Adventures in Shopping

While I know damn well that it is spring and that summer fast approaches, I must say that the days, my days, are getting shorter. Gone are the days when I'm up past 11 o'clock. Thanks to more demanding issues at work, I'm usually exhausted and shutting my eyes by 9:30. Not to be held back, however, my laptop (let's call it Mach 1) appears to be a night owl. With what surprise did I find last night that after shutting it down early, it woke itself up at 3 am and decided it wanted to do...just whatever it wanted to do. Update iTunes, overheat, make random beeping noises, you name it and the hour seemed to be right for it. Up until this point I've been too polite to mention that it has pulled this stunt before. And while we're busy not being polite, I might as well mention that Mach 1's bad work ethic (refusing to open up more than one program at a time is very poor form in my opinion) has really reached a breaking point. Thus annoyed, I resolved this morning for a change of technology.

I marched in early this morning to the local Office Depot intending to buy anything of a certain make and model that would serve my purposes. My reception upon entering the store was the same as it always is these days--an air of shocked horror hangs about whenever I enter a building. Have I suddenly grown 7 ft. tall? Did I finally wake up looking just like Greta Garbo? Do I now sneeze whenever my left foot makes contact with the ground? No, no, and no. Amusing as any or all of these would be, I must simply state that my hair has gone white. Never fear, this is no accident of nature. It very nearly isn't even an accident. After the two strippings that turned my hair school bus yellow, a carefully planned third stripping overshot my intended Betty Grable platinum blonde and instead gave me Betty White white. The affect is actually quite pleasing. I feel like I've finally beaten Billy Idol at his own game.

It also turns out that Betty White white is worth money. As I said, the customary shock and awe overtook the store and staff. On what I suspect was a dare a young sales clerk approached in hopes of engaging the Oddity.

"Do you know what you want?" the clerk asked me after apprehending that I was holding tickets for both the fastest and second fastest of the laptops in stock. For a brief moment I debated whether I would take my usual surly approach that I employ when talking to strangers. It's usually a variation on the them of "fuck off." But alas, I decided to try the friendly approach. "It will be good practice," I told myself. After all, I am turning unusually weird and antisocial, even by my own introverted standards.

"I know exactly what I want," I told the young man. "I'm just debating how much I want to spend." Thus we merrily began discussing price versus processor speeds and amounts of RAM. As time went on, he became more and more hypnotized by my Betty White-ness.
"I bet I can get them to knock 5% off of this model for you," the clerk said pointing to the top of the line. I knew he was mine at that point. Too distracted by contemplating the meaning of the phrase "freakish and disturbing," I knew that I could play my hand and hair for all that it was worth.
"I'll bet you can get them to knock off 20% for me."
"I'll bet I can," he responded confidently.

Ha! Who says my awful coloring jobs don't pay for themselves in the end? So here I sit with Mach 2, the proud trophy of all of my hair coloring woes. Don't be sad on account of Mach 1 though--I'll keep her on a while longer. After all, I appreciate a certain amount of technological randomness and independence almost as much as I appreciate hair bleach.