Maybe you could order Christmas stuff through the shop where Kirby works! ?(Drugs, still, but discount drugs.)
This is no answer; this is just chitchat and commiseration.
I'm the enabling mom of the expensive game junkie. ?I *did* just spend on the order of a couple of hundred dollars at his game store, since the pusher (I mean owner) is having a 25% off sale this weekend.
An example for those who are not familiar with these particular games - it can easily cost $60.00 for a starter set of these pieces. ?That's enough to set up one kind of army but seemingly never the kind my son really wants. ?So then we end up having to buy the smaller adjunct boxed sets or blister cards. ?Yikes - it is never ending. ?You get a big fat manual when you buy the set, but then they change the rules sometimes so you have to buy what they call "codexes" to keep up with the changes. ?
Is it a strange coincidence that the owner reminds me of the comic book store guy from The Simpsons? ??I thought his sort of cranky personality might be enough to make Matthew give up the games, but instead, he's learning how to be around someone like that - a good lesson, I suppose. ?He spends enough time there that he *could* work there, but it's a fairly new store, and he only has one other employee - which could go a long way towards explaining why he's so cranky. ?
We've talked about how virtually everyone who plays these games (at this store, anyway) is an ADULT, with a JOB, but so far that doesn't seem to have dimmed his enthusiasm. ?Yesterday I talked about how when you pick an expensive hobby, like say, restoring a vintage car, you can't always just go out and buy the parts exactly when you need them - that sometimes you have to wait until your next paycheck. ?Granted, he's not paying rent yet or buying groceries but he has an allowance and it has to stretch the month. ?He was worried that when he started getting an allowance, that we wouldn't buy him anything any more. ?I assured him that I reserved the right to buy him stuff whenever I felt like it (which is still pretty often). ?I just can't make myself buy him this particular gaming stuff though - it seems that this is his thing and that he ought to finance it. ?It sounds a bit on re-reading this that we nag him about his interest, but we don't. ?We just talk about it when it comes up ?(which is all the time). ?
I DO know that he is getting a lot out of playing these games and hanging around the store - I'm mostly just blowing off steam. ?
Jocelyn
