More Creativity and Homeowner Adventures

Today was cool. First, I bought a couple of the best tools I've ever owned.


I'm working on this quilted table mat thing for Valentine's Day, and decided to do stipple quilting in part of it. I absolutely adore stipple quilting, it's one of my favorite things about quilts ... but it takes some skill and practice to do. It involves quilting random squiggly patterns over an area, moving the quilt around free-hand. (You can see it a little bit in the pink-fabric parts of the mat in the picture). To do that you have to lower (or cover) the feed dogs so they are not guiding the material, and you can't use a regular presser foot, which creates too much drag on the fabric for the 'free' part of 'free motion.'

I tried doing it with no presser foot at all - it's possible, but very tricky. So today I went down to the sewing shop where I got my machine to see if they had a darning foot in stock. And they did, and it wasn't even expensive! A darning foot is ideal for free-motion quilting because it has a spring and bounces up and down with the needle, giving you tension when you need it (as the stitch is being made), then lifting up to allow you to freely move the quilt - all in the space of split seconds as you sew. It makes free-motion quilting so much easier. I still need some practice to make it prettier, but it's going pretty darn well for just learning.

The second, cheaper, and more surprising thing was the gloves. I'd heard of these, but always thought it was silly. Well, for the record, it is not. These gloves have little tiny rubber grippy dots all over the palms to help grip the fabric, making it far, far easier to move around. It's astoundingly easier, let me tell you. The difference was amazing.

Meanwhile, I am in the process of setting up a dedicated 'clay station,' and this is another wonderful thing.



I'm using my dad's desk which was already up in the Imaginarium. I happened to have a very large piece of relatively heavy glass sitting up there; I'm not sure where it came from, but I think - oh yes, I remember - it was a large cross-stitch picture I'd done for someone one time that I ended up getting back, and when I rented the dumpster awhile back I threw away the cross-stitch picture (long story, but it needed it, trust me) but salvaging the glass, thinking 'that might come in handy for something.' Well, it did - it makes a perfect work surface for clay. I've got a temporary piece of flannel under it to protect the desk, but it's working out pretty well, as it gives me a soft surface to lay things on to the side.

This is working out so great! I have it off my main work table, so I can sew without worrying about dragging fabric through clay projects in process. This is a perfect size for working with the clay, as I don't need a huge amount of room. It's just all around a great set-up. I can use the drawers for supplies. Just awesome.

So to celebrate, I made this.



I think it's going to be come a necklace, although I haven't worked out the details yet. I'm discovering that apparently my creation method of choice is "by the seat of my pants" - I don't know exactly what I'm going to make when I sit down to make something, I just start experimenting.

So I did a little quilting today, did a little clay, and in a few minutes it's band practice. All in all a pretty awesome day.

In the 'homeowner angst' department, I am pretty sure the reason the dining room is so cold is because there's enough of a gap at the edge of the front door for a nice icy breeze to actually blow through ... enough to create a large wedge of frost on the latch plate.





I went to Home Despot today and picked up some weatherstripping, but unfortunately it can't be installed until it's over 40 degrees. Well, that's no damned help now, but eventually I'll get it fixed. Fortunately the stuff only cost about $5, so no great waste if I happen to get a new door before I get it installed (unlikely, but possible). We could always use it on the door into the garage, which I haven't checked, but probably has the same problem.

Slowly, we'll seal up the little leaks around here and get this place warmed up. Most of the house is fine, there's just this dining room and kitchen that get so cold - the dining room because of the door and the fact that there's only crawl space under it, and the kitchen because of the garage door and the fact that what's under it is the unheated workshop. There are things to do about all of that, just ... haven't gotten around to it yet.

Off to feed the Poo and then band practice.

Adventures Of Homeownership, Chapter 23; and Creativity Ensues!

So Greg was away on a winter camping trip with his son and Boy Scouts this weekend, and on Saturday night I was downstairs watching a movie. During a commercial I went to the loo, and on my way there stepped in something wet. Thinking Tyler had peed on the floor again (becoming a habit with him, unfortunately), I turned on some lights to clean it up - and discovered it wasn't Tyler's mess. The main water line had a leak - before the shut-off valve. About 2" above the point where the pipe comes into the house through the basement floor, in fact.

