8/29/2005

wow... its empty in here

vac week has started and campus is empty.
there were 5 other people on the shuttle up today, and there are 7 other people in the comsci lab that i am currently in... a lab that seats ~100 people.
its great :)

before the weekend report, some newsy stuff:
i see synk has finally defected to blogspot. i will change links accordingly :)
like cats? like cute pictures of cats? like cute pictures of cats sitting in the sink? go to www.catsinsinks.com.
like cats? like cute pictures of cats? like cute pictures of cats with things on them? like to build houses of cards on your cat or balance boxes on them while they sleep and take photos? then you'll like www.stuffonmycat.com.
look at the cute picture:


the weekend was really great :)
friday was a little dragged out at varsity, but getting home and relaxing and falling asleep during cocktail (the movie) with moonflake was a nice way to begin a fun weekend.
saturday saw moonflake and i bouncing through to constantia to get her boots refunded (3 month old boots and the soles split... unacceptable) since they had no other stock. nice of them to just refund back to card. pity though 'cos moonflake really liked the boots.
after that little trip, it was out to canal walk to look for a prezzie for my sister since it was her birthday on saturday (not that i've actually seen her since the previous weekend, but its the thought that counts... or something). we found a suitable item (thanks mom for the suggestion) at a suitable price and then were free to roam for another 2 hours before the movie.
see.. we made a slight mistake. we bought tickets to charlie and the chocolate factory when we arrived. we promptly finished our shopping ultra-quick and had nothing to do for ages. so we got a magazine from the kilo-style shop (that no longer sells by the kilo!) and spent some time outside, sitting on the grass, resting our weary limbs.
finally movie time came about and we went, grabbed snacks, and seated ourselves. i got a popcorn and liberally drowned it in salt and viniger flavouring... mmmm :) luckily i had a coke too.
the movie was great. fun fun fun fun. johnny depp steals the show as usual. after the movie we were suitably rested and off on our way to have dinner at schpat's place.
schpat really outdid himself. after a few hours of charging around the kitchen like the proverbial cranially-deficient fowl, he produced a wonderful meal.
deep-fried, crumber brei with black cherry jam for starters (a whole one each!), pork roast with apple sauce, roast potatoes, and veg as a main (very tasty, good crackling... moist... i give it 2 thumbs up), and the "coop da gracey" chocolate mousse with cream and a ferrera rocher for dessert. fantastic!
while all the cooking was going on nick (who was also there) and myself set up schpat's new dvd player with 5.1 surround (and the little stand things for the back speakers. those were the hardest thing to do out of the whole setup... damn infernal chinese gadgets). schpat seemed most pleased when we were done and a battle scene from star trek: nemesis showed off his surround sound.
meanwhile moonflake and elisabeth had gone to go get something from the shops and came back with dvds.
after supper we were so full and comfy that moonflake and schpat fell asleep while watching ladykillers. (well... they didn't sleep through all of it... just some bits.)
it was about 1 in the morning though and moonflake had been running around canal walk all day, and schpat had been equally busy.
back home for a nice sleep-in before waking up for sunday.
sunday normally means seeing moonflake's family, but since we had been housesitting the last few weeks we hadn't seen them in a while. we headed off to visit them, but made a stop at bayside center on the way just to have a look around. what a good thing to do that was :)
i managed to find myself "advance wars 2: black hole rising" for very little monies as cna is phasing out gba games (ie: sale... more than 50% off the last 2 gba games in stock) because the psp is coming. if that isn't a bad business choice i don't know what is.

*start side rant here*
no wonder cna is going down the tubes. i wonder if they realise that they can sell both nintendo and sony products from the same store? they don't even stock the nintendo ds... a cheaper option (compared to the psp) that has already been out for months and has more game support than the psp. i do not see the psp doing well in this country. as moonflake says: at that price "i'd rather buy a pda."
R2,600 for a psp from cna... lets not point out that most other places are R50 to R200 cheaper than cna, or that since there have been relatively few games made for the psp, most people with either go for a ds instead (as there are games a plenty coming out for it - see previous posts) or are rich enough to afford 2 handhelds and will probably get both the psp and the nintendo ds.
either way you should still stock the nintendo ds otherwise toy 'r us and reggies will just take all your customers away from your laughable computer section.
lets not mention the fact that gba games (not ds... gba!) are still in production and gbas (the actual handheld) are still being sold worldwide.
i can see it now: cna big nob: "team, we have a problem! the products in our store are actually in demand. how can we solve this maddening situation?"
some other cna dick: "sir, how about phasing out all the affordable goods that people want and replacing them with overpriced items with very little demand. people will soon realise that if we stock something, they can get it somewhere else cheaper."
big nob: "excellent thinking. have a biscuit." throws doggie treat. "initiate that idea. we'll call it 'plan stupid.' the cash will be rolling in. right! onto the second problem of the day: i feel there are too many pens and pencils in our stationary section. there's too much variety and choice for our customers and the quality is altogether too good..."
cna ass monkey 3: "but sir, the quality is so bad that just last week some kid lost his spleen by writing with one of our pencils."
big nob: "that's not bad... but we can do better!"
and thats the reason why cna is slowly banckrupting itself! but i got my game cheaply so i'm happy :) thanks cna.
*end side rant here*

so after cna we pop into a clothing store (edgars... i think) and 'lo and behold a sale :) moonflake spent the money that got refunded on her boots on clothing :)
so everyone was happy and we had macdonalds double cheeseburgers.
the visit with moonflake's folks was pleasant as always (barring minor drama over some drunken moron driving into moonflake's gran's car). since we hadn't been there in a while the 21 questions (trivia thing from one of the newspapers) that we usually do after supper had turned into 84 questions :)
back home to sleep.
and that brings us to today :)

4 Comments:

Blogger Synkronos said...

I'm guessing the the CNA staff probably don't really know the significance of the PSP and DS being by different companies. Or the fact that they are at different price points. Or anything, really. Now, if they were stocking DSes, _and_ DSes didn't have a GBA slot, then I would probably phase GBA games out. But... neither of those are true. So, they are in fact just morons. Good job on capitalising on that =)

Also, I must still actually do some more Advance Wars playing on your GBA >_> Then I can steal AW:BHR from you too ^_^

Double cheeseburgers are awesome ^_^ I'm happy not paying an extra R2 for an extra bun (2x cheeseburger vs double cheeseburger)

11:46 AM  
Blogger Patrick Schreiber said...

CNA is actually owned by EDCON. That's edgars! They were totally bankrupt about 3 years ago and EDCON bailed them out. Thier problem is that they have branched out into too much stuff. They have tried to be all things to all men. At the moment they are like crap versions of Musica, Toys R Us, Paper Weight, Waltons, Exclusive Books and Sweets From Heaven all rolled into one.

They should drop the whole gaming thing totally, or maybe have it in certain stores, but not everywhere.

12:50 PM  
Blogger Synkronos said...

Jack of all trades, master of none. Interesting... CNA's computer/tech section is truly shit, and expensive. So yes, I agree that they should scrap it.

2:46 PM  
Blogger zenstar said...

i think they should either do it properly (ie: get in some dude who knows the market to take over) or scrap it.
amazingly oversees places like woolworths can happily do a gaming section without being overpriced or crap. obviously they aren't as good as going to a dedicated store, but for a shop down the road they're pretty decent.
i wish cna would sort their shit out, drop the sweets and music, and become a good magazine/stationary store that also has a not too shabby games section.
but until then i'll be nicking their throw-aways that they believe to be trash, and i believe to be gold :)

10:48 AM  

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