So recently I’ve been spanking large sums of money with these lovely people (actually, who am I kidding, I’ve been spanking large sums of cash with them for some time now given half my camera kit was bought from their website) since they are one of the better camera shops about and I need lots of things for my course and photography business. On Saturday I needed to get a background so, on my way home from my course, I swung by the showroom. It was heaving. Turned out there was a 1 year anniversary for the new, bigger showroom so there were loads of special offer on, lots of reps from different companies, various events and a prize draw. I vaguely recalled hearing something about it but had not realised it was then. Anyway, I waited my turn to speak to a sales bod while they dealt with the masses and looked at the shiny things on display. 30 minutes later and I walked out with my stuff, they put my name in the prize draw box (free entry if you bought something) and I headed home.
Today I received a call from them. At first I thought maybe I’d left something there, or maybe I’d been charged for the wrong item, but no, turns out they want to give me a rather nice A3 printer as a prize (the most expensive prize in the draw no less) which I think is rather sporting of them. I don’t think I’ve won anything like that before 
Steve1 will, in the next hour, get up on stage and finally release whatever it is that Apple are releasing today. Being a rabid Mac fanboi I’m interested to know what’s being released and no doubt I will absolutely have to have one as soon as I know whatever it is (it happened with the iPhone, the cube, the 30″ monitors to name but a few). The problem is I can’t afford one. This is new to me2 and no doubt the fact that I can’t have one will mean I want it even more.
Tempted as I am to delve into my savings to get one I need that money for other things (food for one thing :S) so instead there is a plan, not a great plan mind, but a plan none the less. A small (depressingly small) sum of money will put placed on what can only be described as a punt on the markets tomorrow. Should that punt pay off then all the winnings will be placed on another punt and so on and so forth until either one of the punts fail (highly likely) and I’m left with nothing or I have the money to get the new shiny toy. In theory I could turn £10 into over £700 in 4 trades. In practice £10 will probably turn into £0 in one or two, but hey well, nothing ventured nothing gained, and perhaps the gods of technology will smile on me and grant me the money for the iMustHave before it’s released.
1Because those of us indoctrinated into the cult of Jobs are on first name terms with him
2OK, I had to wait for my big current computer but that’s because it was stupidly expensive and just going out and buying it when I first decided I wanted one would have left me paying off my credit cards for 5 years at a stupid rate of interest. That’s not to say I was doing without as I had less silly macs to play with in the interim.
So today I went hunting for the most mythical of beasts: The cheapest advance fare National Express East Anglia ticket. For those not familiar with this operator (although I suspect all UK train operators are the same), when you log onto the website to buy advance fare tickets it helpfully tells you that you can get the tickets from ‘as low as £6′. This is a special online only price which is never available. Whenever I’ve booked tickets the cheapest has often been £9, but sometimes they’re even more depending what time you want to travel*.
Today, however, I managed to get that very beast. The cheapest of the cheap tickets, and all I had to do was book a ticket 3 months in advance on an off peak service. No doubt I got the only two tickets for that price so everyone else will have to pay the higher price (with the price getting higher and higher the closer you get to the day).
*there is the lunacy of the Monday morning Cromer to Colchester advance fare ticket which is more expensive than a first class ticket bought on the day, and more restrictive since you can only use it on the train you’ve booked it on