Lovely. It wasn't a gushing leak, it was a drip, but a very steady drip - like one drip every second. Though there is some type of linoleum flooring directly around this pipe, only a few inches away a section of carpet starts and it had puddled and run and soaked the carpet.

Fortunately, it was pretty easily fixed. It was covered under the home warranty which came with the house when we bought it, and which we decided to renew last year (and will probably again this year, as it's turning out to be pretty darned useful).

The worst part about the water leak was that since it was before the shut-off valve, I had to have the city come out and shut the water off at the street, on a Sunday, in about 18 degree whether - they weren't terribly happy - and they couldn't find it. They scurried around out there for more than half an hour with their metal detector, digging up chunks of my treelawn. As one of the water guys put it himself, it looks like we've had an invasion of groundhogs.

Nice of him to find the humor in it, but when the snow melts, this is going to be a mess. Well, it's already kind of a mess, but ... .

Anyway, that's a concern for another time ... when there's a thaw, like in 6 months from now.

But because things going smoothly and easily isn't part of the Homeowner's Manifesto, last night our stove quit working. Just ... quit. Nothing would heat up, digital display will only come on when a burner is turned on (though the burner won't work). Very weird.

Fortunately, that's covered under the homeowner's warranty, too, so ... another service call put in last night, we'll see what happens with that. I kind of hope it isn't fixable, because I hate that stove, and the warranty includes replacement of the appliance if it isn't fixable. I can go back to the awesome ceran top stove like I had at the old house, and left (because I was just sick of moving and it was too much trouble). I'm sure I'll have to pay something myself if I upgrade, they probably only pay an amount that would purchase a model like the one we killed, which is probably about $400 or $500 - and a ceran top model undoubtedly costs several hundred more. I haven't priced them since I bought the last one in 1994.

Anyway - every time some inconvenience or work drama surfaces anymore, I distract myself (and cheer myself up) by thinking of all the things I'm making right now. Creativity has definitely moved in and set up housekeeping. For a quick something as a mini fix, I'm making a quilted table mat for the dining room. During the holidays I had a Christmas placemat on the table with a little arrangement of candles, but when we took down the holiday decorations, the table seemed so bare. I thought I'd make something to lay on the table, then put some candles on, and since Valentine's Day is the next holiday, it's themed that way. More on that when it's done in a few days.

I'm still slogging away on the sweater, and it's coming along. Gauge is still on track! Amazing. And I'm nearing the end of the back piece. Probably won't be done by spring, when it would have been useful, though. But we'll see.

I'm also working on a scrap quilt, which kind of came about by accident.

I've been wanting to make a mariner's compass quilt for a long time, and I saw one in a magazine I mostly fell in love with - it's called Spice Island, and the fabrics are all batiks in shades named things like cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, etc. - looking appropriately spicy, as you'd expect. Here's a picture of it.


I love the colors of that quilt, but the one thing I don't care for is all the individual blocks with mariner's compasses in them. What I'd really like is a quilt with a big giant mariner's compass in the center, then other decorative things around the outside. I believe those are called medallion quilts.

But I can't find a pattern for one like that anywhere. Every one I can find always contains a bunch of smaller compasses. I've seen one or two that had a compass in the center, but they were quite small usually. I think there's a logical reason for that ... mariner's compasses are a challenging version of quilt-making, and the larger they are, the harder they are to make, so I think it's much easier to make them the size in this quilt.

But I get stubborn when I get an idea, and the only way I've been able to figure out I could make the one I envision is to learn how to draft compass patterns myself, so I can make it any size I want. To do that, I need some good instructions, and people seem to be sort of secretive about this art ... I haven't been able to find any free instructions online, although there are a couple of books that apparently have good directions. My local library doesn't carry them, so I'm thinking about trying interlibrary loan. I very well may end up buying the book(s) but I'd like to check them out first and make sure it's what I want.

Meanwhile, I also love the fabrics this quilt is made out of, but they are batiks, which are expensive. I can't imagine being able to afford all the suggested fabrics for this quilt any time soon, so I had another idea. I could use muslin (which I've taken to buying by the bolt at Joanne's when it's on sale or I have a coupon, and which I think is a wonderful thing), and then hand dying the muslin in the yardages and approximate shades for this quilt - not using the batik method probably, as it's complex and I don't know how to do it, but maybe using some natural dying techniques which give nice subtle colors. Of course, I don't know how to do that either, but I have a feeling that will be easier and quicker to learn than batik, an art form unto itself. (though I may need to try that some day ... ).

