Lee came home the other night and I announced, "You can’t believe what I did! I can’t
believe what I did! It’s so stupid! I surpassed myself this time!"
Lee’s been my husband for 26 years and he took my words seriously. He stood stock still
and checked the floor thoroughly before taking another step. He cautiously approached me
and said almost in a whisper, "What did you do?" All the while checking out the room.
"I accidentally canceled our camera order!" I cried with a dramatic sweep of my hand and
smacked myself in the forehead.
About a year ago, when people discovered we had finally bought a computer, we started
getting requests for pictures over the Internet of the different goats we had for sale. Even
some requests for pictures through snail mail.
We’d get calls like, "How about sending me a picture of that billy of yours over the
Internet. You got some nannies for sale, I see, send me some pictures of them." I didn’t
want to point out that we had bucks and does (these cost more then billies and nannies),
because I understood their terminology perfectly. In our area if you say bucks and does,
you are talking about deer and deer hunting. Besides, I’ve often yelled out to Lee, "Watch
out for that billy, Lee, he’s got his eye on you!" Or, "My, doesn’t this nanny look sharp.
That last worming did all the nannies good."
We’re not a pricey operation here. We are mainly commercial meat goat breeders, but
other commercial breeders wanted some of our stock to add a little Boer in their operation.
Sometimes they were 3 and 4 hours drive away and they wanted to know if they really
wanted to come down. So, I started doing some checking around about these digital
cameras. We have computer nut friends that have them and they were glad to show off
their cameras.
"Look here, Connie. It’s a dandy. I got a real deal on this for only $800. It takes 400
pictures and it plays them back to you before you put them in your computer. You can
even delete any you don’t want."
Another friend would say, "Heck, that’s nothing, Connie. Look at this one. I got it on sale
for $1500 and it’ll add sound and motion to your pictures. Shoot, if I could understand all
these controls, I bet it would even fix my supper!"
Usually our vehicles don’t even cost over $800 and I just couldn’t see us paying that and
more for a digital camera. So, I did a tremendous amount of research, intensively studying
the digital camera and trying to find one that we needed. Okay, okay, I took two hours on
the Internet.
Happily, I found out that to put pictures over the Internet, all you needed was a camera
with a 640 X 480 resolution and they were cheap! You could get one at Walmart for
$109.00. But, if you tried to print these off in a 5 X 7 format to send out snail mail, the
photo would be too coarse. I needed one that would do the 640 X 480 for the Internet, plus
do a little better for running off prints. I found it in one of those Internet stores that’s all the
time worried about your shopping cart. Do you think they really believe we can take one of
those carts home?
At last I found a che… uh, inexpensive camera that would do what we needed and we
wouldn’t have to mortgage the farm for it. Lee helped me fill out the form over the Internet
and send in the order. They emailed and said that when it was processed they’d send me a
notice.
I waited all that day, constantly checking my email and I never got the notice. Impatiently, I
checked my order status email again and studied the form. Yes, everything seemed correct
on it, even had my order number. I noticed it had a Cancel and an Awaiting Shipment side
by side and neither was lit up in any particular way to say which I had.
Worried, I clicked on the Awaiting Shipment and got all sorts of helpful terminology and I
thought that was nice. So I wondered about what it would tell me about Cancel and clicked
it.
Instantly I got an email saying that they had canceled my order! It couldn’t have been more
then two seconds before it had showed up! I emailed back, "No, No, No! Big Mistake. I
accidentally hit the cancel! I want this order! Why does it take you forever to process
something, but instantly to cancel it!" No return message to this question.
I hurriedly called the 1-800 number and got hold of a very nice girl. I explained what
happened. I heard strange sounds over the phone and then her gasping for breath, "You’re
too funny!" she roared in laughter. I would have set her straight, but I thought I’d better be
good because she was the only one who could get me out of this pickle.
She said, "We only had 34 of those che…er, great deals left. I hope I can still get you one."
"Please try," I begged.
When I had finished my story of woe to Lee, I was almost in tears over the
misunderstanding of computers; I saw a grin as big as Texas on Lee’s face. He saw my
distress and lost the grin, but walked up the hallway with his back to me and his shoulders
strangely shaking.
I went back to the computer to see if I had received a message and if I was to get the
camera or not. All I saw was the same old receipt that it was Awaiting Shipment. Then I
spied something else.
Hmmmmm. Wonder what "Terminate" means?
THE END
