Wednesday, November 14, 2007

881

A couple of weeks ago our digital camera called it quits. I was tasked with selection a new one. This turned into another obsession for me. Originally I planned to petition the finance committee for a digital SLR. I have wanted a Canon Rebel XT for a while. After thinking about it thought, I decided that it would not be very practical, what I actually needed was a sub-compact - something that would fit in my pocket. This was also the only requirement provided by the other member of the Obsession A/V club.

I consults with several friends who had recently purchased cameras, Consumer Reports, CNET, and the reviews on Amazon. I made trips to Wal-Mart, Target, and Best Buy to investigate the cameras in person. I made a spreadsheet and listed several features I felt were important, maximum cost, minimum resolution, maximum size, power up up time, etc. After about a week of investigating I had it narrowed down to one. And then back up to three, and then back down to one again. And then it was time to scour the net for a good price.

Today I placed the order. The new camera should be here in plenty of time for Turkey day.

The Charger had its oil changed yesterday. 10500 Miles

Labels: , , , ,

Thursday, February 08, 2007

The Peanut Gallery Has Spoken
On Friday I went to the store to buy a couple of calculator batteries. The calcuator is a TI-83+. The required battery is a CR1616 or a CR2016. Either will do.

A friend, let's call him David, has the same calculator and needed to replace his battery also so I volunteered to pick up a spare.

Before going to the store, I wrote down the battery number so that I would not have to be concerned with forgetting it. Actually I wrote down both numbers. At the store, Wal-Mart, I looked over the battery selection and found the CR1620. Wait a minute, I thought it was a CR2016. Did I transpose those two numbers when I wrote it down?

I decided to call David and have him verify the battery number for me. No answer at this office. No answer on his cell phone.

I went ahead and bought the batteries which I discovered upon arriving home were definitely the wrong ones. I had not transposed the digits. Doh! "Oh well, I thought, I guess I will return them and get the right ones tomorrow."

As is the usual case, tomorrow rolled around the next day and while I was out I swung by Wal-Mart to get the correct battery. Only I forgot to bring the wrong batteries with me.

One this trip I did get the correct batteries. Why did I not spot these the first time? On the first trip I went to electronics (where the calculators live). On the second trip, an associate recommended I check in the jewelry department (where the calculators don't live).

What was the point of this story? Nothing, but iMike complained about there being no new posts in a while so I had to come up with some filler. Hope you liked it.

And the top was up on the Miata. I am still waiting on a warm breeze to blow through.

And I did my taxes last Saturday so that is one less thing. What are you waiting for?

And for the record, the whole elbow kissing thing was not my idea. Some other creative soul created that mischief. I simply got blamed 30 years later.

And the snow. I didn't even mention the snow last week.

I think I am all caught up now.

Labels: , , , ,