No, you're not an idiot. Idiots don't bother to take the time to educate themselves.
As you can see from some of these posts, atomizers don't last forever. Some seem to last for ridiculously long periods of time with daily abuse and absolutely no care. Others are babied and coddled, and die within a couple of weeks. As Notsmelly said, it's kind of the luck of the draw.
I've been vaping since January, and I came to the profound conclusion fairly early on that my life was going to be far less stressful if I simply accepted that atomizers are semi-consumable items. I figure on two weeks for an atomizer.
I can hear the screaming and wailing in the background, but the truth is that many of my atomizers last substantially longer than that . . . and a few don't.
In terms of a budget, though, it's not so terrible. Let's say an atomizer is $10 (although you can get them substantially cheaper than that (depending on the model) if you look around and especially if you're willing to buy a fair number of them). Two atomizers a month is $20. Not bad at all when added to the cost of liquid. (I rarely factor in cartridges because I refill them and when they get nasty, I simply restuff them with poly-fiber . . . a very inexpensive solution.)
Anyway, the way I see it, it's all about managing expectations. If you buy an e-cig kit and expect that your ONLY expense for months and months is going to be new cartridges and liquid, then you feel horribly used when your atomizer dies after 3 weeks. On the other hand, if you EXPECT your atomizer to crap out in 2 weeks, then you're very happy indeed that you got an "extra" week out of it.
I lived through the Chinese New Year when parts were difficult to find . . . and what was out there was expensive. Like Scarlet O'Hara, I swore I'd never go hungry again. Accordingly, I laid in a supply of atomizers and a few extra batteries. (Batteries don't seem to crap out on me like atomizers.)
Once you settle on the model that's your "go-to" vape, it makes sense to buy parts in bulk from China. You can get some awesome deals that way. But for those who are new to e-smoking and still getting their feet wet, I generally recommend that you have 2-3 extra atomizers on hand. And if you get to the point where you only have 1 spare atomizer, you should definitely have more.
For batteries, I generally don't fuss too much with them because I use USB passthroughs fairly often since I work at the computer. I also have an adaptor in my car, so I can vape on a passthrough while I drive. Accordingly, my batteries are primarily used for when I'm out and about. And even then, my "out and about" device is mostly my Screwdriver, which uses non-proprietory batteries (and by that, I mean cheap batteries that aren't specifically designed for e-cigs).
I would imagine that if one were to use e-cig batteries extensively, a battery a month to add into the mix wouldn't be at all unreasonable. Batteries don't last forever, and they hold shorter charges over time. And, of course, sometimes a battery simply goes wonky.
.. Oh wait, I amend that... When I tried the passthrough, I was stupid and didn't know where the "blue" battery was suposed to go or why it was in the box, and that the passthrough didn't work.. So "whomever" from CigTechs had to deal with my silliness.. After he/she realized I hadn't put the "blue" battery in the passthrough itself, all went well and I was cookin' (4 emails)... I think I'll stick with CigTechs and for liquid I'll keep on using HealthCabin since both have great service, and the support is more than I could ever deal with 
