Best Buy, you corporate devil

I have good news and bad news about my camera.

The good news: I found my usb cable. This means I was able to hook up my Kodak camera to the charger that plugs into the wall.

The bad news: My camera has been connected to a perfectly good outlet for over two days, and, after repeated tries, it won't turn on.

Damn you, Best Buy. Either this charger is faulty or the camera was never fixed in the first place. Either way, I'm pissed. Now I have to make the trek to Best Buy and recount my ever-growing story to some poor schmuck who has probably grown accustomed to listening to grumpy patrons who come in every day and complain, bitching about a DVD player they paid way too much money for and, after just a year -- and naturally just days after their service contract expired -- no longer works. Or have to listen to this gal, who:

-brought in her camera on Oct. 20 because the charger didn't work
-got the camera back roughly three weeks later...without the charger
-waited at least three more weeks for the charger to return
-and when it didn't come, she returned to Best Buy -- after numerous calls to the store -- to raise hell
-which was pointless because she went home empty-handed with no answers
-only to return later that week for a free charger...that doesn't work
-which brings me back to Best Buy, more than two months after my initial visit to get my camera fixed

If I were Santa, Best Buy would be on my naughty list.

A right of passage

I dropped the ball this holiday season.

We have a basket full of holiday cards and photo postcards. It seems that every one of Ben's colleagues and a large number of family and friends -- single friends included -- got the urge to spread Christmas cheer this year. Missing from the pile is a holiday photo card of our lovely mugs.

Being a "Mrs." now, I wanted to send one out to everyone we know so I could spread a little cheer of my own and show off a gorgeous wedding photo, too. It's a right of passage for newly-weds and new parents, right?

But Ben, God bless him, thought we could spend our money on better things. And I agree -- the $5o or so it would take to buy the cards and slap a stamp on them could be spent on something else, say a charity like Toys for Tots.

When Shutterfly.com offered a discount on holiday cards earlier this month, I should have jumped at the opportunity. And to think, dozens of refrigerators could be adorned with a sweet card from us right now. Instead, they're decorated with photos of someone else's kids.

Well, there's always Valentine's Day.

My qualm with Best Buy

I may boycott Best Buy for a very, very long time. Although that may not matter much to a corporation that I rarely frequent.

But for the last two months, I've stepped inside the store and talked to sales associates more often than a person would ever want.

The issue: My camera charger stopped working this fall.

Lucky for me, I bought a two-year service plan when I got the camera for my birthday two years ago. Naturally, I brought in my camera and the charger on Oct. 20. The camera and the accessory were sent to the service center to be fixed. So far, so good.

When I returned to Best Buy about three weeks later, the camera had returned but the charger had not. No explanation was offered. Assuming that the charger was simply still at the service center, the associate helping me said he would have to e-mail the center about the problem. He also said that the charger would probably not make it back to Minneapolis before Thanksgiving but that I would get a call when it was in.

When no one called me by the first week of December, I started to worry. So last week (Dec. 10), I called Best Buy, explained my situation and was told I would get a call back that evening. No one called. At this point, I was mildly frustrated. But on Dec. 12, I called Best Buy. Again, I was told someone would call me back that night with an answer. I don't think I even need to tell you what happened or, should I say, didn't happen.

On Saturday, I decided to go to Best Buy and raise some hell. By raise some hell, I mean I wanted to show my frustration, huff and puff, that kind of thing. The associate who had helped me back in November fortunately was working. He checked his e-mail history. The service center never replied to his inquiry about the location and status of my charger. So a higher-up said he would call the service center on Monday -- because it's closed during the weekend -- and get back to me by Monday afternoon. And if he didn't, he advised that I call him Monday. What do you think happened? Not a word from Best Buy.

Yesterday, I called the store and relayed my ever-growing story to another member of the Geek Squad. He informed me that the little helper who promised to call on Monday doesn't work Mondays or Tuesdays. Certain expletives came to mind when I heard this. He also told me that my service plan had expired, and I reminded him that it wasn't my problem that it expired during Best Buy's two-month-long attempt at fixing and returning my damn charger. Likely becoming just as sick of my problem as I was of him, he offered a new charger.

