My current favorite soft drink has a deal going: each 12-pack of cans comes with a $1 coupon off of the next 12-pack. Today was the first time I was planning to use two of them in the same store visit. I decided to read the fine print to make sure that wasn't prohibited. It wasn't, but I found something more baffling. The store is instructed to reject coupons which are "reproduced, gang cut or mint condition." I can understand reproduced. What I can't understand is how anybody's supposed to recognize "gang cut" as distinct from normal cutting. For that matter, wouldn't obsessive-compulsives be penalized for precision cutting which might be mistaken for "mint condition"?

While standing in Oft-Maligned Big Box Store today, I noticed that they're pushing compact fluorescent lights quite heavily. I'd read some time back that they're striving to push consumers in that direction. They're making a good effort, including informative signage and packaging. Stores selling CFL have a lot to gain. If it's true that a $3 bulb can save the consumer $57 in energy bills and another $6 in replacements over the life of a CFL, that's theoretically $50 more the consumer has to spend at OMBBS!

I've been using CFLs in my basement for a while now, and they're fine there, but I have a few outstanding issues before I deploy elsewhere. If anyone has prior experience, please enlighten (ha!) me.

1. CFLs aren't suitable for applications which require dimming. That's at least five places in my house. Has anyone used anything else? Has anyone seen dimmable CFLs?

2. Apparently, phosphor technology is improving to the point that CFLs are no longer undesirably harsh or blue. Has anyone found applications where the color temperature difference is unacceptable? I'm thinking in particular of bathroom vanity lighting, for example.

3. Can anyone think of a reason I shouldn't use CFLs in my garage door opener? I think it uses a relay so the lights are always full on or full off.

I went into Gamestop today. The store was quiet and I still hadn't had any hands-on experience yet, so I handed over my license and they let me play with the Wii display unit. The only game available was a platformer. I think it was Super Paper Mario. Huh, I thought, a platformer that requires gestures? Nope; a few seconds later, the system instructed me to hold the remote sideways so I would have use of the direction pad on one thumb and the A and B buttons with the other. For a console whose new control dynamics are the major selling point, why would they limit the demos to a game that requires holding the remote like a 22-year-old NES controller?

Webster made it well into the millennium without succumbing to the allure of Starbucks. Admittedly, Websterians only had to zip a ways down Five Mile Line Road to get to the store in Penfield, but Webster itself remained unsullied. Not long ago, we got a new shopping plaza on Holt Road that brought Dick's, Kohl's, Panera, Bed Bath and Beyond and more to the town. While a Barnes and Noble is better than nothing, I would've preferred a Borders. The galling part was the embedded coffee shops in the B&N and the Target. At the very least, both sell Starbucks coffee, but I suspect the Target one may actually be a Starbucks.

For weeks now, I've been wondering about the new construction projects near the corner of Ridge and Hard Road. These are a little closer to home for me, especially when I'm coming home from points West. One building turned out to offer mattresses and dental services. Oh, the excitement. The new one in the plaza with the library and Proietti's was starting to look like a Walgreens. This was moderately dismaying because that intersection already offers a CVS and an Eckerd. This plaza, mind you, already has two huge vacancies where once stood a furniture store and a Jo-Ann Fabrics. What would justify a new building?

Today I could see the logos in the window. At least half of the building is . . . wait for it . . . a Starbucks. I think it's the side of the building with a drive through. Can nothing stop them?

PS: I whipped up a Google Map so you can see how close together these are.

Dear Nintendo of America,

Bravi, tutti! You've created a product that made me roll out of bed on a Sunday morning, doff a hat to hide my hair, and drive to a store. Consider my history with console gaming: one handheld and two regular in more than twenty-five years. The first one for which I might have made any effort to be an early adopter was the Atari 2600, and that was so long ago I can't remember how old I was when I got one. I know I didn't get my GameBoy promptly, and the Xbox had been out for three and a half years before I bought one. Even with the Xbox, I only got it then because it was cheap and used games were in copious supply. So consider yourselves proud: I made a laughable effort this morning to get a Wii at full price, not even six months after launch.

I say laughable because I arrived at the store twenty minutes after they opened. I was informed by somebody who was already back to buy accessories that I needed to be there two hours before. Oh. In retrospect, it's obvious I'd be outclassed when it came to being an earlii bird. If that's what it takes, count me out. Cliirlii I'm out of my liigue when it comes to fiiver. A good night's sliip is more important.

