One is none, and two is one

[vaskidmark]

It's only Wednesday and two items that I use every day (absolute necessities) have decided to go toes up.  Both after years of faithful service.

Thanks to the magic of the internet and UPS it is possible to get each of them replaced within 48 hours.  Order it tonight just after the business closes and they pull the order and put it in the next-day air que tomorrow, meaning I should get it Friday.

Yes, next day air is expensive (almost equal to the price of one of the items) but the truth is without it my life becomes 7742.96% more difficult*.

So instead of ordering "a" replacement I have ordered two - one to use and one to scare the first one into not breaking because it will know it can be replaced.**

Anybody else use this method?

stay safe.

* - a statistic I just pulled out of thin air that I can prove with one calculator tied behind my back.

** - the law of machines: they will crap out on you, jam, or break in direct proportion to how much you need them to function right now.

[Hutch]

My strategy is "a pair and a spare" on critical items.  Just got the one wife tho'. She's highly critical.

[Firethorn]

She's highly critical.

You mean that she's highly likely to go super-critical if you get another one too close?

Yeah, that would be bad.   

[Ben]

I do that with shoes now, because for whatever reason as I've gotten older my feet have become more particular abut what they can be shoved into without causing me some pain.

So when I find a pair of shoes / boots that are comfortable for a full day's wear, I buy a second pair to store, because my bad luck is that whenever I find something I really like that requires replacement at some point, they always stop making that thing immediately after i buy it.

[brimic]

Just buy quality:buy once, cry once.

A really obsessed person could take 2=1 and extrapolate it to mean:
If 2=1 and then 4=2=1.....512=256=128=64=32=16=8=4=2=1....

Buy quality and a few spare parts if it makes you feel better. If you wear it out, by that time, you will be able to buy a much more advanced model for cheaper.

[Perd Hapley]

Just buy quality:buy once, cry once.

A really obsessed person could take 2=1 and extrapolate it to mean:
If 2=1 and then 4=2=1.....512=256=128=64=32=16=8=4=2=1....

Buy quality and a few spare parts if it makes you feel better. If you wear it out, by that time, you will be able to buy a much more advanced model for cheaper.

Except for the whole defensive firearm issue. High quality will not keep it from being held as evidence.

I like the 2 is 1, 1 is none idea, except that I can't afford it.

[T.O.M.]

Depends entirely on the item.  Some things I have to buy in multiples, because I have two teenage sons who are Scouts.  So flashlights are almost disposable items around here, so I tend to find decent quality cheap lights (or better ones on sale) and buy several knowing that the boys will lose/break one within a month or two.  On the other hand, items like knives, I have so many interchangeable knives that if I find a new "toy,"  I'll buy it and put the other in the tool box where i can get at it if/when I lose the new one (or more likely one of my sons borrow it from me.)

[wmenorr67]

Then there is just sometimes buying in bulk on something you lose/misplace or break often can net you a decent price per than if you bought one at a time.

[griz]

If something is truly indispensable, such as a medicine, ammo, glasses, etc, I like to have extras so I will not be without until a replacement arrives.  If it's just something that's my current favorite, such as a knife, flashlight, or pair of boots, I depend on similar items I have instead of an exact replacement.  So I usually count on redundancy of function instead of two of everything.

[vaskidmark]

If something is truly indispensable, such as a medicine, ammo, glasses, etc, I like to have extras so I will not be without until a replacement arrives.  If it's just something that's my current favorite, such as a knife, flashlight, or pair of boots, I depend on similar items I have instead of an exact replacement.  So I usually count on redundancy of function instead of two of everything.

Thank you ,from the very bottom of the hole where if I had a heart it would be resting, for including ammo as truly indispensable.   And if I had a heart the lone cockle there would be warm, too.

stay safe.

[griz]

Sometimes I forget that other people don't consider ammo so important.  In the 90s when 22 LR was cheap and available everywhere, I was shocked to find out that people didn't worry about running out of it.  I would no more run out of 22 ammo than a cook would run out of salt and pepper.

[230RN]

...a statistic I just pulled out of thin air that I can prove with one calculator tied behind my back.

I call them PFA numbers.... "Plucked From The Air."  I used to do that when teaching an informal course involving numbers, but of course I had all the results figured out in advance.  (I learned to do that the first time I taught that class and used an actual PFA number... what a mess I got tangled up in!  Mucho embarrassingmo.)

So instead of ordering "a" replacement I have ordered two - one to use and one to scare the first one into not breaking because it will know it can be replaced.**

I frequently do that if I can afford it.  I hate it when something craps out at 3 AM.  I recently bought three cheap mouses (~$8 each) and I'm always two ink cartridges ahead for my inkjet printer --especially black.

And I keep an extra .22LR cartridge around just in case the other one doesn't work.

Terry

[Strings]

I started doing this with nuts & bolts on my Sporty

If something rattled off, I bought spares. Which reminds me, I still need to make a few spare sex bolts

[Hawkmoon]

Buy quality and a few spare parts if it makes you feel better. If you wear it out, by that time, you will be able to buy a much more advanced model for cheaper.

But the more advanced, cheaper model will invariably be a piece of crap.

I'm going through that now, looking for a couple of plug-in timers for lamps. The old Intermatic timers, with the little plastic doodads that you lifted up or pushed down to set the time(s), worked just fine. Now, all I can find is electronic, solid state timers that cost a small fortune and probably won't last six months. The same applies to a lot of things.

I'm in the "always buy a spare" camp. Every time I haven't done so, I've regretted it.

[Firethorn]

Now, all I can find is electronic, solid state timers that cost a small fortune and probably won't last six months. The same applies to a lot of things.

I recently installed an electric timer for my heating system.  Of course, it's US made, the expected lifetime is roughly "forever"

I'm in the "always buy a spare" camp. Every time I haven't done so, I've regretted it.

When it comes to tools, I like the idea of buying a cheap new one - either it works, and I'm happy at saving money -or it breaks(and it generally works at least a few times), by the time it breaks, and especially how it breaks, allows me to know more about what I'm looking for, in order to make an informed purchasing decision next time.

[vaskidmark]

I started doing this with nuts & bolts on my Sporty

If something rattled off, I bought spares. Which reminds me, I still need to make a few spare sex bolts

Is this something I should already know about?

stay safe.

[griz]

Is this something I should already know about?

Not as titillating as it sounds, they are just a way of disguising the ugly nut part of a threaded fastener.

[Triphammer]

You're talking motorcycles & showing us bathroom stall hardware?? What r you tryin' t pull?

[Scout26]

Robert made his Scoutmaster do a double-take once when he used that phrase as they were discussing what they needed for a campout.  Made me proud as a Dad.