Par for the course, I’ve got a big wad of money and I can’t decide how to spend it. Today’s my birthday (yes, happy birthday to me) and the cash is rolling in (or still rolling in some cases… I hope). I’ve got my eyes set on a new digital camera. By “new” I mean my very own. Abby has a 1.3 megapixel camera that we’ve used since 2001, but I’ve had a love/hate relationship with it.

Right now I’m trying to decide between three Canon PowerShots: the A95, the SD200 and the A510 (by the way, the one thing I hate about technology is when we have to give every product an incomprehensible product name; they do it with cars: XL, XLT, LX, SL, GL, GLS–what the hell does it all mean!?).

I’m leaning towards the SD200 because it’s so freaking small. But that also means it runs on lithium ion batteries, not AAs. Which usually means you don’t carry spares. Though I assume you can still replace them. It just means you need to bring the charger with you on vacation. Though I suppose that’s just as bad as toting spare AA batteries. I also like the SD200 because Best Buy has a $50 rebate. That makes me feel like I’m getting more camera for my money.

The downside is that it’s only 3.2 megapixels. For another $85 I could jump to 5 MB with the A95, though then I’m going big and bulky (it’s twice the weight of SD200!). To stay small and trim it gets more costly. I’m not sure how much of a difference the megapixels will make to me. Right now anything more than 1.3 seems huge.

Or I could just forget the camera deal and go blow my money on books, CDs and DVDs. That’s always fun.