Well, I finally broke down and ordered something from Overstock.com. I’ve really been putting it off since I hate their commercials so much.

In case you’re not familiar with these clever spots, they feature this woman with a foreign accent saying she’s just discovered “the big O.” I kid you not. She actually says “the big O.” That’s almost as bad as those Herbal Essences shampoo commercials: “a totally organic experience.” Ugh. I still cringe when I think about those.

Anyhow, so I bought something from “the big O.” A Panasonic 5.8 Ghz cordless phone, to be exact. It arrived fairly quickly. And when I got it, I immediately plugged it in in my living room to charge it up for a full six hours.

The next day, I moved the phone into my bedroom. I actually had to climb under my bed to plug the thing in (yes, I still fit under there). Finally, it was time to test it. So I picked up the phone to call myself and leave a message. Seemed to be working fine. The dialing speed was a little retarded, but other than that, it was pretty nice. As I was leaving the message, I decided to try to walk around and see how the reception was. But as soon as I left my room, the fucking thing lost its connection. What a piece of shit. I replaced the reciever back on its charger and tried again. Worked fine in my room, but as soon as I walked out, phzzt, nothing.

Motherfucking Overstock.com. I can’t believe they’re selling worthless pieces of crap like this. I mean, the phone should at least work, shouldn’t it?

Before I packed the phone up to send it back, I decide to check out the instruction manual — you know, just for laughs. In the trouble-shooting section, they tell you to check to see that the battery is fully charged. Duh. They also say to make sure the base unit is receiving power. Duh. I plugged it into the outlet myself. Of course it’s getting power. . . or is it?

I went back into my room and turned on the light. Yeah, the base unit’s light was on. Everything seemed to be fine. Then I thought of something. I flipped the wall switch to turn off the light. The power on the base unit went out, too. Motherfucker! I plugged the phone into the electrical outlet connected to the wall switch! How retarded was that?

So I plugged the phone into a different outlet and now it works just fine. Aren’t you glad you took the time to read this? Well, think about how long I suffered to type it up. Bleh.