See why I can't get anything done? Everything mushrooms. I go from wanting to simply make a quilt I saw in a magazine, to re-drafting the pattern and re-designing the quilt and hand-dying all the fabric for it before I can start on it.

Anyway - I desperately was in the mood to make a quilt, and knew it'd be awhile before I could start on the mariner's compass, so I started a scrap quilt instead. That's the one I'm working on now.

I've cleaned up the Imaginarium a lot lately, it's really coming along. I'll have to get some pictures posted soon. So my next step is to finish fixing up the 'clay station,' an area I made just for working on clay, so I can go back to working with that. Sometime this summer I want to start an Etsy shop, but ... need some stuff made and ready to sell first.

And I have a jacket/dress thing in process, and a whole slew of mending, and Greg's pirate shirt to re-make (made him one for Christmas, but it was too short, so I'm going to take it apart and remake it longer), embroidery to do on the pirate shirt, clay to play with, and oh, I don't know, half a dozen or so other projects.

I figured out the reason I've been going slowly nuts for awhile now is I wasn't making anything. I am much happier now. :o)

Feeling Creative!

I'm disappointed to note that 2010 was the first year since 2006 that I had no finished projects for the year, to add to my link in the sidebar. No wonder I've been getting more and more neurotic - I'm not creating nearly enough!

Actually, I could have thrown a few things on there last minute, but I didn't bother. I did make a skirt awhile back, but I was disappointed in how it turned out and haven't worn it yet. And may never.

And I made Greg a pirate shirt for Christmas, but although it turned out fine, I'm going to re-make it. I had to make this twice when I made it for me, too, as the first one was a mile too big, and way too short - so I made a second one a size smaller, and lengthened it. But I'd forgotten that when I made his, so it's too short.

Oh, and I did make the funky snowmen. And a few pieces of jewelry. I guess I did a little bit this year - but, like, all in November and December.

I was working feverishly on knitting a couple of baby blankets all last year, but embarrassingly didn't get either one of them done, so those don't count. I was also working on a sweater that I eventually scrapped, then started over with a different pattern - still working on that.

I haven't made any socks in a long time, though I'd like to.

And because I don't have enough unfinished projects, today I started cutting up fabric for a scrap quilt.

Well, here's the deal. I spent much of the day cleaning and re-organizing the Imaginarium. And wow, what a difference! I'm actually hopeful about that space again. It had gotten trashed in the last - oh, I don't know, year or so. I had it cleaned up once, but then it started going downhill and I just wasn't keeping up with it. I'd hit a weird vicious circle - I wasn't making anything so I didn't take the time to clean it up, but I wasn't making anything in part because the Imaginarium was trashed.

But I got far more done today than I expected to, including cleaning off the counters and re-organizing the cabinets, so then I was in the mood to make something. I'd been wanting to make a quilt for the bedroom for awhile, and I had some fabric scraps laying out from the skirt project, so I just started cutting them up into 5" squares (I have a book of instructions for a bunch of scrap quilts, all using 5" squares), then I dug into the stash and cut up some more fabric, so ... apparently I've started this project as well.

Well, I'm not letting this year go by without accomplishing some things. I don't make 'new year's resolutions' per se, but I'm damned sure going to find a way to make more time for creating things this year.

What's on the current plate? The knitted sweater, the scrap quilt, some more clay items to begin an inventory so I can eventually open an Etsy shop, and more jewelry. And more clothes. And some socks. And probably some new garb for both me and Greg (now that I've taken to making him garb because I think he ought to have something nice to wear once in awhile).

Yep. Definitely gotta find more creative time. Definitely.

Droid Craziness (revised)

So here's the update on the Droid Drama.

I got the new digitizer bought from Amazon.com, and it worked perfectly. So I contacted the Ebay seller and told him it works, so you owe me $20. He said okay, and he'd post it to my Paypal account. That was on Thursday, Dec. 16. I heard nothing else from him.

