What kind of evidence would you need?

Lmfao, not a financial expert who doesn't have a new car fully bought and paid for in six month.

What's the difference, really? I'll refuse to sell my appreciating stocks and commodities, just like I'll refuse to sell my appreciating Bitcoin... And most of the wealth out there is in assets, not USD...

Granted, had I waited two weeks, I could've had almost $10,000 more. Though it may have been just as likely that as soon as it had reached $22.5, it went down to $15 again.

And that would be really frigin cool.

Not exactly "took from husband" as the HELOC is in both our names. It's more like "took money from join checking account without bothering to ask my husband." I hear it is a very frequent problems with guys who have wives (my SA goon friend's wife maxes out his cards all the damn time). At least my money wasn't being thrown away on something useless, and was put into what was a fairly secure investment at the time.

P.P.S. Not only am I the financial expert in the family (saved parents a few $10k through refinances and other financial tricks, bailed friends out financially, etc), I also fully fund my husband's IRA ever year, and let him keep the resulting $2,000 tax return that he gets from it (that's on top of the $500/paycheck I put into my own 401k. Retirement first, Bitcoin as a bonus second). I'm not all bad

I hope all of your assholes grow taste buds!

I'm sure it will. Soon as the Bitcoin euphoria dies down a bit, and prices come down to whatever levels I figure are reasonable, hubby already asked me to do this again to help pay off his new (bought a year ago) car. No idea when the Bitcoin rollercoaster will reach the top though.

Nope. Won't have to until April a year from now.
I need a car to drive to work, and mine is almost dead, so...
Also, I'm still in the game. The bitcoins I sold were only the ones I bought with the $15,000 I borrowed. Ever since June of 2011 I have switched from using my bank's savings account to using Bitcoin as my main savings account, and ever since have saved about $200 every paycheck into bitcoin for things like travel, new phones/computers, miscellaneous purchases, and emergency fund stuff. When I announced I'm doing that (about same time Falkvinge said he's moving all his savings into bitcoin), a bunch of people said I was crazy and an idiot for doing that because of bitcoin's volatility. I'm sure there are many who still think that. Yes, it's volatile, but  the volatility really doesn't matter over the long term. Long story short, my BTC account is worth about $20,000 more than I actually put into it, despite the rise to $30, crash to $3, and everything in between. And yes, I've cashed out plenty of times as I traveled or bought electronics. Travels all go on credit cards (lots of cash-back), and get paid off the same month.

OK, bit more info.
First, this wasn't a "lucky gamble." Bitcoin prices stabilized by the time I bought, the loan interest rate is 3% (pretty tiny,  accumulating only $450 a year), and it was a risk I could afford. I knew bitcoin would reach the desired price eventually. Even if they crashed a few times until then, all I needed was for them to reach a target price of $22. When buying, I was estimating that this would happen by the end of May. I only got lucky because the price bubbled up, and I got there in ~6 month instead of ~12, but it would've reached there eventually.
Second, yeah, I'm sure just keeping bitcoins would've been a better financial investment long-term, but the car I currently drive is 14 years old with 240,000 miles on it. It's about time for it to retire, and damn if it isn't trying. I'm frugal, so this new car purchase want spur of the moment, but was necessary. Maybe it being all loaded and luxury wasn't, but, hey, that was free  
Third, it takes 2,650 D-Cells. And I didn't buy the car Phin suggested because Smart cars were completely broken when they came out in US, going from 70+mpg diesel to 35+mpg premium gas only. Waste of money.
I don't offer tax services for free, but keep in it Bitcoin and you don't have to pay taxes on it, or sell it for USD and declare it as a capital gain with 15% tax. You can do more, especially if you mine, but...

Yeah, it kinda turned into a completely paid off loan, and a new one of these, fully loaded, paid in full



Plus a few grand left over to pay down my other loans. No idea how it happened. I dumped over $45,000 on the market in a course of three days, and the price still kept going up. The walls didn't move either. So, new "luxury" car, in six month, pretty much for free, for not really doing anything. Glad I'm such a stupid bitcoiner.

My wallet feels kinda empty though. I still have the few BTCk in my bitcoin savings account, but it just doesn't feel as bloated, and the price is still going up, and I feel I'm missing out on even more money, and so I'm  

Oh, and I'm the finance expert in the family (do our financial planning, investing, taxes, etc), so my husband trusts me with all things finance.

So, my husband owns the house (the mortgage is in his name), but a few years ago we opened a HELOC (Home Equity Line of Credit) together, with both our names on it. Some time last summer, I borrowed $15,000 from the HELOC without really asking for permission or telling my husband about it. I told him eventually (he asked about it after seeing a transfer on the monthly statement). I used that entire $15,000 to invest in bitcoins, and bought about 2,000+ of them.
Anyway, as of last Sunday, it's all gone. No more 2,000+ BTC. All gone poof 

*snort* What? Governments don't want fiscal responsibility  Politicians know they will get voted out if they cut programs to their states, and know they will get more votes if they get even more earmarks and money. They don't care where the money comes from, or if it's from debt. Likewise for people who vote them in. They just want more money for their roads, schools, and government programs, and don't want any cuts to their entitlements, not caring where the money comes from, either. This whole "Rabble rabble huge deficit and debt rabble rabble" is just bullshit that they use to attack each other, but that no one is actually willing to do anything about. Heck, soon as we get a surplus and can actually pay down our debt, we are told, "but that surplus is 'The People's Money'" and we get tax cuts instead of debt paydowns. There really is no end to all of this other than in tears.

1. Amazon's thing is no different from iTunes credits, Facebook credits, or Xbox Live points. There are plenty of non-targets out there, but Bitcoin is completely unique, still being a target all on it's own.
2. Amazon's thing is not a currency. Unless Amazon does something drastic, I doubt this will pave the way for anything, any more than Xbox points did. The closest privately owned currency that Bitcoin comes to is SecondLife's Linden dollars, and those got slapped with so much regulations that they never got a chance to pave the way to anything.

Fuck you, got mine.

My husband works at an automation control company (think computer brains that run all the robots in factories). The box of fans is actually ours though. He just keeps it at work.

You'll never quit, will you 

The power specs are definitely below advertised. Doesn't even come close to 1000watt!  Still can't get software to work. Probably due to the Chinese New Year. By the way, that's not a stock photo I found online. I do actually own this.

The world economy would suffer, sure, but it would definitely not collapse. We don't produce and buy all of the world's products. Many places in the Middle East, South America, and Africa will barely be affected, since they don't really do a lot of business with US, anyway. Plus USA is only 350,000 million people out of the 7 billion population. US is important, but it's not THAT important.