Recently I added up all my bitcoins that I've spent over the years, and I've spent over 300
 
So yeah, used to have >300.
 
Now I'm at <10
 
*sigh*

I'm actively trying to get him to accept bitcoins (he owns a pawn shop).  I've piqued his curiosity, but not enough just yet it would seem.  I've even told him about bitpay!    He's getting closer, just not yet

 
I hope that's the case, because then that means I'll get to finally afford the sailboat I want ($50k sailboat) and I'll be able to stop hodling 5 more btc!  

I'm going to stop hodling 1 btc.  A friend of mine is offering to sell me an M1 garand for $800.  Can't pass it up.  Sorry hodlers, i've found my limit.

I sent a PM, but then thought I'd ask publicly, too, in case others have similar questions.
 
I see in your FAQ a list of prohibited items, but is that list a "no matter what" list or just by final destination?
 
For instance, here in Kansas it's completely legal for me to have firearm accessories shipped to my door, like say I want to buy a new AR-15 upper half.  (not a complete gun, the lower half (lower receiver specifically) has the serial number and requires a FFL transfer).
 
I'm not sure of Florida gun laws, but I think you Floridians can have various firearm accessories shipped to you, too?
 
So are you just taking a "we won't do these no matter what" purchases, or are you willing to have wiggle room for states that it is legal to do so?
 
I've had my eye on a new Spike's upper for a while, but since Amazon doesn't do those kinds of items, I've been having to wait.

When I cash out, I use gyft.com.  Sure it's not pure cash, but if my wife sees money coming into the bank account, then *she* might spend it.  Whereas a gift card is mine, allll mine!!   Especially amazon gift cards.  You can almost buy anything through amazon.  So yeah, it's super easy to cash-out in fiat, if you don't mind indirect methods.

So I recently noticed that namecoins are actually worth more than fractions of a cent.  Like $7 now.  A while back my computer crashed and I recovered what I could, and didn't have any good backups.  Apparently my namecoin folder wasn't important enough for me to try to find/recover.  Plus at the time of the crash, I think namecoins were still under a penny each, and I guess I wasn't paying attention to how many I had... that combined with a couple miners that were doing merged mining through slush's pool, I wasn't paying enough attention to the fortune I was accumulating.
 
So yeah, I'm a little peeved at myself that I "lost" $3500.  While I'm 99% certain they're gone forever, I do have a few hard drives from around the time it crashed, so maybe I backed it up on some other drive.  But I'm only giving myself a 1% of this.
 
http://explorer.dot-bit.org/a/N4ezFjc3qzz5ozkawQaNM7XkAd5UinE5hd

Meh, I survived the crash when bitcoins became 0.025 of their value at the time, this is nothing.  I kept mining then, and I'll keep on truckin' now. 

I don't have a DVR, so couldn't rewind, but I swear I heard Krusty the Clown tonight say he lost money from the bitcoin crash. 
 
Did anyone else catch that, or was I just hearing things??

I'm just pissed because I left work to go talk to a friend of mine who owns a pawn shop.  He showed me an M1 Garand he had for sale and was offering it to me slightly above cost.  I told him I'd think about it, but thought I'd sell a bitcoin when I got back to the office and over the weekend wait for the cash transfer, then go buy it on Monday. 
 
But nooooo, the bitcoin gods were against me, and at some point during the day before I had a chance to sell, I notice the sell price at well below 1000, i was all like "what the hell??"
 
So now I gotta wait for it to climb back up before I can set my hands on that beautiful match grade M1 Garand. *sigh*
 
all you whales doubling your bitcoins, and I'm just happy to be able to sell just one coin.

All is not necessarily lost.  One can buy in now since the price will increase.  Just dust yourself off, pick yourself up, and get on this train before you're left behind it as well.
 
I sold early (to trade/buy crap) back in the $5 days, and even the $50 and $100 days.   But I'm buying back at current values because we'll see values above $10k some day.  Don't lose your cool now, get back on board!

Since I'm sitting at a little over 5btc (yeah I sold earlier to buy some guns and other crap), and when btc is approx $2000 ea I will buy a couple gold bars from amagimetals, and then will hold the rest until they're worth a little over $10k each so I can buy a sailboat I've had my eyes on for a while.    Well by then the sailboat might be $50k or $60k, so I'll have to adjust my buyout price so I can buy that.  I might try to hold off a little longer so I can afford a marina slip to store it so I don't have to trailer it all the time

Now I know the Lawrence Journal World isn't a big newspaper, but it's the local newspaper for Lawrence, KS (home of University of Kansas (Go Jayhawks!)), and there was an article about a local art gallery accepting bitcoins!  Lawrence is sandwiched equidistant (half-hour either direction) between Topeka (capital of Kansas) and Kansas City.

 
http://www2.ljworld.com/news/2013/dec/03/local-gallery-first-accept-bitcoin/
 
Text of the article follows:
 
Art collectors in Lawrence looking for an original painting by a local artist might be able to find one at the Lawrence Percolator for around $250. Or, in lieu of cash, they might pick it up for roughly one-quarter to one-third of a Bitcoin, depending on the day.

