Dollars and Sense

The Honest Man just saw "Avatar" for the first time over the weekend. Yep that Avatar. Nope not the cartoon show on Disney XD, but that marvel James Cameron dropped on people in December 2009. Yep almost a whole year went by before I saw it for the first time. I posted that on my facebook page and the peanut gallery went literally nuts (pun intended). Some even hit me up on personal emails or IMs, going how in the "life of anything" did you not see this in a movie theater?!?! Glad you asked because your friendly neighborhood Honest Man is about to do a lecture on Dollars and Sense.

I have young children. I have young children that are now aware of what they see on televisions, movie screens, in public, etc. I have young children that will imitate what they see at the drop of a dime. The Honest Man does not want to expose my young children to things they should not see because unlike some parents, I want my kids to you know behave and grow up like kids and not be acting like adults at age 5. What does this have to do with Avatar Honest Man?!?! In Dragonfly Jones voice, "SI-LENCE, SI-LENCE Young Padawan." The Honest Man is give you background information

So knowing that my kids are young and I don't want to expose them to things they shouldn't see, it makes it a lil harder to just simply take them with me to movies. In fact, having young kids definitely cuts down on frequenting movie theaters. I probably average 3-4 visits tops a year to the movies because of this and what I'm about to mention next. Wait, I hear someone in the back of class. "How come you just don't get a babysitter?" Wonderful question, glad you asked :-)

Do you know how much a babysitter cost? Try $10 a hr. And that's on the cheap end around these parts. Let's look at a movie like Avatar which is roughly three and a half hours. Well you need time for the babysitter to arrive so let's be generous and say 4 hrs. You can multiply right? 4 times 10 is what class? There's more to that linear equation. So that's 40 bones gone from jump, plus movies these days, even with me trying to take advantage of my student ID (yep I still use mine, sue me!), that's roughly 9-10 dollars per person so another 20 gone for me and my wife. Then add in getting some popcorn and soda b/c you know Mommy and Daddy normally don't eat these things around the kiddies, that's another 20 dollars. Still got that mental calculator class. 40 + 20 + 20 equals hell naw in my book. I see another hand up. "Why are you paying someone, don't you have family in town?"

Another fantastic question :-). And that answer is nope, sure don't. The closest blood relative lives 4 hrs away. And our close friends here all have kids of their own and typically are looking to get away from it all themselves. So the default primary option is hire a babysitter. Of course when family comes in town, if they offer to watch the kids, then we take them up on the offer and that number reduces in half, which is a Honest Man winner. But how often does family come to visit? Making sense of it all yet (pun intended!).

For me to see two movies in a year with the above outline, that's 160 dollars. That's more than my cable bill. And I get to see the movie once versus watching it repeatedly On Demand or on whatever day the episode is showing. Don't get me wrong, there are other options too. I can go with my bootleg connect in my Uncle and get the joint. Or I can try to see the movie during a long lunch break when no one is watching. But again, the frequency of either is not high either. So when people ask How have you not SEEN this movie, there's the Honest Man answers. Because the dollars don't make sense :-)

Today's Lesson

Yep, I really wish I could see every hot movie that comes out and be able to have water cooler talk the following day. But unfortunately, it's not a part of the cards. And frankly, I'm not as pressed anymore. I'll see it when I see it and that's the bottom line because the Honest Man SAID SO! Class dismissed.