Who do I still think I am??

This one's about my first million, spent.

I'm still in catch-up mode from the weekend, but if all goes well I'll be back on schedule by tomorrow night the latest.

30DBC PROMPT (Saturday): "How do you spend your first $1M?"

I think we've all played this game before...pretend you win the lotto or strike it rich another way, and then map out your plans for what you're gonna do with your windfall. It starts out as a fun little exercise...before you break down in sadness because you're 99.867% positive it's never gonna happen.

I've always said I'll be frugal...no wasted expenditures on unnecessary crap. Sure, maybe a reasonable house and a suitable ride might be in the works, but I'm not into mansions and DeLoreans. I could probably update my wardrobe and fill out my closets a little again, but there's almost no need to go crazy here either...I'd probably just get anything I felt I needed that I couldn't find at work. Maybe treat myself to a fancy dinner or two at a decent restaurant, but that would require spending time in public, and I'm not very fond of that.

I know I'd blow a ton of dough on music. mainly to replace the cd's that haven't showed up anywhere between my ex kicking me out and my arrival in Cortland...I'd also have to replace the iPod that got stolen off me when I was homeless. I'm not sure I'd even try to estimate the dollar amount I would be spending at the iTunes Store online, but it'd be somewhere between "totally unreasonable" and "damn near ridiculous".

And then I'd be doing the smart thing where I let my money make me more money. I'm sure there are ways of making this happen...don't rich people do this all the time? Isn't that related to the phrase "living off the interest"? Yeah, I wanna ride that bus to the promised land.

I don't know exactly where I'm at tally-wise. It doesn't matter...I'm spending my first million, so I'm assuming there's plenty more Grants and Jacksons I don't really need to be completely accountable for. Besides, that whole "keeping track" thing...like I said at the top, I don't wanna know how much is going out because there's a certain amount of sadness that comes from seeing the debit side of the ledger. Maybe I've got a bit of a stingy streak in me...I understand I can't take it with me when I die, but I'd rather be sitting on it than having a pile of goods and gadgets with nothing else to show for whatever accomplishment put me into that higher tax bracket.

And a million isn't much these days anyway. How much does it cost to get a library or a hospital named after you? After I've taken care of some debts and gave away a little here and there to some family members and friends, and gotten myself the few things I really want, I imagine there'd be just enough left over to have a bar stool named after me in a couple of my favorite haunts. I'd be cool with that.

What else do I need? Circumstances now have forced me to become a minimalist, and that doesn't just go away once you've started rollin' in the green. I'd probably be the most homely rich dude you ever heard of...<insert witty remark about how "it's what's on the inside that makes you rich, not what you have" here>. I'll be happy bein' the regular guy with regular shit doin' regular things, with no one knowing the wiser about me because I don't need the drama associated with large sums of money. Everyone's got a hand out for somethin' these days..."donate to this charity", "help me with my benefit", "float me 'til payday", "daddy needs a new nose". You hear it all when you're in a better position. Tell you what...if I'm rich all of the sudden, it can't be that hard for people smarter than me to get just as loaded. Ideas now are derivative...all the cool shit's already been invented; today it's all about finding ways to improve on existing great stuff.

But chances are, if you gave me a million I'd be just as likely to piss it away on nickel-and-dime expenditures before I used it to make any real difference in anything. Everyday necessities, the occasional meal out or concert, anything of minimal importance. I'd live life the same way, but with a few extra zeroes on the end of my bank balance. Ain't a damn thing wrong with that.