Well, the drama that was my Xbox 360 is now over. I officially returned it last night and got my money back. Let me break it down for ya:

December 24, 2007

My Christmas present to myself through my in-laws was an Xbox 360. They decided to just give money for presents this year, and I was like, “Sweet! I can use this and add a little bit of my money to get a 360. Finally!” So, I had to work on Christmas Eve, so I picked up a Refurbished Xbox 360 at Hastings that night. (I work there so I got about a $40 discount.) I got it home and immediately hooked it up. It worked okay for about an hour and, since I didn’t have any 360 games, I played a movie. It froze up before the opening credits. Okay, here is the toy I’ve been wanting for a long time, and it is defective. I was rather upset to say the least. But, I thought, hey that’s why they have a 60 day warranty for all of the refurbs.

December 26, 2007

Knowing that the store I bought it at would refer me to the warranty company, I call them first. They tell me that I can either take it back to the store I bought it from or I can start the return process and get an RMA. I tell them I’ll call them back. I immediately call my store manager and ask if I can bring it back and exchange it, he says no and that I’ll have to go through the warranty company first. I say, no problem. I get the RMA # and send my system off to be serviced.

January 7, 2008

The warranty company, Encore Tech Support, receives my Xbox 360 and says that it should be processed that week.

January 10, 2008

Since I need Xbox 360 games, I have been doing offers for free games. If you’ve read any of my Free Stuff blogs, you’ll know what I’m talking about. Well, this day marks the day that I completed and was processed for my free* copy of Halo 3.
(*It actually cost me a dollar. Fifty dollar game for a dollar. Maybe not free, but as close as I’ll get to getting a brand new game for free.)

January 11, 2008

I receive my system back from Encore Tech Support. I decide to hook it up. I don’t have a lot of time because I have to be at work in an hour. I’m still waiting for my copy of Halo 3 to come in. I put in a movie and it works. I’m pretty happy.

January 13, 2008

After about a total of 5 hours of movie and game play, my 360 red lights on me…again. This means hardware failure. I’m a bit upset again and email Encore Tech Support, and they tell me to send it in again. I ask as to what assurances I have that it’s going to work when I get it back and they send back a generic response of please send your system here and use this RMA #. Starting to get upset again.

January 16, 2008

While at work at Hastings I mention to the Assistant Manager, that my Xbox is messed up again and asked if I could return it or exchange it. She says no and that I have to send all defective merchandise to the warranty company. I tell her that she just asked me to process a refurbished Xbox 360 exchange for a customer. She told me that since I was an associate, I had to go with the warranty company. This upset me a little because, yeah, I may be an employee with the company, but I am also a customer that dropped $280 on a system that I haven’t been able to enjoy yet. And it looks like I’m about to spend another $10 to have it shipped back to Encore. That will make $20 total for shipping back and forth with Encore. Just in case Encore doesn’t believe me and they can’t reproduce the error, I send in a DVD with video footage of my Xbox red lighting.

January 21, 2008

Encore receives my system in their system. They tell me it should be processed that week.

January 22, 2008

I receive my $1, brand new copy of Halo 3 from amazon.com. I’m pretty happy with this one.

January 25, 2008

I receive my system back from Encore. Same scenario as January 11. I don’t have time to play my new game but, I hook it up and it works. We watch movies on it off and on through out the weekend. Saturday night, I put in my copy of Halo 3. I have been wanting to do this since it came out. I get 3 minutes into the opening cinematic and it freezes up. I get a bit concerned, but no red lights. I go to bed and pout because I can’t play my game.

