Personal Dork Assistant

Fry's Electronics opened a

Fry's Electronics opened a new store in north county San Diego, so there was a Grand Opening Sale at the SD stores, complete with One Day Only! specials. The line of cars to get into the parking lot went around the corner of the block, but I lucked into a parking spot and didn't have to circle endlessly. Resolved to only grab stuff I can carry in my hands, instead of pushing a cart. The only interesting loss-leader that would've required a cart was the $129 XBox, which probably sold out within 15 minutes of opening time, and I already don't finish my GameCube games as it were anyway.

Was expecting a madhouse inside the store based on what was going on in the parking lot and I wasn't disappointed. Was also expcting the crowd to have already cleaned out the $5-for-50 CD-R's, the $15 USB flash mobile drive, and all the other advertised specials. Turns out that the good stuff were kept behind the counter of the computer repair area, peopled by employees who handed them out by request. Makes more sense than having piles of the stuff on the sales floor asking to be pillaged by the crowd. My god, customer service at Fry's? What's this world coming to?

If nothing else, Fry's ads are a good way to watch defaltion in action. My original Airport card was $150, Sam's wireless card was $50 after rebate. Now I picked up a WiFi PCMCIA card for five bucks after rebate. Caved to a $10 discount and grabbed the DVD-CDRW combo drive to replace the ancient CD-ROM drive that I cannabalized from an old machine leftover in the lab. DVD-ROM and CD-RW drive prices have both crashed predictably, but the prices for the combo drives have remained stubbornly high. Hated the thought of putting two drives in, though, and I wasn't about to pay the big bucks for the DVD-RW burner. Good thing I had a basket. Could've got a motherboard + CPU combo deal for $80 and doubled my computing power, but frankly I get by perfectly well with the Thunderbird 1200, and having it sit in the junk pile just seemed wasteful. Besides, you know it'll get cheaper later. Sure looks like textbook case of deflation to me. It's not just computer stuff, either. There was a Haier portable AC unit for $599. Last time I looked into this sort of thing for dad during the rare Bay Area heatwave, they were more like $999.

The economy is nominally being inflated by rising prices in real estate and services, especially health care. With rising unemployment (those jobs ain't coming back, either) and stagnant wages, what's left after spending all your money on keeping yourself alive and putting a roof over your head? If real deflation kicks in, God help those people stuck with credit card debt and big mortgages. Heck, with record government deficits looming, anyone stuck with an adjustable interest rate debt is going to get screwed pretty good pretty soon. It's not so bad if you have money saved up, though.