8 of 30 Days of Freebies

You know that one big thing at Christmas that all the kids that don't have one ask for, and all the kids that do have one want a better one? And all the parents want a bigger, better, faster one than they already have. Yeah, those pesky little computers.

Well, I decided I want a bigger, better, faster one too, and I remembered all the places that had them on sale at Christmas for REALLY good prices, and these days they come with LOTS of space and plenty of RAM (I get really frustrated waiting on those huge scrap files to save). So today hubby and I, and the two youngest kids went shopping. Yes, I know I said yesterday that it would be a while before we took them back out in public, but the computer bug hit and I couldn't find a babysitter.

Anyway, we went to Decatur to Office Depot, and I looked around at the PCs on display. They didn't have a huge selection, but they had good prices. And they had plenty of laptops, but I really hate those little keyboards and I don't have enough places to plug in all my gadgets. Anyway, when we finally got a geek over to help us, he asked what I needed, I went through the whole spill and my minimum requirements, and blah blah blah, and he finally felt the need to fill me in on the fact that they didn't have ANY computers currently in stock except the ones on display. What?? None?? Nope, nada. You think I'm kidding, call OD in Decatur, Alabama and ask them. Be sure to talk to the little geek in the Technology section so you can give him the same astonished speechlessness that he got from me (Is speechlessness even a word?).

So we go from there to Staples, and get the same thing. Apparently, it's the end of their "quarter" and they don't feel the need to keep computers in stock at the end of the quarter. Probably don't have inventory employees that can count that high. The geek that worked there suggested we try Target. So we drove across town to Target, only to learn that they had more computers in stock than either Office Depot or Staples, and the employees used them to ring up our purchases. They don't even SELL computers there.

So we drove 25 miles to Huntsville, and went into Best Buy. And stood around for 20 minutes waiting on some help. After looking at about 10 different computers, debating on whether or not I wanted a new monitor as well (turns out I did), and finally pointing to the one I wanted, which was much more than I wanted to spend (friggin' sales lady was too good at her job), we find out that that particular model was out of stock. OK, let's go to second choice. Ooops, sorry, out of stock there too. OK, so now she won't even write me a rain check since today was the last day on those sale prices. So here I sit at home, typing on my old computer.

And all this time, while I shopped for computers, hubby got to chase the kids around the store. Seems he preferred that to being anywhere within hearing vicinity of me. As, it turns out, did most of the store employees that I came into contact with. I'm surprised he didn't have lots of help with the kids while we were there. Why the hell do these stores keep employees on the clock just to say, "Sorry, we're out of those." Dang...close the store down and give these folks a Saturday off. With pay. They can afford it since they've sold out of every damn computer in the building.

So here you go, more freebies, made especially by me on my poor old prehistoric Gateway. Funny, I didn't think it was all that old yesterday. Just goes to show what a day of computer shopping will do to ya. Anyway, today's freebie is the upper case letters of the alpha pictured above. You can snag it Here on Rapidshare or Here on 4Shared.

Enjoy!

Kitty