Yard sales are not Thrift stores

I went to a neighborhood garage sale today in a nearby town with one of my friends. I was looking for a power orbital sander. I found one, and a lot more: The cabinet, couldn't help it...it had the prettiest details. Here is a picture of the top: And yes, that is a staple gun... What can I say, I like powerful tools. And you never know when I will feel like reupholstering the pieces of furniture that I find!

About the power sander that I found...It was a steal at $5. The only problem is that its power cord was worn, a tiny detail I failed to notice in my excitement. I thought I would try to salvage it, so I went to Home Depot...

I pride myself on having a decent collection of tools. However, one of the tool sets that I don't have is a star hex key set. Figures - that happened to be the tool that I needed to unscrew the body of the sander. A new set would have set me back about $9. Then I needed to purchase a replacement power cord, which would have set me back another $9. Then, in order to use the tool, I would have to buy a replacement sanding pad and sand paper. Together, these would probably cost between $10-$15 (This is a guess; I actually stopped checking prices when I realized that it would be more cost-effective for me to get a brand new sander). Aside from the purchases, I would have to do the work of fixing it- taking out all of the screws, which were rusted a little, and figuring out how to properly connect the new power cord. I actually could have gotten a less expensive replacement cord but more work would have been involved...wow, that's a lot more than I bargained for.

Practicality won out over frugality. The way I look at it, I actually made up for the five bucks I spent on a lemon sander with the really cool power stapler and wooden cabinet.