Extended warranty? How could I lose!?

So, I made it home in one piece but haven't felt like answering any of the recent Friday Fives. Tomorrow I am going on a cruise to Alaska with my family. This is exciting because I get to go snorkelling for the first time ever.* Also, free food, a giant boat with a swimming pool and library, rainy weather, and opportunities to dress formally.

Back when I did high school debate, we started the debate by defining our terms. For example, if the resolution is: "Civil disobedience is justified," you have to decide exactly what constitutes civil disobedience. Is it always peaceful or can it be violent? Can it include property damage? Refusal to pay taxes? Stockpiling weapons? You get the idea. Then you have to provide a definition of "justified" because, if you don't, your opponent will frame the debate in terms of legal justification and then you have already lost. (Unless the judge doesn't know what they're doing, which happened more often than not).

It occurred to me that things might be easier if I started doing this in other areas of life. So I present:

The List of Terms to Define Before Going on Vacation

1. "vacation" - relaxing? sightseeing? shopping? thinking about work the whole time?
2. "nice" - specifically: nice hotel, nice weather, nice dinner
3. "pack light"
4. "sleep in"
5. "walking distance"
6. "most people" and "speak English"
7. and, finally, "affordable" and "reasonable" These are two very different things!

I stopped the list there because I got distracted making this chart:

Reasonability is a function of value, so the better something is, the more you can charge for it. Things which are out of your price range (illuminated manuscripts, five-star accommodation, designer shoes) may still be reasonably priced for what they are. You just can't afford them. Reasonability comes into play at the lower end of the chart, too. Say you have $100 budgeted for a new pair of shoes. You see a pair of flip-flops for $70. They're well within your budget, but you're not going to buy them because $70 is simply not a reasonable price to pay for flip-flops.

When I first made the chart, affordability was a straight line going across, determined by your budget. But in reality, there's some distortion when the lines cross, creating what I like to call the "life is short" spike. This is when you talk yourself into spending a little bit more than you should because it seems like a unique opportunity. This explains things like green shoes, hard-to-find short story collections, or buying a first-class ticket because then you'll be able to say that you've travelled on all the classes of Russian trains. So some people are more affected by the "life is short" spike than others.

At the very high end, when you can no longer afford anything, you start to exaggerate just how much by. This is where you start saying things like "those boots are worth more than I make in a year" or "I'd have to sell my firstborn child before I could buy that car." Or, "and I still wouldn't be able to buy that car" if your firstborn child is likely to be a nearsighted photosensitive little thing with stupid allergies. So some people are more affected by the poverty exaggeration decline than others.

This post is kind of all over the place, but check out the graph I made.