The Xbox Kinect Debacle of Christmas 2010 – Part 1

About this time last year, the Cap’n and Dimples were watching T.V. together.  A commercial for the new Kinect came on.  Instead of surfing to another channel, both of them watched, transfixed, as people stood in front of a camera that allowed them to control what happened on their video game just by moving their bodies.  When the commercial was over, they both said, “That is so cool!” and couldn’t stop talking about it.

I knew right away I was going to get them that Kinect for Christmas.

I’m usually great at bargain shopping online, but the Xbox Kinect was already either sold out or no bargain at all of my usual haunts. They had plenty with 4 GB of memory, but I wanted to go all out and get the 250 GB of memory.  I didn’t want to be accused of memory stinginess.  I finally resorted to going to the source – Microsoft.  They actually had it in stock, according to the button that said “in stock”, so I ordered it.

I was giddy.  Here it was, the beginning of November, and I already had the perfect family Christmas gift.

Two days after I ordered it, I got an e-mail saying that my package was on its way.  I stressed about how to keep the package hidden until Christmas, and checked the tracking every day to see how close it was to being delivered.  I wanted to be sure to hide the package before I picked up Dimples from school.

A week later, the package still hadn’t been delivered, and appeared to be stuck in some remote spot like Fiji or maybe Sacramento.

Right when I was about to start making phone calls (Thanksgiving week), I got a new e-mail from Microsoft.  Due to an unprecedented number of orders, Xbox Kinects with 250 GB of memory were out of stock.  My order had been cancelled.

What?!!!!  I frantically e-mailed back by dissatisfaction.  Why would they just cancel my order without checking with me first?  Why didn’t they just delay it?  And, what had happened to the one that was on its way to me?  THAT THEY SAID WAS IN STOCK!!!  Did someone hijack it in the parking lot of the Sacramento UPS, and give it to Justin Bieber or the Kardashians?  But all I got in response was $150 store credit that could only be used on one item, and had to be used by Jan. 1st.

You are the Controller of Nothing, Loser. The only Controller is Bill Gates.

So, I now had two problems.  No big family Christmas gift.  And no one to complain to about the abuse I was receiving because this was supposed to be a surprise.  I HATE suffering injustice silently.

Stay tuned tomorrow for the exciting conclusion to the Xbox Kinect Debacle of Christmas 2010…

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