I may be just a little bit crazy...

My dad, when he decides that he is going to purchase something new, will be one minute talking about maybe going to check it out and the next minute bringing it home. The last major example of this I can recall is the time he told me he was going over to the Jeep dealer to look at the new diesel Liberty. I called my mom at work just to warn her that there was a 99.9% chance that my dad had left the house in one vehicle and would come home in another. I was almost exactly right...he didn't drive the new Jeep off the lot, but the grin on his face when he got home let me know he had signed the papers. And a few days later, Tweety (our name for his Liberty...my mom also has a Liberty, but it's not diesel and it's name is Nellie Belle) came home.

I have inherited this trait from my dad. When I decide finally to make a big purchase, I usually head right out and do it. Of course, my big purchases are not $20K+ cars. Mine are things like Rainbow flip flops and an iPod Nano. My latest was a $325 Dooney & Bourke purse (although, to be fair, I went to Macy's with a Coach bag in mind and did not like their selection). I got a bonus check from the hospital in my mailbox, I decided to spend it on a new purse, and I brought said purse home the next day. I am a fan of instant gratification...I always have been. I want what I want, and I want it now.*

Therefore, it is very painful for me to have decided on what camera I want to get and to have to wait for it. I spent hours yesterday reading reviews, both technical and personal, of my two front-runners. I joined a Flickr group dedicated to the Canon Rebel XT and looked at several hundred pictures taken by both amateurs and semi-professionals with the camera. I took a look at some different replacement lenses to consider buying once I learn the new camera and figure out what I am doing. I looked at a couple of hundred pictures taken with some of these replacement lenses, again with that same camera.

Now, I find myself with over a thousand dollars worth of camera equipment on my Amazon wish list, and I have to wait to get it all. And I hate it. I wish I could go tripping around in the woods near my house, with my new camera around my neck, experimenting to see what it can do. I also threw Photoshop Elements on the old wish list because I have been coveting that for a good long while now and figure it will be a good complement to this new camera. And I supplemented that with a book that shares all the stuff that Photoshop does not have in its user's manual (like, apparently, any useful information, from what I read). I still have to think about the type of camera bag I will get and whether or not take some sort of photography class. But I have a good jump start on preparing for a camera that won't be mine for another four months or so.

Of course, I also have on my wish list the sling that I plan to use when I eventually have a baby and a $900 smoker that I hope to get for Bill sometime in the next decade. I guess that's why it's a wish list...maybe I am not completely crazy after all?

*This might be one of the reasons that I am carrying such debt around with me. I have never been good at reining in those instant gratification yearnings, and I will be paying for that for many years to come.