Sometimes You Just Gotta Set the Toilet on Fire (to learn a lesson)

by bigcajunman on July 31, 2012

When I was younger, I was a bit of a pyromaniac (OK, a lot of a pyromaniac), in that I really enjoyed burning things, and I indulged my love of burning things many times in my younger life.

Many a time, I would lock myself in the bathroom with a set of matches stolen from my Dad (who was a smoker), and I’d set things on fire. It started just with the matches, then I looked at the toilet paper roll and I thought, now that might burn nicely as well, and once or twice I indulged in this activity. Very satisfying and enjoyable (at least I thought at the time).

Then came the day, I used a little too much toilet paper, and a scene similar to this erupted:

That was a little too much toilet paper

Needless to say, I ran, my mother found the remnants of this foolish behavior (luckily, it ended up that only a toilet seat had to be replaced), and I got heck for that (and am on occasion reminded of that foolish behavior).

What does this have to do with Money? How many times did you do something foolish with money, knowing that you were being an idiot, but just kept going? Have you had the flash fire that finally breaks you of this bad habit, or do you keep doing this bad habit?

My toilet fire moment (financially) was buying High Tech Stocks, and hanging on to them for much too long.

Thanks to Snoop Lion for the fun reminder of my youth.

{ 4 comments }

{ 4 comments… add one }

Connie Solidad August 6, 2012 at 11:51 am edit
For me, it was impulse buying while shopping for groceries. I would shop while I was hungry, and end up spending twice my budget on items that weren’t on my list.

Once I started hanging onto my receipts and did the math on unnecessary purchases, I started being much more strict on my purchases, and cut my monthly food bills by 40%!

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Jennifer August 6, 2012 at 3:41 am edit
Wonderful article I must say. My biggest bad habit is to not being able enough to maintain a budget properly. Every month I make a budget right after receiving the salary in hand, but every time I end up crossing the given limit of monthly expense by shopping something or other for my family. I have to get a grip on it as soon as possible I guess.
Jennifer Goldblum

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Tara August 3, 2012 at 12:56 pm edit
Very funny. My bad habit was running up bills on credit cards that I couldn’t pay off within the month… took me many years to get really sick of paying all that interest but I finally kicked the habit.

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Modest Money July 31, 2012 at 9:31 am edit
lol at your toilet pyromaniac days. I had a phase like that but it was primarily outdoor fire setting. So luckily no damage to the house.

Financially I guess my habit that I just wasn’t learning from was eating out at restaurants. I knew I was blowing lots of money, but I just felt like money would be unlimited and it was time to live the good life. Also I made the mistake of funding large PPC campaigns with a credit card that I couldn’t afford to pay off until the following month’s commission check would show up. I didn’t really have a flash fire that woke me up, more of a slow burn instead.

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