The Haves and Have Nots

The Haves and Have-Nots...

Last minute gift shopping at the mall I try to avoid, I tried to avoid spending any money on myself today, but the White Barn Candle Shop with it's 75% off sale lured me over and in so that soon I was rummaging through a bin, searching for a vanilla scented plug in diffuser refill for a diffuser I bought there over a year ago but have been too thrifty to replace. The two-pack refill costs $12.50. So since they were on sale for a mere $5, I thought I might treat myself to one.

While I methodically moved box after box aside, not finding any vanilla refills, a couple, maybe twenty years older than I am, pulled 16 of the refills they needed from the bin and then exchanged polite conversation with another woman about how they have 17 diffusers just on the first floor of their house which are plugged in all year, and they've never had any trouble with them. The couple then walked to the back of the store and found more of their desired scent so that the last number of two-pack refills I saw them load into their shopping basket equaled 25. 25! Even at only $5 a piece, that's $133.75 (with tax). The box says these things last 6-8 weeks. So if each one lasts for two months, that means they have to buy 3x25 refills a year (I'm assuming the remaining 8 were for the upstairs?) That's $401.25 a year, IF they buy them only while they are on sale for $5 instead of their usual price of $12.50.

I know this is all very boring. I'm just saying that I keep forgetting the difference between the haves and have nots is NOT that one class can barely pay their heating bill and the other one can. It's that one class can barely pay their heating bills and the other class can give a shit in four different bathrooms and then cover it up with a pretty scent.