salary to engagement ring spending

Only 15% of your income? That's a very low number from such a pedantic source.

xc girl if I was your man the only present you'd be getting from me would be: "my d*ck in a box."

What a retarded thread..... Not exactly the best place to get engagement ring advice. Since everyone else is posting their advice, here is mine:

1. Any dude that tells their woman to go pick out an engagement ring you like - probably really doesn't give two sh*ts about the ring - or marriage (and probably even you). If a ring was to be shopped for, it should be the two of you or him giving it to you during an opportune time.....

2. I really would opt for no rings - marriage is a dead institution and is not applicable to our modern lifestyle. The only place I could still see where it might work is in the backwards hinterlands like most of the rural midwest or something.......

xcjag wrote:

2. I really would opt for no rings - marriage is a dead institution and is not applicable to our modern lifestyle. The only place I could still see where it might work is in the backwards hinterlands like most of the rural midwest or something.......

Maybe that's because all the gay people ruined the "sanctity" of marriage. What a crock.

Well, then you've still got a lot to learn, my fellow sushi lover. Granted, none of the "white bitches" I've dated have been from Southern California, but my Asian girlfriends (two of them from SoCal) have been way more materialistic than my Caucasian reltionships. They've got their indisputable qualities as it relates to spam and clams, but the perception of Asians as these collectivist, non-materialist nirvana seekers is a flat-out myth.

Chinese, Thai, Korean, Philippino, you name it, they're all about the car you drive, the restaurant you pick for Valentine's, and whether you rent or own. And you better f***ing learn to pronounce "Louis Vuitton" correctly!!

you dirty whore. i can't believe you'd even worry about this. how shallow can one person be? who cares what your boyfriend makes. people like you make this a sick world to live in.

I don't see Melinda Gates with a huge rock on her finger. What does that say about Bill? I think xcgirl needs to figure out what her proprities are but one thing's for certain. Every time she looks down at her precious diamond ring she'll think of the Letsrun messageboard. She just got engaged to Letsrun!

Just get your "investment" insured. Shop somewhere other than Tiffany-they mark their stuff up because of the name and no one will know it's Tiffany unless they ask you---and they won't. But you seem like such a blow-hard you probably won't be able to keep your mouth shut about the brand name anyways.

----Also, I've found most girls who say "Well, I won't take anything MORE than 2C's b/c it will overwhelm my dainty finger," are lying. I think you are definitely one of them.

----Lastly, that's a lot of money to be spending on a ring, here's one piece of common sense you might want to think about. Do you do anything active? I'm assuming that since you've managed to find this board for runners you must shlep on out to the roads and keep that body fit for old Dr. Dermatologist (gotta fight off young interns and nurses). I'd just be very, very careful about wearing your new lovely new ring around in public--flashing your bling will attract a lot of attention--and you'll probably get robbed. It will suck to have no ring..and no 3.5 ring finger either. My guess, you'll wear that thing around for awhile, and then---if you are as awesome as you say you are, you'll either get scared, or sick of it weighing down your finger and it will sit in your jewelry box waiting for special occasions with the pretentious family, while all the other girls with smaller rings get to enjoy them every day.

*skips out of post with small ring on finger*

Now thats an interesting perspective.... Gay people ruined marriage for normal people. How does the deviant behavior of gay people ruin normal behavior???

I don't want to get into a debate on gay vs straight but that is not why marriage is a failed institustion.... I have to actually wonder if it ever was a beneficial institution....

Now back to this ring B.S. - what a crock of shit about ring size - who gives a flying f*ck about the size of the diamonds on a ring, - only other rich bitches - dudes certainly don't care. It is meant to be a token - not a statement of wealth.... This is one case where it is a FACT that size does not matter.....

And for effect we have the Blue Nile ad at the bottom of the page.....

How on Earth did this become a 200-post thread?

IT IS SO SIMPLE, PEOPLE!! The price of the ring has a perfect negative correlation with the size of his dick. How can you not know this???

xcgirl, more power to ya! You need to put up with that 5-inch piece of meat for years to come, so of course you deserve that $30,000 trophy!

A Real Horror Show wrote:

an engaged xc chick wrote:

my ring is only 1 karat, the quality is excellent but I just wish the diamond were a little bit bigger.

OMG, I feel for your boyfriend.

:::Shudder:::

For the record, I spent an assload on my wife's diamond, but would have run very far from her if she possessed an attitude like your's.

You're a real horror show.

I was just being honest in my post. Also, I bought him an (almost) equally expensive watch as an engagement present. I guess we are both horror shows! Why do all of these people care what others spend their own hard earned money on?

an engaged xc chick wrote:

Why do all of these people care what others spend their own hard earned money on?

If they didn't, you wouldn't have that diamond, sister.

Watch her get the 30k ring that she wants and get mugged on a run or in a parking lot.

Not that I wish that upon you, but you have to realize that you are going to attract as much negative attention as you will positive attention.

Go marinade on that for a bit...

