What would the world be like without tools? Can you imagine it? We'd have nothing. We wouldn't even be here. Humans couldn't exist without tools. The earliest inhabitants of this planet would've died of starvation if they didn't figure out how to make spears out of sticks and rocks to hunt animals with. Tools are necessary, tools are good, and a love of tools is woven into the genetic fabric of every man on earth. Even if you've never wrenched on your truck, you still like tools. Even yuppies that never get greasy have electronic tools of some sort, and they are just as addicted to those tools as you and I are. Hell, I dig tools so much that I sometimes buy ones that I don't even need yet.
The other day I was at Sears because I needed to replace a 9/16-inch deep socket and I wanted to buy a new vertical bandsaw. Vertical bandsaws are fantastic tools for fabricating mounting brackets and other truck parts out of sheetmetal. It's an excellent low-budget replacement for a laser cutter, water jet, or plasma cutter, and if you have a steady enough hand and a sharp eye, you can cut out parts almost as smoothly as those high-end tools. No one I know has the dough for a laser cutter, but with a bit of patience and 300 bucks, we can all have our own bandsaw.
As I checked out the bandsaws, I saw a new drill press that had a laser sight system with cross hairs for the ultimate in precision drilling. I thought, "Tools with laser beams! Now that is something every guy needs." I daydreamed about all the cool holes I could be drilling in the cool bracketry I cut out with my new bandsaw. The super laser drill and the matching vertical bandsaw were both out of my financial reach though, so I passed on them and just left with my shiny, new 9/16-inch socket.
New tools are fantastic, but used ones can be just as rewarding, especially when you score a smokin' good deal on them. While checking out the internet classified ads today, I came across an ad by a guy who was about to move out of his house. He literally was moving in less than 30 minutes, and his ad stated that the first person to come to his house with 150 bucks could leave with all his tools. I noticed the word "bandsaw" in his bare-bones ad, so I didn't even call the guy to find out what else he was selling or if he was selling a vertical or horizontal bandsaw. A horizontal bandsaw is only useful for making straight cuts, and you can't really fab up an airbag mounting bracket with one, so this might have turned into a wasted trip.