The road less travelled...

[ManekiNeko]

After a somewhat frustrating day working on the final assignment for my Digital Fabrication class, I decided to head home. On the way back, I was met with a fork in the road... should I turn left and take the highway back to my apartment, or head right and go down the scenic route? I usually prefer the highway, but for some strange reason I felt like taking the alternate route. I wasn't sure why, but I'm glad I made that choice today.

On my way back, I noticed a garage sale sign, and since I'm a video game collector and a sucker for yard sales, I decided to stop in and have a look.
The garage sale didn't seem like anything special at first. There was a lot of dusty china, some eight track tapes, and books on subjects that didn't interest me in the least. I thought I'd walk away disappointed, but that was before I walked to the end of the table and found a boxed Bally Astrocade waiting for me there. I wasn't sure if I could afford such a great find, but it was priced at a paltry five dollars... exactly the amount I had with me at the time. I was able to barter the seller down to four bucks, making the deal that much sweeter.

I walked back to my car with the Astrocade in my hands and a huge grin on my face. This had been a pretty nerve-racking day for me, but it ended on a positive note... and it was all because I had forsaken my boring old routine and dared to try something different.

My question is this... have you ever benefitted from trying something you don't normally do, or travelling down a path that you usually ignore?

JR

[BenT]

Cool story.

Last October, I decided to take a left instead of a right at an intersection on the way to work. The route is a little longer but more picturesque. Long story short, I ended up in an 18 car pile-up and am now paralyzed from the neck down. The week I got out of the hospital I had an amazing find at a garage sale, though, so I guess you could say it was worth it. Two more games until my Odyssey collection's complete!!!

(kidding. definitely a neat story, though.)

[o2william]

@BenT: I'm glad to see that total paralysis hasn't impaired your message board posting ability. You're an inspiration to us all!

In the spirit of this thread, I had a somewhat similar experience this weekend. While out and about, my wife and I drove past a "HUGE MOVING SALE!" sign. Normally we would have ignored this because it was Sunday afternoon, and usually you have to get to garage sales at 7 a.m. on Saturday to find anything decent. But this sale was scheduled for Sunday only, so we decided to check it out. We took several wrong turns following the unhelpful directions on the sign, and were just about to give up when we finally spotted the correct street. I'm glad we did, because they were selling a big box of 7800 and 2600 stuff. It contained a 7800 console in excellent condition, with two joysticks and power supply, forty-one 2600 and 7800 games (the rarest of which was Spy Hunter -- and it's up for trade since I already had it), a stack of manuals, and an Omega Race Booster Grip, which I needed. The cost for everything was $15, exactly the amount of cash my wife and I had between us. I'm still reeling from the shock of finding decent Atari stuff in SoCal.