a neo-luddites thought process on a needful purchase...

On the subject of a fair living wages, a depressing trend in modern education, and just business as usual...

We live in wonderful times in some ways...

For instance, West Marine dropped me their usual weekly "you need to buy stuff" email and they had a deal on a floating, waterproof, and rather impressive pocket sized GPS for $99 bucks. Seriously, that much technology in something you can put in your pocket for $99 is just frelling amazing.

Since I was on the West site I decided to check out what a good cheap plastic sextant would cost and saw that, the one I tend to recommend is priced at $199... That said, a more than decent cheapie (the Davis MK3) sextant is priced at $57.99 so, I suppose, non-electronic position finding is still a bit cheaper than electronic but just barely.

Now, personally, me being a neo-luddite and all, I find the ongoing disappearance of traditional sailing and navigation skills somewhat irksome but, since my mother didn't actually raise a complete idiot, I also see the value of a pocket sized GPS that floats and has an on board celestial calculator as one of it's apps.

So, while I won't be trading in my sextant anytime soon, I may just be investing in another GPS while it's on sale.

Listening to a really good podcast

So it goes...