Another strange part of the camera has to do with sealing the battery compartment after placing the batteries inside it.  I placed the four AA sized batteries that were supplied by Casio in the battery compartment.  Sliding the battery compartment cover closed over the batteries was an ordeal.  The problem was that the extended nubs on the compartment cover would not slide easily over the extended positive terminals (i.e., the nubs of the positive side of the batteries).  I was irritated by the difficulty in sealing the battery compartment.  I was very close to giving Casio a Noosie because of this; closing the battery compartment is one of the basic things that a camera should make easy to perform.  In addition, the plastic material makeup and "plasticy" feel of the compartment cover made me nervous that it would break as I tried to force the cover over the batteries.  I finally jiggered the cover a bit and got it to slide over.  This was strange to me as I have never in my life had a difficult time closing a camera battery compartment.  If this continues to bug me, I will return the camera.  I'll also go back and read again Steve's opinions and see if he says anything about this.

It is interesting to consider whether I would have purchased this camera at a bricks store where I presumably would have held, opened and closed, and snapped a few photos with the camera (I do not believe that I would have tried placing batteries inside the camera).  I don't know.  I am confident, however, that I will exchange the camera if I do not adjust to its design.

Hopefully, the picture quality will be as expected and worth these tradeoffs in design.  By the way, AA batteries come in different lengths, usually depending upon who manufactures them; I learned this when doing research for my rechargeable battery purchase (which I have not made yet).  This suggests that I may never again have a problem closing the battery compartment if I purchase batteries that are slightly shorter than the one-time-use Duracell batteries which were supplied by Casio.

Earlier in the day, at 11:52am to be precise, I ordered milk for the boys and lunch for Amy from Kozmo.com.  For Amy, I ordered "The Wrap Caesar Salad," -- which we thought would be a wrap sandwich -- and Pringles potato chips.  The delivery arrived at 12:30pm.  The friendly Kozmo delivery person simply unzipped the insulated bag and waited for me to take the contents out.  This is the second consecutive time that a Kozmo delivery person has not removed the contents from the bag for me; I would have preferred to be handed  my order.  Each item ordered was wrapped individually inside a Kozmo labeled bag.  The number of bags (5) appeared greater than the number of items that I had ordered (3) so I asked which items were part of my order.  The delivery person said all of them were part of my order.  I took them out, went inside and placed them on the kitchen counter.  One of the items was frozen and hard like a rock.  I wondered what it was as I opened it (I did not recall ordering ice cream).  It was a travel freezer pack; this obviously was the property of Kozmo, so I ran outside before the driver drove off and gave him the freezer pack.  He smiled and acknowledged that this was not part of my order.

The other items delivered were milk (check), Pringles potato chips (check), a Caesar salad (huh?) and lemonade (huh?).  Maybe the lemonade was part of a free promotion or it was customer appreciation.  I thought about returning it to the Kozmo driver, but he had already driven off.  Amy was a little disappointed to receive a Caesar salad rather than a Caesar salad wrap as she wanted the bulk of the bread (you know, eating for two and all of that).  I quickly popped a bagel in the toaster oven for her (see Debbie, I am a fast learner).

I was curious about the caesar salad so I returned to the Kozmo site to see what the deal was there.  I determined that "The Wrap" is a brand name (recall that my order was for The Wrap Caeser Salad).  Some items were listed as The Wrap blah blah blah Wrap (e.g., "The Wrap Chicken Teriyaki Wrap").  As long as the last word in the product description was "Wrap" that meant that one would be ordering a wrap sandwich.  In fairness to Kozmo, "The Wrap Caesar Salad" was listed under a section labeled "Salads" and had I clicked on the item for information I would have seen that it was indeed a salad. On the Internet, sometimes it is important to read carefully.  We live and learn.  For the record, Amy thought the salad was fine.

When I was placing the Kozmo order I noticed that Kozmo is now selling some electronics; I saw the Palm V for sale at under $300.  This is pretty good as it is on back order at most places (e.g., Outpost.com, Amazon.com).  The price was somewhat competitive as most of the price leaders of which I am aware are offering it for $260-$300.

