I’d like to buy some crap, please

I  only buy crap.  It’s not generally my plan, but it happens each and every time I buy something, no matter how hard I try to buy non-crappy products.  Because everything available today is, well, crappy.

I used to be surprised when I’d bring whatever I was purchasing to the cash register.  For some reason, the cashier would ask me if I wanted to buy a “protection plan” that will let me return my purchase, “no questions asked!”

“Hey,” I’d say, “can’t you just sell me one that works?”

Sales people hate me.

Apparently they can’t sell me one that works, because nothing does anymore.

What bothers me more, though, is that all the products we buy are intentionally designed to be crappy.  You know they are.  There’s no other explanation.

When was the last time you could understand what anyone on the other end of a cell phone said?

When was the last time you bought a computer that you didn’t want to smash within nanoseconds because they changed the damn software just enough so that the menus or tabs (or whatever they are calling them this week) are just different enough that you forget what you were writing while looking for the damn things.

When was the last time you bought a product, any product at all, and sat back and relaxed?

For me it was in 1982.  I remember it fondly.  Ma Bell’s telephone monopoly was split up, and customers could no longer “rent” their equipment.  I’d had mine for years by then.  I had to buy out my phones or give them back.  They cost about $25 each, and worked clearly for years.  They’d still be working now, if telephone lines hadn’t become digitized — excuse me,  “improved” — so that the old products don’t work with the new.

I’m feeling all warm and fuzzy now as I remember fondly when I could actually distinguish the gender of the person on the other end of the line.

How many things do you own that work (or work well) 2 years after you buy them?  Not my TV, my telephone.  Not even my new toilet.  And that’s pretty shitty, if you ask me.

Why do we put up with it?

Why is it acceptable that the main dialog on any phone call is “What?” “ Whaddya say?”  and “Are you still there?”

Why is it acceptable that if you buy a camera that isn’t quite what you were looking for, that the store gets to charge a 15% re-shelving fee?

Why should I need to be protected from my purchases?

At this point, I’m ready to just flush this crap down the toilet, purchase protection plans and all.  The only trouble is, my toilet is new, too.  And its protection plan runs out tomorrow.