I picked it up last night. It requires a USB cord, though. My old didn't. So I'm on the hunt for the original package my camera came in and the USB cord that should be in it. Great.

On a side note, while I was at the store last night, there were at least a few customers and employees just moments away from going postal in that place. I could only empathize.

What's missing in my life...

I love my new 'do, but I miss the swish.

That's right, boys and girls. I cut my hair. I started gradually, cutting around five inches in October. This weekend I trimmed about two more inches.

I like the cut. It's sophisticated. But as I ran tonight, there was no swish. My usually long tail is about two inches.

I miss my hair, but only when I run.

Meet the dish washer

Getting married has destroyed my hands.

I wash dishes for two now. Almost every day, the dishes pile up. And almost every day, I wash them. On weekends, I've washed dishes multiple times a day. I do this because we don't have a dish washer, I hate clutter and my husband -- well -- is worthless when it comes to washing dishes (he does other things around the house). He either has to work at home after dinner or is just too tired (yes, I can hear the violin player, too) to do them.

So for the first time in my life, my hands seem irreparably dry and sometimes cracked. I never required hand moisturizer. Now I have a bottle in the bathroom and lotion in my desk at work. I cringe when I have to shake hands.

Being a wife is hard.

One, two, three, four, bounce, kick, straddle step

I wish I had a video camera. Because words, I fear, cannot convey the extent of which I looked like a giant, uncoordinated, lanky, foolish dork on Monday night.

Ben talked me into taking "step" class at the YMCA. It's an aerobic class where you basically do different foot movements and kicks that require stepping on and off a platform. Not only do you have to get your feet to do short, quasi-choreographed movements, you have to move your hands and arms, too.

I could barely get my feet to move at the right time and in the correct sequence, let alone coordinate my arms to do whatever they were supposed to do. You would think that after much repetition -- doing the same foot sequence for maybe five sets throughout the course of an hour -- someone with a year of danceline and several years of dance class behind her could get a handle of things. Not me.

No, this girl, at times, just kind of stared at the instructor, wondering how I could get my feet to connect with my brain. Whenever the instructor apologized for the confusing moves, I knew she was talking to me. In a group of seven, I was the worst. Even Ben, who my sister had initial doubts about, performed much, much better than me. Compared to me, he was like a Vikings cheerleader, albeit a 6-feet-2-inch one with legs of steel.

So next time at the YMCA, I will return to the treadmill and kiss it. Because running is one thing my feet can do right.

Three ladies, a kitchen and a strong sense of humor

It is a guaranteed bonding experience when three young women, with their combined culinary ignorance, mixing bowls and cookie sheets, flour and sugar, wax paper and rolling pins, come together for the common goal of a holiday baking party.

Today, my friends, Naomi and Heather, and I joined for such an experience. A holiday baking fest, as I like to describe it.

We spent four hours baking, cleaning dishes, melting caramel and chocolate, making meringue for the first time. Four hours! By the time we finished, we had:

--Baked cookies on a sheet we failed to butter because the recipe instructions said null about greasing. You can be sure we used Pam for the next batch.
--Used about eight eggs on a simple meringue frosting that called for only three -- not because we misread the directions but because we(I) didn't have patience and dumped instead of gradually poured the granulated sugar into the meringue. I didn't get a thick frosting; I got a fluid mixture that couldn't properly frost a cookie even if I begged and begged it to. The second try, I'm happy to report, was the charm.
--Spent around an hour preparing zimtsterne cookies (that doesn't include baking time) because I wanted a challenge.
--Burned multiple fingers after melting chocolate and taking a cookie sheet out of the oven.
--Used a shot glass as a cookie cutter. Talk about improvisation!

But we also:
--Produced about 60 chocolate peanut butter krispy balls. Yumm.
--Baked a successful batch of zimtsterne (the cookies were too damn hard to make a double batch this time).
--Prepared enough dough for five dozen fruity oatmeal cookies.
--Made just enough turtle clusters, although there will be no complaints from me if my friend makes more.
--Baked pre-made macadamia nut cookie dough, in case all of the other recipes proved to be disasters.
--Ate enough cookie dough and peanut butter krisp clusters to make our blood sugar levels shoot through the roof. Yes, I think there may be a hole in the roof.