It's hard to believe that it's been less than a month and a half since I started my obsession with listia - an auction website that allows you to bid for items with "credits" rather than actual money, which you are given freely or earn by "selling" your own stuff. My obsession started with a mild dislike, which quickly developed into a mild like as I got my first items.
Those first items became addictive, however, and I was quickly bidding for stuff here and there, and even selling items, both to get rid of unwanted stuff and to gather more credits to get even more stuff for myself. And I got a lot of stuff, A LOT of stuff. All in all, when you combine what I got myself with what I got my husband/sister/friends to get for me, I'm ashamed to say how many items I won. Really, do I need that much more crap in my life? But getting those little packages everyday in the mail is a high onto itself.
Some of the stuff I got wasn't the best - though the plastic beads that I wasn't most disappointed with, became quite a nice bracelet for Camila. But I also got a lot of great stuff. I blogged about the lot of Avon products I got yesterday, but I also got a bunch of craft kits and games for the kids plus other craft items and a lot of beauty products (what the hell am I going to do with them?). I even got a bunch of photo paper and a personalized apron for Camila.
Of course, this stuff wasn't really cheap. I probably spent about $30 on the shipping fees of some of the things I really wanted and another $30 on mailing things that other people won from me. All this in a month and a half - so it's been QUITE AN EXPENSIVE hobby (without even considering all the productivity time it's taken away from me). Of course, it doesn't look that way when you are spending a couple of dollars here and a few stamps there, but things add up quite quickly.
So I'm quitting. Cold turkey. Today. Or at least I'm trying to quit. I still have some auctions going that I posted several days ago, and I'm praying to my unexisting god that nobody will bid on them. Everything I posted is terribly overpriced but it won't stop people from bidding - hey, it hasn't stopped me :(