Marketing

Be forewarned that in reading this post you may perceive me as being a cranky, nay even a misanthropic member of the human clan.  If you see me this way,  you may be right.  So many things these days just wear me down.  The ultimate goal of the perpetrators, I am sure, is to wear me out.   I have probably carped about some of these annoyances before.  These things may seem petty to you. and perhaps they are, I'll give you that.  But a sufficient number of these little things loom quite large in my field of vision. 

These are little switch knobs for the rheostatically controlled lights and fans.  They are not readily available in the cream color here in Perfect.  So in the past, I have added a couple of white ones, notwithstanding the fact that they do not blend with the rest of the electrical fixtures.  So finding ourselves (what a concept!) in the City the other day, we stopped at a huge hardware outlet.  Certainly they had the item we desired.  Here you go, sir!  The guy handed me a packet containing two knobs.  Two matching knobs.  I think not.  One cream knob, one white knob per package.

There are marketing genii sitting around dreaming up ways to make the customers' lives more pleasant and efficient.  There are no such things.  Oh, there are marketing people, but they are sitting around dreaming up ways to steal from us without violating the law.  This is one example.

Thus, I bought three packages to get three knobs and paid for six knobs.  When I finished the installation of the knobs, now all matching the decor, I threw five white knobs into a box somewhere in the garage along with the spare screws and bolts we bought in packages of three, needing four, two to spare.  They will probably still be there at the resurrection.  But I have spare knobs!  They don't match anything, but I have them.