Sincerely,
tfofurn

PS: what's the proper ii form of "sincerely"? The "e" looks a little odd in "sinciirelii." I'm also not entirely comfortable with putting a "ue" on the end of "liigue," but thought it might enhance riidabilitii.

PPS: even I get sick of the ii form, so those of you left twitching by two posts in a row with this can rest assured that laziness will prevail and I won't be using it again for a while.

Remember my enthusiasm about combining Buy.com and Google Checkout? Yeah. The honeymoon is over. Buy.com's inventory system only updates the e-commerce site once a day. Thus, I was able to order two copies of [redacted] after they'd sold out of them thinking they still had a few. One of those was supposed to go to my Father, one to ddmerillat. I ordered them as part of two separate transactions, with one set coming to Rochester and the other going directly to Pittsburgh. I paid for second-day shipping, figuring that they'd ship some time early last week. All of the other items from both transactions have already been received. The [redacted]? Out of stock, with no idea when it will be back in.

Lacking the [redacted], I gave ddmerillat the other half of his gift tonight: a [redacted]. They were so ridiculously cheap, I'd ordered three of them, planning to give one to my Father and keep one for myself. The packaging claims it works with Windows 2000, but the drivers won't install without Service Pack 2 when you plug it into an XP machine. ddmerillat isn't running SP2, and I don't think my Father is, either. Argh, argh, argh.

I'm marveling at Google's willingness to give away money just to bolster the use of Google Checkout. They're offering big discounts for online purchases at supported stores. Think $20 off of a $50 order. It's not one per user. It's not even one per user per store. I've already taken advantage to the tune of $60, and I'm planning to do another $20 momentarily. This is indicative of a customer acquisition budget crazier than even the most profligate seen in the late 1990s. I find this particularly funny and disturbing because Google is the kind of company to which I want to give money. I don't trust advertising, even the very finest advertising, as sufficient to maintain them forever. I'd rather give them $100 a year to be sure services like Google Mail stay the way I like them. I quake at the thought of Yahoo Mail's descent into ad-saturated madness befalling my beloved GMail. I continue to ask Slate.com to offer a Salon.com-style premium subscription . . . all of the content with none of the ads. It's a bargain compared to the aggravation of dealing with all of the maddening animation trying to get me away from my reading.

Today's day of shopping was one of extraordinary magnitude. We forged our shopping in the spirit of our ancestors. Most of the stores have our gratitude.

The key exception was a used CD/DVD/video game place. They were using the front-desk computer as their music jukebox, and it was plugged into the overhead speakers. While the store itself was nice and the staff were friendly, the cashier's use of the front-desk computer for instant messaging was a bit of a problem. Every few seconds, the "boo-da-ling!" chime that signals the arrival of another message would ring through the whole store. I have gaim configured to not make a sound unless an IM arrives in a background window, so the sound carries more urgency for me than for a typical user. I wasn't quite salivating when I heard the bell, but it was close.

When last we left our intrepid adventurers, ddmerillat's jukebox was left bereft of batteries so that mine might live. Tonight, ddmerillat and I went shopping to remedy the situation. We contemplated Kmart and Wal-Mart, but settled on Radio Shack on the premise that they would have better batteries than Wegmans. Better, in this case, would mean more milliamp-hours. I choked when I saw the price on the batteries: $19.99 for a four-pack. This was double the price we'd seen at Wegmans two nights previous. Wow. We bought them anyway, figuring it had to be better to justify the cost. They rang up at $17.99, which was small consolation for the price doubling. On a whim, ddmerillat went to Kmart next door while I got gas. When I pulled up to Kmart again, I could see through the window that Dave was at the checkout. Kmart was selling 2500 mA-h batteries for $5 less than Radio Shack's 2000 mA-h batteries. We were back in Radio Shack tout de suite to return them. I would ask what kind of fool Radio Shack takes me for, but the answer is apparently "one who doesn't go next door to Kmart to comparison shop."

Christmas is but a few weeks away, and the gift suggestions are already circulating. I've been keeping mine on a static web page for many years now. I'd like to switch to something else, but I'm not sure what's up to the task. The ideal candidate would be easy enough to use that I could talk my family into putting their desired items in, too.

( Background and requirements. )

Anyone know of anything appropriate?