That old thing....
 

Now at last I know I can believe my wife when she says: 'that old thing - I've had that for years...'

Argh - am definitely guilty of buying clothes I will diet into... The stupid thing is I do get to the point where they fit me, but I've forgotten all about them by then.

My worst is definitely shoes though. I have very, very sensitive feet. Breaking in a pair of shoes involves turning my feet into steak tartare. So I have (literally) dozens of pairs of shoes at home that I have bought, worn once, and then retired to the back of the cupboard as punishment for maiming me. Until I forget & get them out again.

I will go into spec mode on thrift shop items that cost a $1.00 or $2.00, but if I am going to buy something brand new, it better fit the me in the present not some me off in a future hypothetical land where I've lost 20 pounds, spent 3 weeks at the spa and had a face peel and a bikini wax.

This reluctance to buy things that might someday fit is not evidence of any pragmatic wisdom on my part, its an example of my tendency to need immedient gratification. If I'm going to buy a new outfit, I want to wear it NOW!

By the way, my latest thrift shop find is an embroidered silk lined, real sable, full length coat, hand sewn and with a designer label that I snapped up for $75.00! It fits, too!

Nice find! Stay away from the PETA folks, though.

*small, snotty cough here*

Ahem. Cyclefrance, you DO realize, don't you, that were it not for women spending a bundle on clothes they'd never wear the world economy would FAIL, don't you?

Men.

My buddy at work was gathering up old clothes to donate to Goodwill. His live at home, 20 something, daughter, contributed 6 pairs of shoes with the sale tags still on them. :eek:

...and of course, we mustn't forget the billions that you ladies are obviously saving with all these bargain purchases. My wife assures me that she has saved me well over £2,000 in the last six months alone. I am such a lucky man that she contributes so to our finances.... (or so she keeps reminding me...)

One thing I can never get my head around is,I bought in the sale and saved
£20.00,it would have cost me £80.00 at full price..OK but Guy's logic is,if I didn't buy it I would have saved £60.00...

My good Lady is baffled by my opinion on shopping...

Both men and women are on a mission to save - it's just that they attack the problem from totally different and opposing perspectives - and as may be expected the two opposites cancel each other out. So at least your no worse off as a couple...!!

(now can hardly wait for one of you fine ladies to bend that conclusion with inspired logical argument to show/prove that the female element actually improves upon the situation and really prevents the neutral end result I predict...)

I've been wondering ... is the £ over top of the number 4 on a British keyboard, or do you have to remember some obscure ALT-code to make it display every single time you use it?

Over the number 3 on this old jobbie I'm using at the moment - $ over 4. You now have my undivided attention as to what follows next in this curious logical progression you have no doubt just initiated....

If the British Pound sign is over the 3, where do you keep the #?

Yes, how do you form a pound symbol? :D

I mean, an octothorpe?

Mine's next to the enter/return key - # at the bottom and funny ~ thing in shift mode.

A lot of keyboards I have used hide the \ - pleased to inform that this one doesn't

And where's the Euro sign? :neutral:

I would get very confused with your keyboard, Cycle. Very confused. Because now I can't find the question mark or virgule.

We haven't bothered with one 'cos we know it ain't gonna last...!

Actually - cannot find it - have tried help/troubleshooting options but no joy - guess will just type the word as have done so far

€ is in Word under symbols .... just copied and pasted

ALT 0128 yields €

Must be a different combination over here - that just throws me back to the beginning of the Cellar page we are on...

Well, to hi-jack the discussion on symbols...

I accept your challenge!

A man left to his own devises will order Chinese carry-out every night and buy a Jaguar to impress the chicks. He'll probably squander his paycheck on a state of the art home surround sound system and a big flat screen TV to watch football or soccer matches on.

Since men have no idea of how to press the buttons on a washing machine or use an iron, they'll send the clothes that they DON'T buy on sale out to the cleaners and run up a considerable bill with that establishment every week.

