Wednesday, November 26, 2008

kingdom of numb skulls



It seems that one bad decision leads to another. For some unfathomable reason I decided to head over to Costco yesterday.


Run that one through your Spaceship Enterprise data analyzer. Costco. Tuesday before Thanksgiving. I may as well have been shopping at an O'Hare gift shop.


So, what was so important to brave the reenactment of the Norman Invasion? I need a new lap top computer for my move to Mexico -- and I thought Costco would be the place to start. The selection is small. The products are out of date. The price is slightly discounted. Why not fight a mob for all of those advantages?


Not unsurprisingly, I found nothing -- in less than five minutes. But this is Costco. There had to be something to buy. I wandered up and down each row -- finding nothing. I almost picked up three biographies (Andrew Jackson, Sam Adams, and FDR), but I put them back. I need to study Spanish, not American politicians.


No hunter returns home without bounty -- especially from Costco. I grabbed a copy of Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull -- and proved my theory: one bad decision leads to another. It is dreadful. Though, I must admit, Cate Blanchett's sword-wielding Russian parapsychologist is something to behold.


Fortunately, the day was not a complete loss. I also bagged a copy of the eleventh season of The Simpsons. I may not have television, but I now have all of the advantages of reruns.

10 comments:

1st Mate said...

Steve - Why not take a look at Amazon for a laptop? Shipping would be free.

I actually dozed off during part of "Crystal Skull." I did think it was nice that Indie and his original squeeze got back together.

jennifer rose said...

You can get a new Dell Vostro A860 (their basic commercial notebook)
at dell.com starting at $349 plus $20 shipping.

http://www.dell.com/content/products/category.aspx/vostronb?c=us&cs=04&l=en&s=bsd

They were running it for $299 last week and I expect that they will
again before Christmas.

Dell's Small and Medium Business computers are much better constructed
and frequently less expensive than Dell's consumer computers.

You can save 20% to 40% off of the price of a new PC by getting it
through the Dell outlet website:

http://www.dell.com/content/default.aspx?c=us&cs=28&l=en&s=dfb

Anonymous said...

Steve
Well said, this I believe has happened to most of us. Especially liked the line "no hunter comes home without bounty"

Saludos,
Frank

Steve Cotton said...

Bliss -- I will start looking on line after I get past my tactile addiction -- something I can do only at retailers. As for Crystal Skull, I was shocked at how bad it was. Even Cate could not save it. The earlier discussion on Harry Turtledove's series applies to the Indiana Jones franchise. The first one worked as a spoof on Saturday serials. When it became its own serial, it simply became soggy.

Jennifer -- Thanks for the suggestion. I always need to spend time at retailers doing my research and touching their goods. Then I fall back on the web to order. I may wait a month or so until I am closer to the move date.

Frank. Thanks. I sense another hunter in our midst.

Islagringo said...

LMAO at the thought of you wandering up and down the aisles of CostCo, pushing an empty cart through the crowds! We are off to CostCo and assorted other big box stores, etc, yuk, on Friday. One nice thing, Thanksgiving means nothing down here so no big crowds. Also, people don't get paid until Saturday so no shopping early for them!

Speaking of Thanksgiving, L was sitting next to an elderly American woman on an airplane yesterday. She was literally appalled tht the English do not celebrate Thanksgiving. She thought it heathenistic.

Steve Cotton said...

Wayne -- People get the strangest notions in their heads. When I lived in England, an American friend thought the English were not patriotic because they did not celebrate Independence Day.

Hollito said...

Steve, as Amazon was already mentioned, I would like to point out other possible non-local sources (even I do not live in the USA):

newegg.com is always mentioned positively and has a huge selection of everything electronic.

geeks.com is a good source if you do not mind to get a refurbished PC (I own a IBM Thinkpad that was a company-leased PC before. Was like new, cheap and accessories like batteries, docking stations and so on are dirt cheap on ebay. And it´s rock solid. Can´t beat Thinkpad quality!)
Since days I am thinking about buying a refurbished Dell PDA from geeks.com...at about 100 US$ it´s a bargain, and a PDA is so nice and handy when you travel ;-)
But they also have brand new stuff.

To check prices in the US, I always use pricegrabber.com

As mentioned, I´m pretty shure there are a lot more good companies in the States I do not even know.

Oh, and if you buy a new laptop: Stay clear of Vista, if you can. I *have* to work with it in the office, and I wish I could get my old XP machine back...
My wife recently bought a nice Compaq notebook directly (Built-to-order) for about 500 US$. It´s nice and I really like it - even it has Vista installed. ;-)

P.S.: Yep, Indy has seen better days (and movies).

Steve Cotton said...

Hollito -- Great to hear from you again. Thanks for the information. My usual problem with computers has reared its ugly head. All I need is a very plain computer for internet connections. Taking into account the corrosive effect the tropical climate will have on anything I buy, I do not need anything fancy. So, what do I do? I start building the most expensive option online. I need to start thinking retirement.

Frankly Ronda said...

cnet.com - Husband used this to research our recent purchase.

We got an HP Pavillion DV7-1020 laptop. So far so good.

Steve Cotton said...

AMM -- Thanks for the additional computer intelligence. Costco had an HP DV7 model. But the 1183, rather than the 1020. I may take another look at it.