My question was honest: aside from jealousy, why would anyone bitch about how someone else spends their money? It is not - nor was it intended to be - a thread-killing question. I asked because I'm genuinely interested in trying to understand those who exercise the aforementioned right.
Now, here's some solid thinking...
I've seen people collect and be obsessed over so many different things, it's crazy. I'm a middle class guy, but my ex-wives parents were very wealthy (they OWNED Weight Watchers...). You want to talk about people that spent money on stuff! Woo woo!
But as I got to know them, they were just as passionate and obsessed as many of us audio types were.
Really at the end of the day, they just have a couple more zeros on the end of their everything. I try to keep my five thousand dollar car running, they have to keep their 200 thousand dollar car running, it's all relative.
And I know I've gotten warped a bit by being exposed to so much gear. I had a mfr call me the other day and ask if we want to review their newest speaker. When I asked "how much" and they said 10k, I thought "that's not too bad!!"
But then the UPS man rang the bell with a kit from RAW Acoustics and a really cool pair of $500 mini monitors!
Back down to Earth.....