Exact nail on the head. It is about one's priorities and what floats their boat. I had a close friend who makes a great deal more than I ask me how I could afford to buy a piece of land that I had bought. I answered "you don't really want to know, it will hurt your feelings. Think about it before you make me tell you." A month later she demanded I tell her.
We went down their budget:
1. Vehicles- Them- $1300/mo for 2 new ones.
Us- $0. We always paid cash for used.
2. Eating out- Them- ate out almost every night- her figures once added up for the good meals and junk meals..Over $2k/month
Us- less than $200/month. much less.
3. Vacations- They did 4 per year....them- over $20K per year
Us- about $1K per year, some years..lol.
4. Sports- them- spent well over $10K for LSU weekends.
Us- Watched our team on TV.
I told her "I could go thru the rest of your budget, but she looked like she was in shock and teary looking. Then I dropped the bomb on her. I told her I was paying $610 per month for the cabin/100 acres of hunting land. Less than the price of 1 of their car payments.
Today? We still drive 2 decent looking but older car and truck. We still don't go out to eat much. We still don't throw money away. Now, though, we do a big vacation every year and we can afford stuff and have stuff that they still can't because they spent 20 years spending their money on expendables. oh well.
I guess it depends on what one's priorities are.
There are people who'd rather have 55K new truck instead of decent used vehicle. Or spend the $$$ on new bass boat.
Or have one dozen or two dozen "deer" rifles, half dozen shotguns, etc.
Ever go out skeet or trap shooting? Some of those guys are shooting over/under shotguns that could easily pay for an African safari. Plus they usually have a decent collection of them to boot!
It's just what are your priorities and what important to you in most circumstances.
I've know a few hunters who due to lack of upland birds hunting or only able to harvest one big game a year (whitetail) that have taken up competitive shooting sports such as high power or 3-gun. Or as mentioned previous have become addicted to trap or skeet.
Others rather varmint and predator hunt as the seasons are generally longer and one can get more shooting in one year than in life time of big game hunting (perhaps exaggerating a little but not by much)
