Welcome to a new family member

Those of you who know me know that I love eBay. I have made hundreds of purchases on eBay, including both of my XBox 360s, and have only had one bad experience that was eventually resolved. If you know what you're doing, you get great deals and great products. Also, the resellers don't tend to be morons.

Now, one of my 360s died last week and it is out of warranty. I decided the time had come to actually buy one new. So, as reported by Coxxorz and others, there were several XBox 360 deals this weekend. Walmart for $159 (Arcade). BB for $159 (Arcade) plus Fable II. There was even rumour of the 60GB version on sale at Costco for $199 (wild goose chase). Since I live in the boonies and didn't expect to be able to snag any of these, I had asked Graybush to pick one up for me if he could.

So, Saturday evening I get an email from Graybush saying he got one from Walmart and then got one from BB with the Fable II game. He would hang onto the Walmart one for me until he heard whether or not I would want it (Note to Graybush: I don't so you can return it, thanks!). I decided since I had to drive my girlfriend to Ottawa for her Cello lesson (don't ask), I would go look around for one of the deals.

I figured I would try Costco first. I don't often go to Costco and I have made a point of avoiding it over the years at Christmas time. I had forgotten this. It was total insanity.

There were 50,000 Wiis and Wiifits, but no XBoxs at all of any kind. It still took me over 20 minutes to figure this out and get out, trying to get through the tangled mass of humanity. It was worse than Timmy's on a Monday morning!

So off to Best Buy, Kanata. First I had to find it. I don't know if you are all familiar with the Centrum area of Kanata, but it is a massive war zone of stores and restaurants and Best Buy is not in an obvious location. Finally I locate it, and head in. Pretty normal crowd, so that's good. I found the Elite and the MW2 versions advertised, but no Arcade. I ask a guy. He's clueless and asks another guy. They hunt around and find one on the bottom of a non-descript shelf. Awesome. I tell them I will take it, but it's supposed to come with Fable II. They both look at me like I'm drunk (I am not at this point). A third guy comes along as says that yes, it comes with Fable II. An argument ensues and they go off to find a manager.

They come back with a copy (pictured above) of Fable II and all was well.

This is precisely why I shop on eBay. Less hassle, better prices and fewer morons.