Mental Arithmetic..a Wonderful Thing
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I just read a journal entry, which viewed life events in days as opposed to years.
It really interested me because, suddenly things jump out of those much larger 'days' numbers, which maybe hadn't been recognised in the much smaller 'years' numbers...
...for example - imagine the sense of achievement at being married for 3652 units of time (days), as opposed to 10 (years)...
It made me realise, though, that I do exactly the same thing with currency - though in my case, intentionally!
That is to say, I will manipulate the conversion rates, between dollars and pounds sterling to convince/dissuade myself about buying something...
...for example - That iPod costs $299
ME - "eek! - I don't have that much spare cash!"
ME - "ahh, but it's only 172 pounds, AN ABSOLUTE BARGAIN!"
(add to that, the fact it would cost 299 POUNDS to buy it in England, anyway and ....the credit card is being swiped before you can say 'six-pence').
Strangely enough, though, I can also convince myself of the opposite - but here I need to bring in the use of memory (real or loosely based on reality will do) - lol...
ME - "you would NEVER catch me paying 35 POUNDS for dvds (entire series or not!)"
The funny thing is - We've lived here for over 5 years now and are paid here, in dollars, so why DOES the pound even matter, in any purchases we make?
The answer, of course, is that it doesn't - AT ALL - except to change the scale of a number, on a price tag and to make the different (in this case, more convenient) perspective magically appear.
It really interested me because, suddenly things jump out of those much larger 'days' numbers, which maybe hadn't been recognised in the much smaller 'years' numbers...
...for example - imagine the sense of achievement at being married for 3652 units of time (days), as opposed to 10 (years)...
It made me realise, though, that I do exactly the same thing with currency - though in my case, intentionally!
That is to say, I will manipulate the conversion rates, between dollars and pounds sterling to convince/dissuade myself about buying something...
...for example - That iPod costs $299
ME - "eek! - I don't have that much spare cash!"
ME - "ahh, but it's only 172 pounds, AN ABSOLUTE BARGAIN!"
(add to that, the fact it would cost 299 POUNDS to buy it in England, anyway and ....the credit card is being swiped before you can say 'six-pence').
Strangely enough, though, I can also convince myself of the opposite - but here I need to bring in the use of memory (real or loosely based on reality will do) - lol...
ME - "you would NEVER catch me paying 35 POUNDS for dvds (entire series or not!)"
The funny thing is - We've lived here for over 5 years now and are paid here, in dollars, so why DOES the pound even matter, in any purchases we make?
The answer, of course, is that it doesn't - AT ALL - except to change the scale of a number, on a price tag and to make the different (in this case, more convenient) perspective magically appear.
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