January 27, 2008

I turn on my 360, and lo and behold, I get the red lights. Not a lot of events in my life have gotten me as mad as I was that night. I send an email to Encore letting them know how upset I was and that they need to take care of this. I didn’t care if they had to go down to Wal-Mart and buy a new one to send me, I wanted results. And the thing that bugged me was that I kept getting the same console back every time. I wrote down the serial number each time before I sent it back and got the same one back from Encore every time. I then turn around and send an email to Hastings customer support. I knew I was taking a gamble when I did this, because I knew it would more than likely make my store manager mad at me. (More on that later.) I proceed to tell them everything and ask for advice on how it can be resolved. At the end of the email, I write this:

P.S. Incidentally, (this will probably nullify my complaint) but I am also an associate at store 9697 where I purchased this console. I feel that this should not disqualify me from receiving customer service for my problem. I am a Front Counter Team Leader at that store and have witnessed and help process refurbished Xbox 360 returns in store when the managers have told me that since I am an employee, I can’t return mine. I feel that this is discrimination. Please inform me of my options.

January 28, 2008

I call Encore. Long story short, they are a complete waste of time and could not offer any support. They send an email with RMA and they have agreed to send a call tag so that I wouldn’t have to pay shipping this time. Thanks…thanks so much.

January 29, 2008

I get an email in the morning from Hastings customer service. This is what it says:

Thank you for your email. We apologize for the inconvenience your purchase has caused you. Please not that we greatly appreciate you contacting the Encore RMA Company to get your system fixed. If you still have your purchase receipt and all the boxes and equipment that came with your console when you purchased it, you may take it back to your local Hastings and we will be glad to exchange it for a working console. The refurbish are 100% guaranteed and if not the store may exchange them for another unit. We apologize for the inconvenience. We value our relationships with our guests. If there is anything further that we can do to assist you, please do not hesitate to contact us.

I’m starting to feel better. Then around noon, I get a call from my store manager. Let’s just say the tone of the conversation was not good. As I said earlier, I knew the email to corporate was going to get some people mad at me, but hey, I spent $280 and got zilch. He proceeds to tell me that I never told him it was messed up. I told him that I called him the day after Christmas and he said that I never told him about the second time. I said, “Hey, I told your assistant manager.” He’s all, “Well, you didn’t tell me.” To which I replied, “Your assistant manager is an extension of you.” This goes back and forth and he keeps telling me, “You didn’t have to contact corporate.” To which I say, “Well, Todd, I didn’t feel like I had any other options.” Truth be known, if I hadn’t contacted corporate, I wouldn’t be getting this call right now offering me a refund. He tells me that the next time I come in I can get a refund.

January 30, 2008

I got to work at Hastings, with my 360 in tow, and decide to wait until later in the night to process the refund. Getting there at shift change would involve new drawers and there wouldn’t be enough cash to do a refund. I ended up calling Todd later that night asking him questions about the store and he asked me if I did my refund yet. I told him no and he said that we had gotten a couple of refurbs in if I wanted to exchange it. I told him that I might. I was very tempted to do this all night, but in the end, I just felt burnt on the refurb systems, so I got a refund.

So, that’s it. To sum up, don’t buy a refurbished Xbox 360. Especially if they were manufactured before July 2007. Horrible experience and now I have a copy of Halo 3 that will never be used. Oh well, at least it only cost me a buck!

Well, I did another trail run with Jon today. It wasn’t nearly as bad as the last one. We did run the same route, but the weather was a lot better. I was running in a short sleeve shirt by the end of the run. Beautiful day. If you want to see the route, just scroll down to the next post.

Well, I must be a glutton for punishment. I went with Jon on another trail run today. Not only did we do the same route as last week (grueling), we did more. We finished the trail in about 41 minutes. Instead of heading down the road and back like last time, Jon says, “Hey, we have 35 minutes left to run. Wanna run the trail again and then take a shortcut back when we get to the lake?” Every ounce of my being (and body) was screaming, “No!!!! DON’T DO IT!! IT’S NOT WORTH IT!” But, instead of saying that, I say, “Hey, I’m following you.” PRIDE IS GOING TO KILL ME SOMEDAY!!! So, off we go again. We ended up doing around 7.7 miles. Oh yeah, did I mention that the temperature was 32 with a windchill of 22. The wind was brutal!!! Anyway, here’s the route.