Interesting thread...

In response to the "sad representational of American women," you can always marry a Canadian. My friend's father did that. They live a remarkably happy and normal life in BC and their children are well-adjusted, sensible, rational, kind children. Are all Canadians like that, no, and not all Americans are to be demonized, but this thread is ridiculous, so there you go.

In response to the resale value of a diamond: It isn't there the way the jewelers tell you it is because even if a pawn shop or a jeweler will buy your used ring, no one else will buy it used.

In response to the ring being what you make of it: My parents were in a similar situation to Flagpole and his wife, and while my mom's engagement ring is actually my grandmother's, the wedding ring itself is just a very thin, very simple band that fit next to the ring. It cost them nothing. Why? The couple who bought a fancy engagement ring had never come back for the matching wedding band because they got married. The entire jewelery industry is based on peculiar supply and demand. Sure, stones are rare, but you can't eat them, feed your children with them, send your children with them, heat your house, take you to work, or enable a family vacation.

In response to Flagpole and saving: Be careful how early you retire. My great-uncle retired 30 years ago when he was in his late fifties and he moved down to Florida. Everyone thought he was the biggest success ever. He and my great-aunt went out to dinner all the time, they went dancing, they joined social clubs, they traveled, everything. And he was still bored out of his mind and felt purposeless. Within a year he went back to work. He used to run an upholstery business, so he worked 3-4 hours every morning for another upolsterer, not because he needed the money, but because he was bored from lack of purpose. It's also the case that the longer you live without work the easier it is for your mental edge to slip. By all means retire!! It's great if you don't need to work you whole life. But retire with a plan for what you will do, because not working--especially if you enjoy work and get fulfillment from it--will be ever-present on your mind.

As for saving, you shoul still save, and you should still save the way Flagpole is suggesting. Sure, you could spend money now and be happy, or you could save it for the day that your loved one is diagnosed with cancer and you have hospital bills that insurance won't cover, or maybe it will be your great joy to tell your son or daughter that you've saved up enough to pay a portion of their children's college tuition bills with your children (their parents), and enable a generation of your family to graduate from college debt-free. That may be one of the greatest gifts of all time. Or you could put seed money down to fix the leaky roof of your church, which might matter a whole lot more to you at 70 than at 30, when it might be the center of your community life. Just because you get older doesn't mean that the opportunities for you to spend--and spend money wisely--disappear.

As for the ring, it's just a ring. It's a piece of metal and maybe a stone or three set in it. What matters (or, at least, what I think matters) much more is that you are getting married, which is wonderful, so congratulations. Make what you want of the ring, but make it what YOU want of it. Not what your friends want and not what these posters want you to want.

If you are worried about eternal things, perhaps you should rethink your position:It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God."Mark 10:25P.S. Many would say your view do make you a bad person.

another xc girl wrote:

Why do people drive Jaguars instead of Hondas, wear Ferragamo shoes etc. etc. As much as it doesn't matter in the eternal scheme of things, money allows you to buy a different set of trinkets. Other things like buying a house, saving for your child's education, taking great vacations, donating to charity are obviously much much more important than an engagement ring and going into debt or compromising your financial security to buy it doesn't make any sense either. If you have the money and he wants you to have it similar to how he wants to drive a nicer "status" car, then I don't see what the problem is. People can make judgements about you being concerned with material things, but in a relative sense I don't think it's so bad, and it doesn't make you a bad person.

To be perfectly honest, I don't even know if you should know how much your boyfriend makes, xc girl.

How'd it go down: do you ask him or did he openly volunteer his "great wealth" when trying to bag you home the first night you met in some bar or club?

Milton Friedman wrote:

Only 15% of your income? That's a very low number from such a pedantic source.

All I can do at the moment as the sole-income provider. Was a lot higher and flat out tons more when my wife worked before we had kids. That great start is what allows me to only do 15% now. Sometimes I put a little extra into one of my retirement accounts, so it's a little higher than 15, but 15 is dedicated.

xcjag wrote:

Now thats an interesting perspective.... Gay people ruined marriage for normal people. How does the deviant behavior of gay people ruin normal behavior???

I don't want to get into a debate on gay vs straight but that is not why marriage is a failed institustion.... I have to actually wonder if it ever was a beneficial institution....

You didn't catch the sarcasm in my post, eh? This is the BS that the Focus on the Family fvcks spew everytime someone discusses an amendment to ban gay marriage. "We must ban gay marriage because gay marriage ruins the sanctity of marriage!"

Then the preacher that is saying this gets off work and meets up with a gay escort, buys some crystal meth from him, but claims he doesn't have sex with the escort, or use the crystal meth. Two weeks later, another anti-gay preacher comes out of the closet and says he's struggled with homosexuality since he was 5. And about a week later, another preacher resigns because he had inappropriate sexual relations (but doesn't give any further details). These people are seriously better than the Jerry Springer show.

Sorry for getting away from the topic of the thread for a moment.