Want to buy something online? On a lark, found it on Ebay, need to buy it right away, without checking your closet for the one you have already? Here’s a little browser plugin that might break the instant gratification spell and give you a moment’s reprise to reflect and say oh, no no no.

It’s a browser plugin called the Wait-a-Bit Bug.

Here’s how it works. Once you initiate a purchase with your browser, the Wait-a-Bit Bug kicks in and asks for a validation number. This number will have been provided by your spouse. The rules of this inter-relationship cooperative effort will be that the number come from some object in the home, a serial number perhaps, or an expiration date. The plugin will provide the matching information already provided by your spouse: a description of where the number can be found. The partner wanting to make the purchase will now have to track down the item and type in the requested number. This task should provide the needed wait period in which to reconsider the appropriate quality of the purchase.

If you do complete the purchase, your partner is notified at the first opportunity that another item and identifying number must be selected. In this way, partner notification is enforced, and the purchase can be evaluated from differing perspectives, ensuring that one person at least will not be impartial and or indifferent.

If the buying behavior proves too compulsive to be affected by the wait period, the level of difficulty can be adjusted by selecting household items requiring searches of greater complexity. This strategy can incorporate the hiding of specified items, the specification of items which do not exist at all, as well as the recording of serial numbers deliberately mistyped. Hopefully these options can be agreed upon between the partners.