Last July I ordered several items of clothing from a merchant on Ebay.  When they arrived, one was not the size advertised, and one was damaged.  I noticed these flaws AFTER I left positive feedback.  (Note to self, inspect everything carefully before leaving positive feedback!) 

So I contacted the merchant, who told me that he did NOT want me to return them, but that he would replace them.  So I waited a couple of weeks, and asked for a progress report and was told “so sorry, we’ll be shipping them tonight.”  A couple more weeks, and still nothing.  My inquiries to the merchant have now remained ignored, so I am assuming that the merchant has “stiffed” me at this point and has no itention of doing the honorable thing.

I was walking through the mall yesterday, shopping for a birthday gift for my mother.  I noticed a quarter rolling on its side down the walk-way, and I paused and watched with interest to see where it would go.  Maybe by the time I got to it, it would have stopped rolling and I could pick it up!  I’m not ashamed to admit that I pick up coins from the ground!  Before I got to the coin, however, a teenager kicked it away!  I asked the teenager why he didn’t pick it up, and kicked it away instead.  Would you believe his response was “A lousy quarter isn’t worth bending over for!”  Well, if THAT is the attitude of today’s youth, I think we are in sorry shape!

I was reading an article in the LA Times about how recent research has determined that some new shower curtains give off toxic chemicals for up to an entire month after they have been opened. Not all, but many shower curtains are made with PVC, a type of vinyl that has been linked to many health hazards. Some shower curtains are made from a safer ethylene vinyl acetate, and some are made from fabric.

I think that in the future, when I buy a new shower curtain (or curtain liner!) I will look carefully at the label and see what it is made from before I buy it! If it’s made from PVC, I will be putting it back on the shelf!

Just spoke with my sister on the phone. Her son recently bought a new Play Station 3. He is very impressed with it thus far, after playing only a couple of games. He could only find the system with the 40 GB hard drive but plans on getting another Play Station 3 when the new Socom is released on the system so he and his friends can play games online together.

The controllers are wireless and light weight and don’t require batteries. He bought an extra controller so he could play games with friends. He has been having a blast playing Call of Duty 4 online but he is looking forward to playing some of the other games he bought – Drakes Fortune and Unreal Tournament 3.

When the death of HD was announced he decided to buy a Play Station 3 because in order to compete with the new Play Station 3 the XBOX system now has to either sell a blu-ray add-on to the XBOX system or release a new system with better graphics or more power than the Play Station.

My youngest son has shamed me into replacing the standard incandescent light bulbs throughout the house with CFL bulbs. The CFL bulbs use less electricity, so that makes them environmentally friendly, and it will save money on the electric bill. It took a while for me to find 3-Way CFL bulbs, finally found them at the local ACE Hardware store.

There are a few older light fixtures in the ceiling that are too small for the CFL bulbs that I bought to fit into. So, I will have to keep my eyes open for different sizes and shapes of CFL bulbs to fit into those.