On Monday I received a message from Ebay Buyer Protection, checking on the status of my claim - they knew he'd offered me $20 but wanted to know whether I 'officially' accepted the offer, as if so, he'd have three days to post the refund from the time I 'officially' accepted through Ebay's resolution center.

I told them I had in fact accepted the offer, and they said he then had until Dec. 23 to post my refund.

Dec. 23 was winding away, and I'd received no refund, nor heard anything from him. But - to be fair - I was going to wait until today (the 24th) to do anything, as technically he had until midnight on the 23rd to post the refund.

But meanwhile, I got another message from Ebay Buyer Protection yesterday asking if the matter was resolved, or if I wanted to escalate the case to customer service. I considered just doing that, but - still giving the guy the benefit of the doubt - thought I'd make one last effort to contact him before doing so (as once you escalate it, it's out of your hands - you no longer negotiate with the seller, and Ebay simply makes a decision, and everyone has to live with it).

So I wrote the seller another email asking about my refund.

He responded last night, telling me that Paypal was holding the $40 I'd originally paid, so he couldn't refund my money because he didn't have access to it, and I'd have to "close my complaint" before they'd release the funds so he could refund my money.

I was extremely skeptical of that claim, so first of all, I went and checked, and Paypal had paid the guy on November 24 - almost a month ago. I wrote him back an email saying only "You were paid on November 24."

Meanwhile, I went back to the Ebay Buyer Protection site and did in fact select the option to escalate my complaint. I explained all that had happened, and at the end of the message, I told Ebay that I'd tried to give this guy the benefit of the doubt, but in light of what appeared to be him giving me the runaround, I would like to know if I was allowed to rescind my acceptance of his offer of $20, and instead ask for a refund of the entire $40. I didn't know if they'd allow it, since I'd already accepted the $20, but I thought it wouldn't hurt to ask.

Ebay's Buyer Protection site popped up an automatically generated message telling me that they'd get back to me within 48 hours, though I didn't expect to hear anything that soon due to the holiday.

Less than 15 minutes later I had three new messages in my inbox. The first was from Ebay telling me that they had issued me a refund for the full $40. Wow. That was fast. And the whole amount!!

The second one was from Paypal telling me that I'd be receiving the refund of $40, and that processing could take a couple of days.

The third was from the seller (who, since all these messages came in within one minute of each other, obviously didn't realize what Ebay had done yet), telling me that oh yeah, he did get paid on November 24, but then when I initiated my complaint, Paypal "took the money back" and was holding it.

I ignored his message and thought that was the end of it, until 15 minutes later when I received another couple of messages - one from the seller saying that Paypal had 'just' released the money, and so he had refunded $20 to my Paypal account; and a second from Paypal telling me I had received $20 in my account.

Well, hell. Now I've got the seller's $20 refund sitting in my Paypal account, and Ebay's $40 refund on the way.

The seller's statement that Paypal had "just" released the money made me wonder if I was wrong, and in fact, there had been a hold on it - which of course, when Ebay notified them the case was resolved, would have been released right about the time he said it was.

But none of this makes any sense whatsoever. First of all, while Ebay and Paypal do a lot of business, they aren't the same company, so why would Paypal be able to unilaterally put a hold on someone's already-paid money pending the outcome of a complaint with Ebay? And since not everyone leaves money sit in their Paypal account, it seems a rather arbitrary kind of thing - for people who have already withdrawn the money, they are subject to no hold.

But even if they can do that, when I sent Ebay my last message, I explained all of that - that the seller claimed he couldn't post my refund because Paypal had a hold on the money. So if that was true, why wouldn't Ebay have told me, yeah, that's true, and then done something about it - instead of almost immediately just issuing me the full refund? If they knew the seller was telling the truth, it would seem that it would make more sense for them to have (a) told me that, and (b) dealt with the money already being held, rather than initiate a brand new refund directly from Ebay, and then release the Seller's entire $40 back to him.

Second of all, on Monday Ebay told me the seller would have three days to post my refund to my Paypal account. Well, if they knew they'd initiated a hold on the money, why would they expect him to be able to post the refund, knowing they had a hold on the money? The only point to placing a hold on the money would be to ensure it was available if a refund was ordered - so if that was what happened, once the seller and I had agreed to a refund of $20, why not just use the money they'd put the hold on, and instruct Paypal to refund me $20 of the money they were holding, instead of trying to make the seller pony up another $20 before they'd release the original payment?