A guy on his own will also buy himself a big labrador retriever or other hunting dog that will eat a small fortune in dog kibble every month. To go along with the dog, he'll buy himself a few hunting rifles, membership at a sportsmen's club, and, most likely, a fine bamboo fly rod, expensive reel and a huge selection of hand tied flies. Naturally, he'll have to buy a second membership with an outfit that allows him to fly fish on a blue ribbon trout stream - members only allowed.

No doubt, our proverbial single gentleman will discover a taste for fine single malt scotch or perfectly aged Irish whiskey or Kentucky bourbon. This indulgence will also add considerably to his monthly expenses.

One day he'll look around the clutter at his bachelor pad and realize that he really should obtain the services of a housekeeper. She'll come over twice a week from then on and the cost of her services will be yet another financial outlay.

Just before this man topples over the brink into bankruptcy, he has the luck to find the love of his life and marries her. The little lady fires the housekeeper, tells the laundry that their services will no longer be required, persuades her husband to drop one of his sporting club memberships in favor of spending more time with her, explains that the occasional gin and tonic is more than adequate if one wishes to partake of strong spirits. She tells him that one sleek, classy, and undependable woman in his life is enough and they rid themselves of the Jaguar in favor of a more dependable, fuel efficient car.

So what if the Mrs. buys a few extra things on sale now and then? She has saved her man from certain financial ruin! ;)

You had me going there,I was all set to believe you until the getting married bit blew the fantasy right out the water....Most Guy's get married after the imortal words heard are "Honey the test came back positive"..
Thats the road to bankruptcy............... :D

It's not supposed to do that. I'm having the same problem.

All right, who stole my damn ALT codes this time??

(It's working fine in my word processor, it's just here in The Cellar that things have messed up. UT, is there some newly installed vBulletin shortcuts of which we've run afoul?)

alt 0128 doesn't work for me either.
UT must be trying to control the oil market with dollars. :lol:

€

Are you using the numeric keypad? The number row won't work.

Yes, absolutely the numeric keypad. Never occured to me to try the number row.

I somehow end up with the blog view doing that now.

And I know it worked in the past. I use ALT codes a lot, especially the M-width dash, the trademark symbol, and the degree mark.

€!!!... keypad it is, thanks HM. :D

Thanks HM. Laptop at home doen't have a separate keypad - they are intergrated into the alpha keys and accessed via the function key. Will let you know if any combination of function+alt plus the requisite numbers does anything for me later (in office right now)...

mjk8

Hmm....


€

€

€

Ok, a little monkeying around has resulted in partial success with this problem.

I, too, am posting from a laptop keyboard. I am accessing The Cellar (now, as always) with Firefox, on a machine running fully patched XP Pro, SP2. The Euro signs above are displaying nicely in my quick reply box, and I expect they'll turn up in the post in a minute too. But, I could not produce them in the quick or advanced reply text input boxes. I took the same key combo I expected to work over to Notepad, and it worked just fine. Cut and paste brought into the reply box.

My conclusion is that the combination of Firefox and the Cellar's text input boxes intercept the codes and treat them in some special way (like moving the cursor to the search box for the Google toolbar) before Windows can display the character.

The combination of (either) Alt PLUS Fn (in blue on my Dell laptop keyboard) and the corresponding (blue) keys representing 0128 (mjk8) produces the Euro symbol. It is critical to use the numbers for the "embedded numeric keypad" as the numbers at the top of the keyboard will not work for this purpose. But not in The Cellar. On other browser based text input situations (Google), it does make the symbol.

Conclusion:

Type it somewhere else, and copy it into your post.

€

managed to produce that from my Dell laptop (just bought a basic inspiron 1300 as my 6-year-old Acer Travelmate was on its last legs...) by holding down alt and fn keys and then tapping 0128 sequence.

So seems to work OK from basic Dell board without any additions...

€

Brilliant!

Works for me, too!

My previous troubles were from trying to get the thing to work using NumLock. Your more elegant solution is much better. Thank you.

€

=C

dammit

That's, like, a hella sad smily.

Or maybe it's just got a really droopy mustache.

Well, it could have turned out a sad person with buck teeth: C=

€

Yayyy!

For the ladies, it's a blood sport. :D