Last year, I ordered a personalized pen set from an offer in my MasterCard bill. It was cheap, and I thought it cool to have a pen that said "ALL YOUR BASE ARE BELONG TO US". This year, I got a letter offering me the same package, for the low-low price of $24. Not. I declined that, they sent it anyways... and charged me. I called them, they didn't argue about crediting me back. It's nice when you don't have to fight with people.
My trusty Canon PowerShot S400 started exhibiting the Memory Card Error defect over the summer. It was occasional at first, becoming more frequent over time, 'till the camera was pretty much unusable. I called Canon, they told me to send it into factory repair in Elk Grove Village. I got the repair estimate back this week... $155 to repair it, or instead, they'd sell me a refurb S410 for $175. The S410 does not have this flaw. I'm going with that option. Even better, they had no problem shipping to the folks' house in Wadsworth. I'll have it Monday.
Basketball won a close game with Escondido yesterday. They needed one they had to work for, lest their 7-0 record go to their heads. I'm still concerned... our starters are doing all the work, we're getting nothing from our bench. Sooner or later, we're going to see an opponent that will fail against. Two more games in Irvine, Friday and Saturday, before I leave. Hopefully the movie selection on the bus will be better than last night--Rush Hour 2 (I wasn't in the mood for Chris Tucker) and Ace Ventura 2 (the Union-Tribune sportswriter told me whatever was in the background sounded terrible... I told her at least she couldn't see it. Said sportswriter also referred to the tournament as the "Irvine Weekly World News Tourney". Sadly, there were no alien abductions at halftime.)
Christmas presents seem to be settling out... I'm not racing, but it is winding up last-minute.
