Best Buy Stream of Consciousness
This post has no significant enlighting thought. Fair warning.
I just did a Saturday afternoon tour through Best Buy. It was an impulse turn--maybe I'll just swing in and see if I can touch a Motorola Xoom--but perfectly calculated to entertain that particular slice of my brain which also enjoys Engadget updates and YouTube reviews and Amazon Prime and opening 14 browser tabs at once.
I strolled defiantly past the yellow-polo security guard (dodging the snarky hello) and straight towards… nothing. Anything. Best Buy mush. My memory is mush and blue signs and beeps. Does this happen to anyone else? I'm certain this is how Best Buy designs their stores (or maybe security has some sort of 4G brain gun), but I always nearly instantly forget my original idea for heading into a Best Buy.
Instead, I begin a Hansel-and-Gretel-like trek through a digital forest, starting with Tablets. The breadcrumbs go something like this:
Blackberry Playbook 7-inch. No e-mail? Really? Lame. Samsung Galaxy Tab. Motorola Xoom--slick. Heavy. Low on battery. Wireless charging mat. Why don't I have this? $49 Where would I put it? Can I picture myself with a tablet this in my living room? I need speakers. 2.1 5.1 Listen Live 7.1. Bose. Subwoofer. But I live in an apartment. Good wireless headphones? Don't see them near here…. But I see computer monitors. $129 for a 20-inch. HDMI. Need this for my home-office. Or this 27-inch Mac. Holy amazing. Love how Apple negotiated 20 square feet of space in Best Buys that look like an Apple store. That woman looks like someone who doesn't know the difference between Apple and the Toshiba across the isle. 3-D television demo… hold up, that Dyson fan has no blades. How is that possible? Blu-Ray player. I wonder what the cheapest they have would be? Whoa: wireless music systems. Bet they are lame. Samsung bezel-edge TV is incredible. Huh, no-charge 3D glasses. What was I looking for? No WAY: they have a live demo of Google TV. This one doesn't work. This one does. Try searching. Try Apps. Try Netflix. It makes you sign in. Who signs into their netflix account in Best Buy? If they only had wireless HDMI… what's the name of that new standard? I need a tablet that connects to my TV. Wonder if Android 3.0 will do that soon. I should get a new coffee maker. Or an Xbox 360 if they're cheap now. Wonder if they could upgrade my Toyota's Bluetooth. Or a PS3 because I still don't have a blu-ray player. Whoa: security guy again.
And it's been like 45 minutes and I find myself needing 15 more things than I remembered I needed when I walked in.
Honestly, despite that I keep up on tech news almost daily, I'm not really too much an early adopter. Why? I'm so indecisive on purchasing things. I run into all the choices and my brain launches into this heat-producing loop on the pros and cons of each (often with accompanying OneNote chart), and then it's over. I've gone numb and don't have the energy to buy.
Saves me every time.
I thanked God on the way out of Best Buy for: food and shelter and debilitating indecisiveness.
