Yeah its a generational thing, Marketing has an awful lot to answer for.  My Dad liked to look smart, liked the family to have decent things, but for sure he wasnt discarding something just because it was 'not-new'.

My Dad was an engineer, and if he took some rubbish to the dump (what we now call a recycling centre) he would often come back with something he thought he could fix up, for some reason it always seemed to be a lawn mower or a moped!  My Dad saw the real value in things, things that with just a couple of minor tweaks, and with parts he just had laying around, could be given a new lease of life.  I think in some sense he knew how hard it was to make products, and to him it seemed like a travesty to just discard all that hard work.

It just struck me; Wow, I miss my Dad.  But I have picked that trait up from him to some extent, I dont like being wasteful.