to put a tuna can (when we weren’t vegetarians) on the toilet seat for my husband because he would make the lunch sandwiches the night before and that’s the only way I knew he wouldn’t forget ! 😆

But just today, we went out to post some items for my business and I found out we’ve got a possible postal strike coming. So we rushed off to FedEx (not on our plan for the day) to get waybills, etc. Then we continued on doing other errands but I totally forgot to check my list and ended up forgetting to pick up something that I had on hold. Now I’ll have to wait until Tuesday for it 😥 I do make lists so I won’t forget to do things, but I forget to check the list. It happens a lot to me.

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[nellie]

Ha Ha on the tuna can! I used to put notes on the front door to remind my husband to take out the trash to the curb in the morning before work on the day of weekly garbage pick-ups. But I figured he’d consider it nagging and so would write “Happy Garbage Day” instead. Didn’t work very well – I think he thought I was trying to be funny or nice and just went to work and left the trash in the garage! Eventually decided it was better to do it myself so have been doing it for years. Not sure why, but I rarely forget anymore. I swear the brain is a weird thing!

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[Anonymous]

Woohoo! We just took our new gas weedwhacker out of the box and actually used it! (we bought it about 4 weeks ago). It required the purchase of a gas can and some gas – I know, we should use electric, but we’ve had electric ones for years and they just don’t keep enough juice to do the job for very long, so it takes forever. I usually resort to hands and knees and pruning shears.

Anyway, it’s a fun task, so I can see my husband and I fighting over its use.

One out of the box, 3 or 4 more to go, but it’s a start!

Happy Garbage Day! I like that! I take the garbage out because I am the only one who remembers. I get most of it out the night before (all the recycling boxes, except the garbage bags because of animals) because I don’t do well running to the curb in my jammies when I do hear the garbage trucks rolling down the street. Sometimes I get it out late afternoon the night before because if I go in the house and stay, I will forget about it. Somehow I can remember that Wednesday is the day to put it out, but I can’t remember that Thursday morning is actually garbage day! Sheesh!

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[Anonymous]

You guys are singing my song. I am the online hunter. Once I get something stuck in by little ADHD brain that I “need” something(BTY no one “needs” a special plaque removing toothbrush), I will not rest until I find that particular item – at the best price. It’s the “at the best price” part that will send my hyper focus into overdrive. Then, the holy grail will finally arrive and I will think, what in the world am I going to do with that? So, I dutifully pack it all back into the box and drive it around in my car for several weeks thinking I will drop the return package off at the post office. I drive by many post offices in the course of a day – yet I do not stop at them. The return period expires………………………………………

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[shutterbug55]

That is why I do a lot of shopping on line. No recipts, if I don’t want them, and EVERYTHING can be returned. I don’t return a lot, but if I do, I get the MDA and schedule a UPS truck. I don;t even have to the driver. I just put the package out at the door.

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[Author]

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