Third, the seller claimed that the hold hadn't been placed on the money till I initiated my complaint, which was on December 8. Well, if he knew two weeks ago they'd put a hold on the money, why did he never mention that before? When I told him the new digitizer works, so you owe me $20, he said he'd post it to my Paypal account - not "I'll post this to your Paypal account when you release the hold on the money."

Fourth, had I closed my claim like he stated, and then he hadn't paid, I would have had no recourse whatsoever, as once you close a claim you agree that the matter has been completely resolved and you will take no further action. So why would Ebay / Paypal have it set up that you have to close your claim to release the funds to complete the transaction? That makes no sense at all. If Paypal was holding the money because of this claim, it only makes sense that they would allow the release of the funds once an agreement had been reached, but before expecting a person to close their claim. You can't close your claim and state everything has been resolved before you've actually received the refund you negotiated.

I'm only going on about all that because my inherently overly-honest nature makes me uncomfortable with basically telling Ebay I thought the guy was a flaming liar, then wondering (when he immediately posted the $20 refund) whether I was mistaken. I wouldn't like to have called someone a liar if I was wrong.

But I can't see any of this making any damned sense at all.

Well, anyway - I don't see any way to figure out what really happened. Once Ebay's $40 refund also posts to my account, I guess I'll contact them and ask them what they want me to do with the "extra" $20 - since, if Ebay footed the bill for the $40, they may want the $20 to come back to them as reimbursement, not go back to the seller. (That's if I can figure out any way to contact them, as I was just looking around on the site, and I can't find any place to just send them an email - everything's automated forms for situations that don't apply here).

While I was impressed with how fast they resolved this issue, this has been a huge pain in the ass and a real clusterf**k, and I'm not sure I ever want to buy anything on Ebay again.

Meanwhile, the phone works perfectly with the new digitizer, as if I'd never broken it, so that's a wonderful thing.

And otherwise, I've got presents to wrap!! Merry Christmas!

What A Weekend

This was a crazy productive weekend.

Friday night we had band practice, and I've been working on a new part which is pretty intense bow-action-wise, and challenging, and fun. (that becomes more relevant in a few minutes).

Saturday I went out and did some final Christmas shopping, getting not only everything I hoped to find, but finding things that were even better than I hoped! That was nice. I also washed the truck (it was hideous after the recent snows and salt-laden roads), so that made me feel a lot better.

Later Saturday afternoon and evening, I baked cookies - peanut butter cut-outs and jam thumbprints.

Today, I made three of my clay snowman ornaments for my co-workers.


I originally made one of these for myself, but everyone who has seen mine liked it (I already have an offer to sell one), so I made these, but they're still kind of prototypes. Hopefully in time I'll perfect the design.

I spent a few hours working on a present I'm making for someone, too, but I can't talk about that here because, obviously, it's a surprise.

I also baked more cookies (chocolate with peanut butter chips) and decorated some of the peanut butter ones for work.

And oh my God, I made a pan of the world's best fudge. This was my mom's recipe, and I always said my mom's fudge was the best in the world - it wasn't just because she was my mom, I really never have had fudge as good as hers - but I could never duplicate it (even though I was using the same recipe). Hers was so creamy that it just - quite literally - melted in your mouth. Mine tasted just as good, but was always too hard, like it would actually crumble.

Tonight I figured out what I'd been doing wrong all these years. Her hand-written recipe said "2/3 cup (small can) Carnation Evaporated milk." Well, every time I went to buy this, they only had one size can, so I figured that was the 'small can,' and would always use the entire can.

Tonight I decided to make a double batch, as the single batch is always just too small, so I actually decided to measure the evaporated milk. Imagine my surprise when I discovered that the one can was actually double what the recipe called for. So all these years I'd been putting in twice as much evaporated milk as it was supposed to have. I'm surprised it didn't make it runny and unable to set up, instead of too hard and crumbly.

This time, using the proper amount, I made the perfect fudge. I'll be in a sugar coma within 48 hours.

