Yeah, this is getting a bit out of hand. It reminds me of when I found myself constantly buying PC accessories and/or parts to upgrade my computer setup, after I got divorced in the late 1980s. There was no one to say, “No” anymore.  

After finishing my last big LEGO set (NASA Lunar Roving Vehicle 42182), the plan was to wait until I sold some furniture (mid-century lounger) and a couple of my old guitar amps to fund purchasing the very expensive The Lord of the Rings: Rivendell 10316 set that I’ve been lusting after for some time. Then I heard that there was going to be an Amazon Prime Day on October 8th & 9th and I hoped that Rivendell would get a discount. But I had to balance that with the knowledge that LEGO sets are usually retired after a couple of years and Rivendell will have its two-year anniversary next March. In the meantime, I was able to sell my amps, but the lounger wasn’t selling (any Las Vegas locals are welcomed to click the link  and make a deal with me…). I was also working to reduce other expenses. Then a pop-up showed that if I purchased a LOTR set between 9/24 and 9/30 I would earn double VIP points, which can be used to discount future purchases. So I decided to make the buy this past weekend.

When I went to the LEGO website to check to see which of my two local LEGO stores had the set I was met with a “BACKORDERED” sign. Shit. If I placed the order they promised an October 10th shipping date. Damn. What am I supposed to do now? Yeah, I ordered it anyway. I wanted those damn double-points. 

I had just finished building my Alien Space Cafe MOC (see here) and had started pricing the parts needed if I was going to make it into a three-story building. But I didn’t want to blinding continue to build my LEGO city without getting a better grasp on how it would work with other structures.1 So, I decided that while I waited for the arrival of the Rivendell set, I’d spend my VIP points and get my alternative choice: Natural History Museum 10326 (Pictured above, BTW, there is a Minifig in front of the box to show you how huge this box is). 

The Natural History Museum, which was released in December of 2023, was less likely to be retired at its one-year anniversary, but I also didn’t want to risk it. That might seem a bit extreme, but in the process of organizing my sets I discovered that out of the 71 sets in my inventory, 35 of them were retired (which means that they cannot be purchased directly from LEGO, but might be found from third-party vendors with a huge markup in price).2 There’s a definite illogic to this fear, in as much as the instructions to built most of these sets are downloadable from LEGO directly (even after retirement), and one could order almost all of the parts from LEGO or through a website like Rebrickable.3 So there is a certain level of availability regardless of the “retirement” status. Blah, blah, blah. I bought the Natural History Museum set and it’s sitting in my LEGO area waiting for me to open it up and begin my LEGO therapy, while I wait for Rivendell to show up.

Here’s a gallery of images from my current LEGO collection (that doesn’t include my future LEGO “city,” which is currently just one lonely two-story Alien Space Diner…). Enjoy.

Sources:

Tags: 1st world problems, LEGO, LEGO 10326, LEGO addiction, LEGO therapy, 

Creative Commons License

JosephBruceBustillos.com (website) by Joseph Bruce Bustillos is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License

FOOTNOTES:
  1. At the same time, I knew that Rivendell was not a model that you stick next to an Alien Space Diner and really would have to be its own “land.” The City was understood to be separate from Rivendell.[↩]
  2. For example, one really popular modular building, LEGO Creator Expert Assembly Square 10255, was released in 2017 for $279.99, it has since been retired but can be purchased on Amazon for $419.99. I saw a “used/built” set at Brick & Minifigs for around $450. Ugh.[↩]
  3. Buying the parts through Rebrickable showed a cost of parts between $881.30 for 95% of the parts to $328.94 for 84% of the parts. They also showed three vendors selling the set, I assume intact for between $294.54 and $349.99. Link: https://rebrickable.com/sets/10255-1/assembly-square/#comments[↩]