Shopping for hardware is a complicated undertaking, so it’s essential to decide beforehand exactly what you want and how much you are willing to spend.

In my case, I answered these two questions with “a flat screen monitor” and “hopefully not too much.”

With that taken care of, I went to the mall. I went into three stores. In each one, the same thing happened: the sales people saw a grey-haired guy standing in front of computer stuff, breathing through his mouth, and avoided him until he left again.

Then I went back to work.

The following day, I went to a different mall with a colleague from work, a fellow who knows more about hardware than I do. When we got he said, “computers are over there. I’ll be in the DVD section.”

I stood in front of the flat-screen monitor display and oxygenated my blood through my mouth. I observed the products on sale and educated myself through close attention to physical details and the descriptions on the little price tag things next to the monitors. While the 17″ ones were the cheapest, I realized, the 19″ monitors were bigger and cooler-looking. So I decided I wanted one of those. They ranged in price from something-something-99 to you’ve-really-got-to-be-kidding-99.

I asked the saleskid which one he would recommend. Cunning as I am, I think I phrased it like this: “I want a monitor. Which one should I buy?” He shrugged. I looked for my work colleague, but he was engrossed in the fine print on the back of a DVD. The FBI warning or something.

The cheapest monitors were suspicious-looking and oddly named, while the expensive ones were cooler looking, had unnecessary features (Height-adjustable!!) and I also had never heard of the brands, although they sounded cooler than the cheap ones. Which left the ones in the middle.

This, I realized too late, is done intentionally. There is, I think, a science to marketing. Cheap ones over there, with the cheap prices you use in the ads to lure customers, expensive ones over there, which you never plan to really sell, they’re just to make the ones in the middle, the ones you really intend to sell, look reasonable. They do this with everything – cars, shoes, humans.

So I bought a medium-priced monitor. Expensive-medium. Black, to match our keyboard at home. Looks really cool. Built-in speakers! Nothing is too good for you, Alpha!

Now about that cello…