But back to the fiddle thing - my right hand is in such excruciating pain I can barely move it. Typing does hurt, but not as bad because I don't have to move it much to do that. But opening and closing it, or trying to pick anything up, is kind of impossible. It was a combination of the fiddle playing Friday night, working with the clay today (conditioning new clay is labor intensive and hard on the hands, and forming the pieces, smoothing, shaping, etc. just added to the mix), and probably washing the truck (manipulating that spray wand at high pressure, in the freezing cold) and cookie making as well (holding a hand-held mixer, stirring things with a spoon, rolling the batch of jam thumbprint cookies into little balls, etc. etc.).

Basically, I beat the hell out of my hand this weekend, and I desperately wish I had a paraffin dip bath. I do have some paraffin ... somewhere ... I suppose I could melt it in a double boiler (i.e., in a tin can in a pan of water) and pour it on ... something to consider.

But, it really was a great weekend. Now I just have to work up the energy to go clean up the kitchen from the last batch of cookie decorating and fudge making, clean up the upstairs from the crafting today, and turn off the lights, and settle myself in downstairs with some rum. Mmmm.

This week I have to take my truck in to my mechanic because it's giving me grief, which is a pain in the ass, because he wants to keep it all day, which means finagling around getting it there, getting to work, and getting it back again. And I have to wrap all my presents and finish decorating cookies.

But, I'm in a good Christmassy mood this year, and it's a holiday week - my favorite time of the entire holiday season is the week leading up to Christmas. And, it's a full-moon winter solstice tomorrow!

So I'm looking forward to a good week.

Droid Drama Update

I'm adopting a new philosophy: "The universe loves me and just wants me to have an interesting life."

I posted awhile back about dropping my Droid and cracking the screen all to pieces, but then learning that I could order a new digitizer and our office computer guy would put it in for me. So I ordered one from Ebay (as recommended), it arrived promptly, and our computer guy installed it.

The "back" soft key didn't work. Well, now, that wasn't entirely disastrous, but it was hideously inconvenient. Do you ever notice how much you use the 'back' button on one of these phones? It's the main way to navigate in and, more importantly, back out of menus and many applications. If it would have been something dumb like the 'search' soft key, I wouldn't have even cared, as I never use that one. But the 'back' one was difficult.

I eventually learned work-arounds for most things, though it was annoying and tedious, and in a few instances there is no work-around except to shut the phone off and turn it back on, to restore a certain app or function to its main screen.

The computer guy said there might have been a tiny piece of dust on the contact or something like that, and that he'd take it apart, check it, and see if that helped.

He did that, and it didn't help. Both he and Greg suggested I contact the seller. Initially I wasn't going to, as I thought, oh, it's just one of those things, it won't do any good. But then I saw where Ebay has "Buyer Protection" now - if you have a problem and can't resolve it with the seller, they will refund your money.

I'd already decided to buy another digitizer and see if that one worked (the loss of that 'back' key was annoying enough that I decided I'd risk another $40 to try to get it back), so I thought, well, it can't hurt to try. I sent the seller a message last night, very polite, explained the problem, and said I just wondered if he knew of any fixes, or had any more digitizers he might be willing to swap.

He wrote back and, while he was extremely polite, basically told me 'too bad, sorry to hear it,' and went on to say that he "knew the soft key didn't work" and hoped I could "figure something out."

Huh. Because his original sale page description said: "Product is brand new and tested to guarantee it works.

Well now. So I initiated a claim under the Ebay Buyer's Protection thing, and they sent him notice of it. Then we began exchanging emails. The first thing he said was that he had made a mistake, and confused me with another buyer, to whom he sold an actual Droid phone (not digitizer) on which the back key doesn't work ... so he thought I was them. Then he figured out I had only bought the digitizer, and he assured me - again - that it worked fine when he shipped it to me.

I replied that it arrived well packaged and didn't appear damaged in transit, I had an electronics expert install it, and it still didn't work ... so I'd beg to differ.

After a couple of very polite exchanges, in which he continued to insist it worked when he sold it, he offered to refund half my money as a compromise.

This got me thinking. His emails struck me as sincere, he was truly apologetic, and I believe that he truly believed the thing worked when he sold it. I also don't know for a fact that it's not my phone, instead of the digitizer. The bottom line is, there's no real way to tell what happened.

