funny, never heard from him again

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[from the archives]

a corollary to the pomona theorem:  it can be wise to refrain from exercising one's scintillating wit until after one has closed the deal.

the parable of the dented fender

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remember back at the end of this post where i proclaimed my love for my new car?

yeah, well, we always hurt the ones we love (or maybe that's just me).

when i went in for the estimate, i pushed the guy to try and keep it at or below $1,000, that magic number being my deductible--that way, i figured, i could just pay for it outta pocket and avoid filing a claim with my insurance company.  when he balked, i told him i'd be perfectly happy with a used fender, and the bumper didn't look too bad--it just needed a little touching up.

for a minute, it looked as if it might be possible--until he opened the hood, that is.  as he poked around, finding more and more wrong, my heart sank--as the total inched inexorably toward the $1,500 mark, i realized i'd have to file a claim after all.

with that realization, my attitude did a complete one-eighty.  screw the used fender and the touched-up bumper--if the insurance company was picking up the tab, we were gonna fix this fucker better than new, goddammit.  as he continued to poke around, finding more and more wrong and the total inched inexorably past the $2,000 mark [because by now he knew the insurance company was involved], my satisfaction grew--suddenly, i was all, like, "hey, look at this" and "don't forget about this" and "i know it's on the other side of the car, but can you fix this, too?".

in other words, i displayed the kinda behavior humans can reliably be counted on to lapse into when, as the redoubtable mrs. thatcher so memorably put it, it's "other people's money".

what's the point of this little parable, you ask?

simple:  next time you wonder why (a) healthcare and college in this country are so expensive; (b) government spending and future entitlements are orders of magnitude higher than revenues; (c) the welfare classes are rioting in europe; and/or (d) [insert leftist- or corporatist-induced economic distortion of your choice here],

come back, read this post and multiply the above numbers by a few trillion.