MNteractive

[What happend to all of our writers? If you all don’t start carrying your weight around here we’ll just have to rename the site “Darrel’s list of complaints”.]

I try to be a good American. Supporting the economy by buying lots of crap. Some I need, some I don’t. But it’s getting hard. REALLY hard. I’ve noticed that a majority of my purchases over the past few months have been an absolute consumer nightmare. A few examples:

• Frigidaire fridges. Two Fridges. 5 service calls. Still not working. I’ve since done enough research to convince me to never touch Frigidaire again.
• Really shoddy service from A&E appliance repair. Apparently, the mercury thermometer, the two brand new analog fridge thermometer, and the brand new digital thermometer, while all reading the EXACT same temperature are all equally inaccurate and just plain wrong according to the repair tech and that nothing is wrong with my fridge. (Tip to A&E…when I google your company, when the first page of results is ALL complaints about your company, you may want to rethink your service record)
• Fischer Price FP3 player. I’ve already bitched enough about that one on here. ;o)
• Sentry Wireless Headphones. Worked for one day. Then died. (Did replace with Sennheiser’s which are pretty good, btw.)
• Phillips 20″ TV for the excercise room. Headphone jack didn’t work and the universal Phillips remote that came with it couldn’t control a Phillips DVD player.
• Sears Treadmill. Works, but after 2 weeks the ‘increase speed’ button works sporadically at best.
• $5 paint roller. It doesn’t roll. How can they scew that up!?

So, the lesson here? Well, I’m not sure what it is. I suppose it’s definitely pay for a subscription to Consumer Reports and avoid buying anything if you can help it. Odds are it’ll be more painful than enjoyable.