Meanwhile, I'd ordered a new digitizer, through Amazon - it's from an outside seller, but a reputable electronics store with a 5-star rating, so I figure if there's another problem, I'll have a good chance of having some buyer protection there as well. And it was the same price.

So a plan occurred to me. I was concerned that if I continued to be persistent, and Ebay Buyer Protection refunded my full purchase price (which I assume they'd go after the seller for), and then I got the new digitizer and discovered the back button still didn't work, I'd feel like a real moron - because it wouldn't have been the digitizer after all, but my phone.

So I made the seller an offer. I told him that we'd put the matter on hold for a week - if my computer guy installs the new digitizer, and the back button still doesn't work, then it was my phone, not the digitizer he sold me, and I would ask for no refund. However, if the new digitizer works 100%, then the problem was his digitizer, and since he is so sure it worked when it shipped, and there's no way to prove when or where the damage occurred, then I would accept his offer of a refund of half my money.

He was happy with that, and - in a telling statement - even said to me, after apologizing again for my phone problems, said he sincerely hopes the new digitizer works out for me. Well, if he gets his wish, he'll owe me $20 - whether he remembered that or not when he said it, I don't know. So it just renewed my belief that the guy's honest, not trying to rip me off, and actually hopes my phone gets fixed. So I do think the guy's being sincere. But maybe I'm just a big schmoo. Doesn't matter, I'll feel better about it this way, and that's what matters.

Meanwhile, the other night my SD card died. Just died, no reason. At first I thought it was another malfunction with the phone, but then I tried Greg's card and it would recognize that one - just not mine. So I went out today and picked up a new one, and it is fine.

I thought I was safe because I'd downloaded a file manager program awhile back that lets you sync your phone with your computer wirelessly, and backup all your data, and I'd done that when the screen cracked. Well, funny thing - I cannot figure out any way to get the data back onto the phone. I tried everything, went to the website looking for help (nothing at all useful there), zip, nada, zilch. The only thing I was able to recover was my pictures and music (very important, though, so a good thing!) but none of the apps I had installed solely on the sd card.

Well, that wasn't the end of the world, because there weren't that many, and I've been able to replace most of them. A few are acting incredibly squirrelly - I re-downloaded them, but they still won't work. Whatever. I'm tired of screwing with it.

Meanwhile ... one of the black plastic strips that makes up the 'back' of the phone (the back isn't a solid back, but a couple of different flexible black plastic pieces that basically stick on with double-sided tape) fell off and disappeared somewhere yesterday. My computer guy warned me that might happen, after removing and reinstalling them several times. If I'd have known when it happened and got the piece, I could just put it back on. But since I have no idea where it happened and haven't found it yet, I now have a 'raw' strip on the back of my phone that isn't covered (well, it's partially covered with the old double-stick tape, but that's ineffective), I have to try to cover it with something.

This phone is rapidly turning into a paperweight. In another moment of 21st century irony, last night, while sitting downstairs with Greg, when I first discovered that the strip was missing off the back and the sd card was also fried, I looked at him and said, in great frustration, "Well now it's nothing more than a phone." Huh.

But anyway ... I'm hopeful. That the new digitizer will work right ... that I'll find something appropriately quirky to cover up the phone's raw bit on the back ... that I'll fix the broken apps and the new sd card will be fine ... that in a week or two it'll be at least somewhat back to normal, and no longer "just a phone."

(Actually I'm facetiously exaggerating - in fact, most everything does still work ... email, Twitter, games, camera, music, texts, Kindle ... oh, and the phone ... so it's not really that bad).

I also picked up a padded case for it today - it's actually a tiny camera case but it works. If I can get this thing fully functional again, I'm going to baby it like a Faberge egg.

21st Century Irony

I'm considering suicide, but I know I'm changing insurance policies in January - I'm switching from a private policy to my employer-provided group policy - so I'm wondering if I should wait (for the suicide attempt) till after January 1, as if it fails, it might be considered a pre-existing condition.

Gotta love life in the 21st century.

Or not.

(Of course, the fact that 'failure' enters into my contingencies means I'm not that serious so don't fret about this one. The one to fret about will be the one no one sees coming. ;o) )