How to spend money!

Most people might not need any help with how to spend money.  We can all manage it quite easily unless we're ruthless and miserly savers! When you're in a new country and all your stuff is on a boat in the middle of an ocean somewhere, it becomes even more difficult to resist buying things to make you home comfortable... even when you know you've already got those things!  So, I have been spending quite a bit, but I've tried to limit it to those things I really need, those things I actually don't have (not even on the boat!) or those complete luxuries which I don't need, don't have coming over on the boat, but really, really want!

An example of the first category was saucepans.  I have a beautiful set of stainless steel saucepans on their way over here, but I also have a ferocious gas hob in my apartment whose flames are all bigger than the camping pans I'm trying to cook with.  This has made every meal time like running the gauntlet, trying not to get burned!  So, for $12 I got a set of 2 saucepans & a frying pan from K Mart and no longer need to worry about how close the local emergency department is!

Most of my other purchases have fitted a bit more into the luxury category - the tv, the stereo and more recently, the piano!  Now that really is a complete luxury, but given that I sold my piano 10 years ago when I came out her on my working holiday and haven't owned one since, it doesn't feel like it.  I knew it was meant to be when I got this apartment with a piano shop - Hutchings Pianos - located at the end of the road, a 1 min walk away!  It was on my day off that I wandered in to have a look around.  There was a lovely girl in the shop who showed me round their myriad of rooms, demonstrating a variety of different pianos as we went.  She played beautifully and really showed off all of them well.  It's an amazing shop that just looks from outside like the front rooms of a couple of houses knocked together, but when you go in they've got 3 floors across 2 houses filled with 7 rooms of pianos... beautiful $90k grands to $2k second hand uprights and $600 digital pianos.

After I'd been shown around, she left me alone to go round and try out anything I wanted.  By this time there were other people in the shop too, so I had to dredge some pieces from the depths of my memory to be able to not only try out the pianos but also sound halfway decent too!!  I started with the digital ones as I'm a bit concerned that living in an apartment, I could have neighbours complaining about the noise.  At least with digital, if they complain I can plug my headphones in... although I really don't want to be playing with headphones all the time.  I was surprised that the starting price for a keyboard (a proper one with weighted keys and a sustain pedal) was as low as $600.  At $1,600 though, you get a real digital piano, fully housed and with a full set of pedals built in... just like a 'proper' piano.  There is a real difference in the tone and warmth of the sound between models and brands, so you really do need to try out a lot of them.  After trying the digitals, I moved on to the second hand uprights and found a really lovely one with a beautiful feel and tone, so it became a toss-up between the $2k Yamaha digital and the $2k second hand upright.  If there were no other considerations, the real piano would have won - there is no doubt it creates a better acoustic and feels more responsive in the sense that you can change the volume and tone by how you play the notes.  However, the digital is so amazingly realistic and if you take care to pick the right one, has a beautiful tone and feel that it really isn't a second best option if noise is any kind of consideration for you.  I also loved the black ebony finish which will mean I also have a beautiful piece of furniture that really goes in my apartment too!

While the girl went to check on stock and what kind of deal they could offer me, I started on testing out the grands!  These started at $90k and there were some real beauties, but they definitely require a bit more finesse than I currently possess to be able to get the best out of them.  Maybe something to aspire to for the future... one day when I can afford the abode with a beautiful wall of glass overlooking the harbour and the concert grand in prime position!  Maybe a long way off, but never give up on your dreams!