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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

to ask what's the worst thing you've ever bought?

156 replies

y0rkier0se · 06/04/2017 19:02

I'm moving house next week, and i'm in the process of -procrastinating- packing. I found some ceramic zebras that I bought at an auction a couple of years back. They're two cream zebras, with grey and blue paint covering them, with crystals around the base. It's truly horrendous, the only possible justification for buying them was that from where I was sat in the large room you couldn't see quite how bad they were. And I really really wanted to use the paddle [grin and they're so bad that no-one else bidded. DP constantly jokes that they're going to get damaged in transit but as terrible as they are, I don't want to get rid as I laugh every time I see them. Anyone else got any 'seemed a good idea at the time' buys?

OP posts:
7Days · 06/04/2017 21:36

A horrible coffee table, and a shockingly bad picture and table lamp. We had just moved into our first house, and i had been saving for something really nice for the sitting room. A couple of hundred pounds. Did I ever pick the wrong day to go shopping, had pmt and was raging with dh for some reason. Met mum and she STUCK UP for dh. Gave mum an earfull. Went shopping and anger bought the most ugliest looking expensive bastards you could ever encounter. Mum was annoyed with me so she only gave a half hearted attempt to stop me. I knew it was bad at the time but the full horror only dawned after I'd come on a few days later.
That makes me sound like an awful bitch. But in my defence I was very young and dont get pmt like that anymore. It was 15 yrs ago and have done my penance. Lived with them for about 3 yrs.

Original poster
y0rkier0se · 06/04/2017 21:49

Hahahaha 7days, cut your nose off to spite your face there!

OP posts:
fruityb · 06/04/2017 21:57

I know someone with one of those robot vacuum things. Their dog had a shit in the house... vacuum went through aforementioned, and continued its journey round the house... I'll leave that there.

Mine is a Peugeot 206 as well. I spent more on repairs than I did on the car in the first place. I used to kick it on a daily basis.

Also have a shit hand held hoover. Noisy and does nothing.

Original poster
y0rkier0se · 06/04/2017 22:10

I actually laughed out loud to the thought of that fruity Grin

OP posts:
SmokedSalmonAndFizz · 06/04/2017 22:11

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Persemillion · 06/04/2017 22:20

A steam cleaner. Loathe can't describe my feelings for that thing.

Penguin27 · 06/04/2017 22:23

The Predator statue 😂

The worst thing I ever bought was a pair of £200 designer jeans 2 sizes too small Hmm

Original poster
y0rkier0se · 06/04/2017 22:27

See I find my steam cleaner a really useful purchase! I don't really 'get it' but it makes a satisfying noise and things smell cleaner after

OP posts:
Gingernaut · 06/04/2017 22:33

A Good Houskeeping electronic top pan scale. One of those weighing scales that look like a chopping board.

Lovely.

Excep thee design flaw is that it cuts out after 20 seconds. WHETHER YOU'VE FINISHED USING IT OR NOT!!!

The number of times it's just cut out before I've finished using it is too high to count.

aquashiv · 06/04/2017 22:35

A carpet sweeper. They are phenomenally rubbish. The effort required in order to pick up one hair that spins round the wheel and invariably pops out again.

Persemillion · 06/04/2017 22:46

y0rkier0se

That's how diverse we humans can be, I gave mine to my sister in law and she can't live without it!

Original poster
y0rkier0se · 06/04/2017 22:46

Definitely didn't just have to google carpet sweeper to see what it was Hmm in my defence we have wooden flooring downstairs

OP posts:
Bloodybridget · 06/04/2017 22:49

A dustbuster. It busts less dust than I could possibly have imagined.

Thinkingblonde · 06/04/2017 22:53

A Vax cylinder vacuum cleaner....I didn't pick it, DH did. I was in hospital and our old vacuum cleaner 'broke' so he bought this new one. It was powerful alright but the filter needed cleaning after every use.

To clean it I needed to belt it on the outside wall, I'd get covered in dust.
Dh sometimes blasted it with compressed air to clean it.
150 quid he paid for it.
I took it down to the tip eventually as I was sick of the palaver.

Oh and the 'broken' Hoover wasn't broken after all, I checked it and found a pair of socks and a lump of wood jammed in the pipe.

Got a lovely Dyson and a Dyson cordless now. Happy face.

RedDogsBeg · 06/04/2017 23:03

The only way to explain some of my dh's purchases is some kind of auction fever, OPGrin. They are a source of endless amusement within the family so perhaps, just maybe, not such bad purchases.

Pettywoman · 06/04/2017 23:03

An inflatable home sauna. Admittedly it was a joke purchase but supposedly a non joke item. You put it over a plastic garden chair, inflate it and plug in a kettle/steam thing. Your head stuck out the top. Totally shit.

to ask what's the worst thing you've ever bought?
MumBod · 06/04/2017 23:07

Not one, but two salt lamps.

I sleep-bought them off Amazon. We were all like Confused when they turned up.

Stellar67 · 06/04/2017 23:21

Where do I start? I don't just have one.

A Rayburn, that we had to uninstall and install (never did the latter).

A plantar fasciitis foot holder thing. Was shit. More pain than gain.

A kiln, yes. DH said let's get into pottery. Saw a kiln on a selling page and got it. Not touched it.

A sewing machine. This is a recent purchase as dementia MiL gave me her MIL sewing machine which was awful. Hadn't the heart to say anything. Que a bin bag of random sewing arriving. I've just spent over £150 on a thing to sew some stuff for my mil. 😳

Quinoa

Twofurrycats · 06/04/2017 23:22

Every dining room carpet except the last one for 17 years! All looked great in the shop and on floor for a short time. The first one was cheap to replace a swirly 1980's nightmare but i was for ever shampooing it. Still looked shit. Then a more expensive one: shed fluff forever then looked shit. I wanted wood after that but it would've been a nightmare (flagged floor with God knows what on top of it). So far carpet 3 is behaving - but I'm keeping my eye on it.

EdSheeranswife · 06/04/2017 23:25

A tattoo of my exh name in Chinese on my back Blush --I was 19 and it was the 'in thing'

Still saddled with it 16 years on Envy

SabineUndine · 06/04/2017 23:27

I've got a robot vacuum and I love it. Worst buy probably a steam cleaner that the cat and I are both frightened of.

owenjonesismyhero · 06/04/2017 23:28

Aspire One Cloudbook 14 AO1-431-C2Q8 - full details in case anybody googling buying this piece of shit can see this - It has so little memory it can't even keep track of the time and date properly and I have to keep resetting it.

Sold as having 2GB - but this is all taken up with the system itself. no room for office, or even a printer software to be installed.

I HATE it.

Stuck16 · 06/04/2017 23:37

A pencil drawing of myself and exh from a street artist in Ibiza- not even a caricature because at least that might have been funny this was a serious, no smiling portrait of us- we ended up looking like Pauline Quirke and Linda Robson from the opening titles of Birds of a Feather- cost 60 euros and i don't think we ever took it out of its box

ragz134 · 06/04/2017 23:46

mumbod I nearly bought those salt lamps the other day, I convinced myself I needed them... I'm guessing they are not as wonderful as I hoped?

toffeeboffin · 06/04/2017 23:51

A salad washer.

Totally feckin useless.