Lifestyle Challenge Goals - Love & Hate

It occurred to me that I need to figure out what the object of this challenge is before I can make the rules. Here's a little love/hate list that should help me establish some goals:

LOVES:
1. Shopping for gifts is fun. . .more fun if you find something for yourself too.
2. Shopping is mindless and sometimes comforting
3. Shopping requires no complex brain function - the advertisers tell you what you MUST have and you go fetch it.
4. It's a confidence builder to look nice and have your home nicely furnished.
5. Sometimes more is more. . .Sometimes less of more expensive is wicked good.

HATES:
DID YOU JUST READ THE ABOVE LIST? Add this: You have to pick it out, put it in the basket/cart, take it out of the cart, put it on the table/belt for the cashier, they put it in another bag, you put it in your trunk/car/cart, you take it home, pull it out of the bag, and eventually put it away. It's too many effing steps! Not to mention how many other hands have touched a product and how much shipping was involved before it even made it to the store!

Not that saving money exactly is an ultimate goal in this project (it would be nice tho) but let's throw this into the negative list: "The combination of rising unemployment and pre-existing debt is driving the number of consumer bankruptcy cases higher. . .The number of bankruptcies in the first half of 2009 totaled 675,351, up 36.5% from the first half of 2008." (Bloomberg)

Ouch! Time to get some priorities in order and I'm about to make myself either an example or a horrible warning. . .