Once again. I hurt. The consolation is that Amy, Iliana, and I went to Jon’s house to have homemade pizza with his wife, Miriam, and son, Jeremiah. The pizza was awesome! His wife is Italian and they have a really good recipe for the dough and the sauce was great. I’ll run 8 miles to be able to eat that pizza again! Iliana and Jeremiah ran around pushing each other around and playing. It was great! Great food + Great friends = one of the best Saturdays I can remember.

I could not stop laughing at this.

I could not stop laughing at this.

I could not stop laughing at this.

Well, did my first trail run today. A friend of mine, Jon, is going to run a 50K trail run in April. So, decided to do his long run with him this week. Luckily, his long run is just supposed to be a hour to 2 hours on the trail. I thought, “Humph. No problem. Only an hour today?” Little did I know. Talk about tough. I have found a new way of getting a better workout with my time. I ran about 5 miles today; 3 of it being on the trail. I feel like I just ran 10 or 11 miles. The constantly switching from go up hill to down hill. Dodging rock and limbs. Pretty tough. It was as much of a mental workout as it was a physical workout. Good news is I only fell one time. Check out my route.

Oh yeah, good times. I don’t know if I will be able to make it next week. I hurt.

Ya know, one of the things that frustrates me most about this candidate is her supporters. Not the informed ones, but the uninformed ones. I have no problem with people that can give me a good reason for voting for her. My problem comes when people use one or two of the following:

Bill was a great President.

I think it’s time for a woman President.

George Bush is a moron.

Let’s break these down:

Bill was a great President.
Okay. That’s great. He was a good President. He did some great things. All of which escape me right now, but I’ll go ahead and agree that he did some great things. That doesn’t qualify Hillary in any way. That’s like you being on an operating table and the surgeon looks down and says, “Hey, it’s okay, my husband was a surgeon for 8 years.” Just because Bill was good, doesn’t necessarily mean Hillary is going to be good.

I think it’s time for a woman President.
If this is your reasoning for electing the next leader of the free world, please don’t vote. That would be like voting for Obama because he is black. It’s actually sexist to choose your candidate based on this reasoning. Could you imagine the outcry if all of the candidates were women and a guy ran and people started saying, “Well, it’s time for a man to win.” It doesn’t matter that she is lacking a Y-chromosome. She did prove she could use those woman-ly wiles and start crying so people would take pity on her and give her what she wanted. That’s the only reason she won New Hampshire. I’ve even talked to Hillary supporters that agree with me on that one.

George Bush is a moron.
So what. How does this in any way make Hillary the best candidate for the job. Bush just surrounded himself with the wrong people. You would think that by now, someone would of thought of putting a micro-receiver in his ear and feed him lines during press conferences. And if they are doing that, the guy feeding the lines has to be a Democrat. That’s why we get Bush saying stuff like, “Too many OB/GYNs aren’t able to practice their love, with women all across the country.” Yeah, that was pretty stupid, but using his stupidity as an example does not in anyway qualify another candidate. Simply going around saying, “At least Hillary is smarter and more articulate than Bush”, isn’t enough to qualify her in my book.

I once saw the end of 60 minutes and the commentator said, “If you don’t know the names of your 2 Senators, please don’t vote, because your vote is going to cancel my vote.” I think it makes sense. I’m going to go out on a limb and say that we can all agree on the fact that we want informed citizens voting in the election. I don’t want people voting who vote for Fred Thompson because their favorite show is Law and Order. (I know someone who is doing that.) I don’t care who the candidate is, Democrat or Republican. Just have a good, informed reason based on the candidate’s platform. Know what the candidate stands for. Heck, everyone keeps telling me, “Ron Paul‘s not electable.” So what, I’m still gonna vote for the guy because I believe in his message and his stance on a lot of issues.

And there’s also the fact that he is male … and old. I think it’s about time we have an old white guy as President.