The Lawrence Percolator announced this week that it is now accepting transactions in Bitcoin, making it possibly the first local merchant in Lawrence to accept the internet-based digital currency that is now starting to make its way into the mainstream online retail industry.

"Once you learn the system it's much easier to make transactions in Bitcoin than in cash or credit card," said Walt Ohnesorge-Fick, a volunteer member of the Percolator's board of directors.

The Percolator, 913 Rhode Island St., is a nonprofit gallery that describes itself as being "dedicated to community involvement and area artists."

Bitcoin was launched in 2009 as an alternative currency used mainly for internet transactions, but its precise origins remain something of a mystery. Since then its value has risen sharply, from about $30 per Bitcoin around this time last year, to a recent high of just over $1,000 per Bitcoin.

"I learned about the coin in 2009 during my grad program at San Francisco Art Institute," Ohnesorge-Fick said, "and had I bought into it then, I would have been able to retire today."

But financial experts caution people against speculating in Bitcoin value as a strategy for getting rich quickly because its exchange rate can fluctuate wildly, even over the course of a single day.

The website bitcoinmarkets.com, for example, quoted an exchange price of $799.99 Monday afternoon, down sharply from the previous 24-hour average of $989.03.

Although Bitcoin is commonly referred to as a kind of currency, Kansas University law professor Rick Levy said it really isn't. And that, he said, explains why it's legal to use and is not considered a form of counterfeiting.

Article I of the U.S. Constitution gives Congress the power to coin money. But Levy said Bitcoin is not "legal tender" and nobody has a legal obligation to accept it. Its value, therefore, is determined by whatever people are willing to accept in exchange for it.

"Historically, there have been other forms of made-up currency," Levy said. "For example, companies would pay their workers in 'scrip' that was used in the company store, and the military did something similar in other countries during times of war."

Ohnesorge-Fick said the gallery hasn't yet completed any transactions in Bitcoin, although he said he has made several purchases himself using the alternative currency. He said artists who sell their work through the Lawrence Percolator can decide for themselves whether to accept payment in Bitcoin or U.S. dollars.

Ok thanks for the info.  Should I assume that I'm hashing at the correct rate, then, and should hopefully be compensated accordingly?

So I'm wondering if someone might offer some advice, please?
 
I'm using bfgminer version 3.8.0 and connected to slush's pool.
 
I'm using the following settings on on the command line:
 (note that -G no longer appears to be an option)

When I check my account status on their web page, it's saying I'm only mining at roughly 300Mhash/sec.  It should be roughly 40Ghash (two jalapeños and one little single).  This also appears to be the same result on btcguild.com as well.

The bfgminer app shows that I'm hashing normally, i.e. 15GHash for the 2 (upgraded) jalapeños and the 1 little single (25GHash).
 
So I don't know if I need different flags or a different server or port or what.  
 
Anyone have any suggestions on where I'm going wrong?

I've found various snippets of information on the web, but lots of conflicting info, which might be dependent on the miner and version.

I have 5btc right now (mining super slow) so I'm unable to quickly build up what I spent recently.
 
That said, I'm also dumping $100 from my paycheck every two weeks into buying bitcoins.  Instead of my 401k allocation, my wife agreed to let me try this for a year and we'll evaluate when that time is up, and maybe rebalance after that.   $100 doesn't seem like much, I know, but we've had to batten down the hatches since she lost her job so I had to lower my 401k allocation. 
 
I'm in the process of trying to get my 401k company to add bitcoins to available funds so that I can get the pre-tax benefit of the 401k plus the awesome returns of bitcoins, and get my 50% company match

I buy stuff because no one knows what will happen.  Could it drop to zero? Dunno.  Could it shoot the moon?  Dunno.  What I do know is the value *right now*.  And I've bought various things along the way.  I'm a little disappointed in myself that I'm not sitting on a million bucks right now, but hindsight is always 20/20.  Same with our own country's economy.  I'm a "prepper" and building up some food/supplies in case of economic collapse or natural disaster, because no one can predict the future.  I'd rather have tangible goods than "electrons" or "paper".  
 
So that said, I'll keep spending when I see something cool I want that my wife wouldn't otherwise let me use "real money" to purchase with, such as some sweet guns that I wouldn't have been able to buy otherwise.

Let's see:
 
2 silver bars (1 oz each)
1 computer case - Corsair Obsidian 900D
2 Radeon HD 5770
2 Radeon HD 7970
2 BFL Jalapeño ASIC miners
1 BFL little single ASIC miners
1 Mossberg 590a1 shotgun
1 Beretta NEOS .22 pistol
1 AR-15 rifle
some ammunition
some gemstones (sapphire and topaz)
some paintball gear
paintballs
and probably some other odds and ends I'm forgetting at the moment.

I'm currently in a holding pattern while I wait for bitcoin value to stabilize, then I'll probably get a Dan Wesson .357 pistol pack
Maybe also a solar-powered backup generator ( http://www.sunrnr.com ), either directly if I can get him to accept bitcoins, or indirectly if I have to sell some coins.
I will also buy a gold bar once bitcoins are in parity with gold so I can get a one-ounce of gold straight up for a bitcoin.
 
and by then I'll probably be out of bitcoins.