Sports just saved me $177

Being a sports fan just saved my family $177 bucks, and possibly a lot more.

This morning, our credit card company called to ask us if we had just made a $177 dollar purchase for a World of Warcraft subscription.  We certainly hadn't, so we got our $177 refunded and our credit card number changed.

While we were happy to get the call, I was a bit surprised that a credit card company would even check up on a purchase of only $177.  After all, that's not a huge amount of money, so the purchase was clearly flagged because it was considered  to be an usual purchase for our family. 

That got me thinking about how lucky we were that I don't play games like World of Warcraft.  After all, I kinda fit the profile.  I'm a male computer programmer, and I played Dungeons and Dragons in high school.  I'm good at Math and Physics, studied engineering in college, and didn't even kiss a girl until I was 21. Heck, I bet 90% of guys with that background have made credit card purchases for various types of sword-n-sorcery type games, books, and movies.  If I had been making those kind of purchases regularly, I don't think a $177 credit card charge for World of Warcraft would have raised any eyebrows.

However, I don't purchase that type of stuff, because I'm a huge sports fan, and most of my leisure time is dominated by sports.  If it wasn't for my love of the Mets, Jets, and Knicks, I'd probably be a World of Warcraft player, and I'd be at least $177 poorer right now.

I guess, I also have my kids to thank.  I used to buy lots of video games ( mostly sports video games, but still video games nonetheless ), and if I was still buying video games I guess the World of Warcraft purchase wouldn't have seemed too unusual.  However, I pretty much stopped playing video games after my kids were born.

Anyway, it a scary world out there, and it tends to bite you on the ass more often than not.  It's just nice when you are lucky enough to dodge a bullet every once in a while.

Rich

The Evidence

So, as promised, I did it.  I went to the the most evil place on earth.  As you can see, I wasn't happy about it.

Well, at least the boys seemed happy ( even Michael the Mets fan.  He hasn't learned to really hate the Yankees yet - the little guy doesn't have a mean bone in his body ).

As you can see below, Peter was especially happy.

If you zoom in on the picture below, you'll see that I was actually smiling ( That's because we were leaving. ).

Rich