I, like most people I know, have learned my lesson about buying expensive sunglasses.  After sitting on a few pairs of specs and writing off $100 here, $150 there, I have resolved several times to never spend more than $50 on a pair in the future.

Which leads me to the latest victory of my vanity over precedent and reason: my purchase of a pair of Oakley Half Wire sunglasses.  My 18-month-old son had just wrecked my latest pair of $50 glasses (twisted into a wire pretzel), so I was in the market.  Sure enough, my focus settled on the $175 Oakleys, which were way cooler than those under my limit. ...