Hobbies

Last night my youngest son needed to do some Christmas shopping and wanted to go to Cabela's. It isn't too far from our house and so I agreed to take him. If you have never shopped at Cabela's it is like Disneyland for those outdoor-type people. They have all sorts of stuffed animals on display. Not the stuffed animals that you sleep with, but the kind you mount on your walls or proudly display in your den after shooting them.

I also brought my youngest daughter who had never been to Cabela's before. She was amazed at the size of the store. She also enjoyed just looking at the animals, especially the aquarium.

My first stop was in the gun section. I am not a gun fanatic and don't even own one. However I do get the chance to shoot them every time I go to Scout camp. My youngest son is actually a pretty good shot and I have been thinking about getting him a .22 rifle. It probably won't happen this year but maybe sometime in the future.

I was amazed at what I saw. They had all sorts of different types of guns. Some were new but a lot more were being sold on consignment. They even had a Winchester rifle from the 1800's. Talk about an heirloom. At about $10,000 I don't think I will be buying one anytime soon.

The Winchester rifle was not the most expensive gun at Cabela's. The most expensive one I saw was a scale replica of a Civil War-era Gatling gun. It came in at about $20,000. That is way too expensive for someone who only has a passing interest in guns. Though I wonder if they would rent it to me when my youngest daughter starts dating. I think that would be more intimidating than cleaning a shotgun when the young man comes to pick her up.

Until recently I have always thought that I have some expensive hobbies (computers being one of them). Then I started expanding my horizons and realized that it doesn't matter what you choose for your hobby. It can be as cheap or expensive as you want it to be. There is one big difference with computers though: the older your equipment is, the less it is worth. Contrast that to the Winchester rifle from the 1800's which probably appreciated quite nicely over the past century. Somehow I don't see my computer being worth more 100 years from now.