Mixed retail fortunes
In the recent past I've bought a number of items for mind, home and body, most of which were painless transactions. Recently, however, things have gone a little pear shaped. (ED: +1)
We bought two new screen doors (and a repair on a third) so we'll be able to cool the house more effectively. Told they'd take 1 1/2 weeks, it was more like 3 1/2 weeks to delivery, only to find that the front door had been made incorrectly. Current status: waiting to hear back from the manufacturer with the replacement.
Today I received a package of multiple shiny things from ebay, some for me, but mostly for Christmas and birthday presents. There was a delay of a couple of weeks because one item was on back order. When they all arrived one of them was not the droid I was looking for, and it seemed likely that I would have to pay for shipping to return it (and possibly even shipping again to receive a replacement). I expressed displeasure to the retailer who immediately offered to ship out the correct item free of charge and let me keep the wrong one.
Last week I bought a brand new TiVo off eBay at a respectable discount off retail pricing. It was a private sale and the person selling it has been very communicative. One of those communications was to tell me that after she shipped the box she found the remote control on the desk where she'd checked all the components. Oops. The remote is in the mail and hopefully both packages will find their way to me.
Last Thursday we went to the Princely Treasures exhibition at the art gallery of WA, and was tempted into buying a small beautifully-produced book of silk textile designs and photos. It came with a CD of .jpg files, but it wouldn't run on either the Win7 or the XP laptops. Husband took it back today and got a replacement, which also wouldn't run on XP, Win7, or W2K for good measure. There is no visible shading on the disk and I suspect it is blank. Win7 coped the best in the sense that it invited me to burn something on the disk. I think it most likely that there was a bad batch of these made and I don't hold out much hope for getting a functional replacement. Will give it another go when I feel up to it.
The Australia Post courier is now not only chatty, but chatty about parcels he's delivered in the past. He seems friendly enough (and possibly starved for human interaction) but it is ever so slightly creepy.
Also perhaps related to shonky merchandise, I believe now that Bob The Big Pygmy Perch (dec.) was a very old fish when sold to me, so I'm confident that he died of natural causes rather than poor fish husbandry/wifery. Peggy, Poppy and Disco Stu, however, are doing well. Peggy seems to be full of eggs and has taken on even more femme colouring. Poppy seems to have missed the boat this season and has reverted to the androgenous mid-ground colouring, and Disco Stu has brightened up his boy colouring in the presence of The Ladies. For a while there I thought Poppy (once confidently identified as F) had switched to M, but I think it more likely she's just gone out of season. Still, Life will find a way. Some of the minnows also appear to be full of eggs.
Whoa, need to put my head down again. Had a complete relapse of the vertigo virus I first noticed a month ago, along with fever and sundry unmentionable symptoms. Very bored of it!
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Nearly forgot the three 1.5l food containers bought a few weeks ago from Coles. Buy 2 get 1 free, a bargain, right? When I got them home the insides smelled very strongly of nasty plastic, so I washed them and left them out to air for a week or more until I couldn't smell anything. Loaded them up with sundry dry goods. Last night broke out the noodles and was nearly overpowered by The Stench. Same with the pasta, and then I only gave a cautious sniff to the 3rd but it was contaminated too. Had to toss out all contents, plus of course the containers themselves. Actually felt ill from the smell after a while :-(
We bought two new screen doors (and a repair on a third) so we'll be able to cool the house more effectively. Told they'd take 1 1/2 weeks, it was more like 3 1/2 weeks to delivery, only to find that the front door had been made incorrectly. Current status: waiting to hear back from the manufacturer with the replacement.
Today I received a package of multiple shiny things from ebay, some for me, but mostly for Christmas and birthday presents. There was a delay of a couple of weeks because one item was on back order. When they all arrived one of them was not the droid I was looking for, and it seemed likely that I would have to pay for shipping to return it (and possibly even shipping again to receive a replacement). I expressed displeasure to the retailer who immediately offered to ship out the correct item free of charge and let me keep the wrong one.
Last week I bought a brand new TiVo off eBay at a respectable discount off retail pricing. It was a private sale and the person selling it has been very communicative. One of those communications was to tell me that after she shipped the box she found the remote control on the desk where she'd checked all the components. Oops. The remote is in the mail and hopefully both packages will find their way to me.
Last Thursday we went to the Princely Treasures exhibition at the art gallery of WA, and was tempted into buying a small beautifully-produced book of silk textile designs and photos. It came with a CD of .jpg files, but it wouldn't run on either the Win7 or the XP laptops. Husband took it back today and got a replacement, which also wouldn't run on XP, Win7, or W2K for good measure. There is no visible shading on the disk and I suspect it is blank. Win7 coped the best in the sense that it invited me to burn something on the disk. I think it most likely that there was a bad batch of these made and I don't hold out much hope for getting a functional replacement. Will give it another go when I feel up to it.
The Australia Post courier is now not only chatty, but chatty about parcels he's delivered in the past. He seems friendly enough (and possibly starved for human interaction) but it is ever so slightly creepy.
Also perhaps related to shonky merchandise, I believe now that Bob The Big Pygmy Perch (dec.) was a very old fish when sold to me, so I'm confident that he died of natural causes rather than poor fish husbandry/wifery. Peggy, Poppy and Disco Stu, however, are doing well. Peggy seems to be full of eggs and has taken on even more femme colouring. Poppy seems to have missed the boat this season and has reverted to the androgenous mid-ground colouring, and Disco Stu has brightened up his boy colouring in the presence of The Ladies. For a while there I thought Poppy (once confidently identified as F) had switched to M, but I think it more likely she's just gone out of season. Still, Life will find a way. Some of the minnows also appear to be full of eggs.
Whoa, need to put my head down again. Had a complete relapse of the vertigo virus I first noticed a month ago, along with fever and sundry unmentionable symptoms. Very bored of it!
--
Nearly forgot the three 1.5l food containers bought a few weeks ago from Coles. Buy 2 get 1 free, a bargain, right? When I got them home the insides smelled very strongly of nasty plastic, so I washed them and left them out to air for a week or more until I couldn't smell anything. Loaded them up with sundry dry goods. Last night broke out the noodles and was nearly overpowered by The Stench. Same with the pasta, and then I only gave a cautious sniff to the 3rd but it was contaminated too. Had to toss out all contents, plus of course the containers themselves. Actually felt ill from the smell after a while :-(