A New Toy!

No, not that kind of toy, I've already got a "naughty drawer" full of those! I decided it was high time I purchase a laptop. Even this old dog 40-something woman can learn new tricks, right??

Isn't she beautiful?? I think I'll name her Rhonda. She's got an AMD Turion 64x2 2.1 GHz processor, 4 gigs of RAM, a 250 gig HD and an NVIDIA GeForce 1 gig video card - she even has a built in webcam!

Shhhhh!! I don't want to hear about how it's too bad she isn't a Mac!



She has sleek lines and gorgeous body art.

The best part of Rhonda is the story behind her acquisition. You see, I've been wanting a laptop and became extremely jealous when my good friend Tali purchased a new one last week. I knew we were going to visit Tali this weekend and I knew she would be strutting her "stuff" in my face. After a great deal of surfing the net research, I came to the conclusion that I really liked her "stuff" and wanted "stuff" just like hers. The problem? The cost of the system was $100 more than she paid less than two weeks ago ... kind of ...

There was a blurb on the main laptop page saying the system was $799. When you clicked on the link to that product it showed a price of $899, and when you looked at the local area flier it listed a price of $849.

$100 isn't much of a difference when it comes to computers (or so Tali kept telling me), so off to Best Buy we went, Tali leading the way. We head straight to the computer section and find the model I want - selling in the store for $849. She informs the sales geek that the website is showing the model for the $799 she paid. Sure enough, he logs on and sees that for himself, and then the tail chasing began.

Around and around sales geek went, following the path of three different prices. Then manager geek was called. Around and around he went following the path of three different prices. He even went so far as to look at what the lowest price was that the system had sold for in the past and the computer was telling him it was $799. Manager geek argued that whomever rang up Tali's system must have overridden the price. He also gave some song and dance about how they were only required to honor the local price, the website was national, blah, blah, blah ...

Just when I thought it was inevitable that I was going to have to pay the $849 price, Tali pulls out the smokin' ace up her sleeve - although she doesn't have the sales receipt, she has a rewards card that allows them to pull up the transaction. Guess what?? Just last week they sold her the very same system that I wanted for $799 - no price override. And guess what else?? They agreed to sell me the system for $799. They weren't happy about it, but I was!

And making me happy is what it's all about, right???