No Limits Ladies.com

As you know, No Limits Ladies readers are some of the best in the world. They not only look out for opps for themselves but for the people they care about too.

Well, one such reader, Miss C is showing us all some love. She sent me an email about a great little contest DebtKid is hosting. DebtKid is giving away a Nintendo DS Lite to a commenter with a dumb purchase story.

Frankly, I need a Nintendo DS Lite like I need a hole in the head. I'm already addicted to Spider Solitaire (which I'm convinced is spyware yet I can't stop playing anyway) and Poppit, a free game at Pogo.com. I don't need any other time wasters.

But it did get me to thinking about my dumbest purchase ever.

There is a lot of competition for that title. There are the scams (Read Books For Money, Stuff Envelopes For Money), the home improvement and craft projects I'll never do (light fixtures that haven't been fixtured, the cloth diaper instructions for the babies we can never have), the aspirational clothes that I'd need surgery to fit into.

I need a week of entries to talk about the bad investments I've purchased. Before I developed discipline, I gambled away money on fads (dot coms, anyone?), I bought on rumor (mining stocks with no mines in production), and other fun stuff.

But then I got to thinking... are these really dumb purchases? If I learned something, if I didn't repeat the purchase, were they really a bad idea? Yeah, I could have learned from other's mistakes but sometimes you need to learn these things myself.

And since I've lived to tell about them (and have even prospered), they weren't life threatening dumb mistakes. They sure weren't brilliant moves though.