Amy gave me a grocery list Thursday evening for a Homeruns order.  I got into my stuff quite a bit and I did not place the order before midnight, so I waited until today to place it -- which was ok with Amy :-).

I placed the order.  One of the items that Amy had on the list was diapers for Sam as he was down to about five diapers.  I told Amy that I had placed an order with DrugEmporium on Tuesday evening (and I received confirmation that the order shipped on Wednesday).  By the end of the day, the DrugEmporium order had not arrived and I was nearly certain that it would arrive on Saturday.  Then I thought about the consequences if the order did not arrive, i.e., Amy would not be a happy camper (I guess Sam too would not be wild about it).  I saw this as another opportunity to practice doing whatever an 8+ pregnant wife says (and our plan is that we will not be in this situation again -- three children will be enough for us, thank you)..

Even though it felt suboptimal from a diaper per dollar perspective to buy the diapers from Homeruns as I had a six week supply due to arrive on Saturday, I sucked it up and placed a call to Homeruns at 8:41pm (by the way, I was delightfully surprised to see that the Homeruns price for a double pack was $12.59 -- the lowest price around that I know of).  My understanding was that I could modify the order as long as I called before 9:00pm.  Apparently, either I misunderstood the order modification directions or I was given incorrect information.  The customer service person told me that my order was in process and that I could not modify the order at this point.  From an "I need to satisfy Amy" perspective, I began to sweat a little bit.

I did think of a way around this in which I could get the diapers from Homeruns by tomorrow.  Before I report on how I could have done this, let me say that my Homeruns order at one point was near $100.  I did not need some of the items; one of the items that I ordered -- Kingsford Charcoal -- I had been looking for desperately without much luck as I had not seen it available for sale online anywhere ever (about one month ago, I did see that Homeruns was selling some type of charcoal, but I didn't like it for some reason -- yeah, I can be particular about my charcoal).  Anyway, since the magic point for free delivery was $60 and I did not need all of the items, I decided to remove a few items from the cart; I considered them "in the bank" for my next order (which will likely occur by next Wednesday when the MIL hits town).  Working my way to $60 on my next order should be effortless and in the event that it happens because I need just a few things within a day or two or three, I could place an order for these few things (along with these "banked" items) and be at $60+ without looking to order any GMTFD (get-me-to-free-delivery, i.e., items one orders, that can certainly be used but were not part of the planned shopping list, in order to get over the free delivery order level) items.

So what does all of that have to do with my diapers? Well, I considered using my "bank" items immediately for a second Homeruns order.  The order deadline was midnight, so I could easily make it and have my new order arrive tomorrow at a different time.  (I'm reading some of what I have written about the Homeruns/diaper order and I am getting a little nervous about myself; yet, these calculations and derivations are very quick for me.  It really is effortless, for me.  I'm not recommending that anyone at home try this.)  I went to the Chair of the Board and ran it by her.  Amy thought it was not necessary to place the order for the diapers.  End of story ,almost.  I sent an email to Homeruns about my experience.

(Beginning of message to Homeruns.)
I was disappointed with an element of your service this evening.  I placed an order this afternoon (May 26) for delivery tomorrow morning (May 27) and I recall seeing on the screen after completing my order that I could modify my order until 9:00pm.  Apparently it said something else as I called customer service at 8:41pm to modify my order (to add one item and to change the quantity from 1 to 2 on another item), and I was told that my order had been "routed" and that I could not make any modifications.

Perhaps I misinterpreted the order modification message that appeared after I completed submitting my order.  If this is the case, then you might want to consider modifying your message to be clearer.  If I read the order modification order correctly, then I should have been able to place my order.  Maybe the order modification message says I can change the order up until 9:00pm or until the order is in "route" whichever is sooner?  If that is the case, I believe the message could be clearer.

Sincerely,

Bruce

p.s. In my entire relationship with Homeruns, no one has EVER responded to any of my emails.  I hope someone responds to this one and lets me know the scoop.
(End of message to Homeruns.)

I hope the DE order arrives tomorrow.

By the way, I forgot to comment that the remainder of the etoys order arrived yesterday (May 25).  In addition, I have not heard high or low from JustPretend.com.  Also, Amy is 2-3 centimeters dilated (i.e., Baby J. is getting ready to say "hello world").