so shady, so beautiful...

I know it has been a long time since I put anything up on this site, but I needed to document this before the details of the compete saga left my mind. So, our house has been on a fairly rigorous hunt for a nice TV for our living room. It included looking online and several craigslist hunts and culminated in an offer too good to refuse. So let me walk you through today.

I responded to this ridiculously shady ad on craigslist for a 42" plasma TV - as Ben pointed out, no brand names, no descriptive features. It was pretty much as vague as you could get. The price was $800 and to me, that screamed for further investigation. After an e-mail, I got a response this morning with quite a few more details. I called up the guy and he was fairly forthcoming about everything. It turns out he's "moving out of town" and needs to sell is trying to sell "his" things. Here comes shady detail #2 - he says he's got it in one of his storage garages and we could swing by to take a look at it. Who sells stuff out of a storage garage, or multiple garages? So anyway, I thought he said he would bring it to this one garage and we could take a look at it there. Fortunately, its pretty close to our house and in a pretty decent area of town.

Ben and I drive down there and pull up to a Public Storage facility. There is a huge, electric gate between us and a woman who is frantically trying to organize a alleyway full of stuff. We call the guy and he's there, too. He opens the gate and drives out in his Mitsubishi Montero. Shady detail #3 - we exchange our plesantries and he says to us, "so, the TV's at my other place - do you want to hop in or follow me?" I'm thinking that there isn't a chance in hell that you are getting me in your car. You could at least entice me with candy or something if you're going to be that obvious. So, we tell him that we will follow in the car and he says that he will drive slowly to prevent us from getting lost. With that, he takes off down the road at a speed limit shattering 50mph. Please note that this was not the freeway and the posted limit was 40.

So we think, how far could this place be, right? I mean, he's "moving" out of town so he probably keeps his stuff close together. Shady detail #4 - the thought that it would be close by slowly fades away as we are driving further and further away. This was especially true as we were cruising East down Highway 60. After about fifteen minutes of driving, we finally arrive at the second storage facility, (shady detail #5) a house? Hmm. Well, we think to ourselves, "at least we can see what kind of living environment he has." Surely if he is strung out on meth or speed all the time, his house will be a wreck and we can duck out graciously. Shady detail #6 - as we are walking up the driveway, Ben asks, "nice place, is this your house?" The response being, "no, this is one of my friends' place." Nice. Especially awesome since the door is locked and after knocking a couple of times, the guy that opens it is this rather generously hefty looking Mexican guy. Hm.

So he walks in and pulls out a really nice looking TV. We run it through the gamut and make sure that it works and the picture is good and everything else. So, time to make sure this is really legit - or at least to test exactly how thorough this guy's fencing outfit is. We ask for a paper copy of the warranty and receipt of purchase. Shady detail #7, he says, "its totally covered under a warranty. I don't know exactly where the warranty is." Nice. So what you are really saying is that you didn't buy it. Hm. He swears up and down that a warranty exists and has us call Best Buy. There is a whole seperate story about Best Buy, but it essentially pares down to us driving back to the Public Storage and talking several times with Best Buy customer service. In the end, there did not seem to be a warranty at all.

So we get back to the Public Storage where another person was supposed to be taking a look at the TV. We break the news that Best Buy didn't think the TV was under warranty. Again he swears up and down that there is a warranty and we basically say that since another guy was taking a look at it this afternoon, he could deal with it. If the guy didn't buy it, he could look for the warranty and I would call him back tomorrow. After this, we said our goodbyes and parted ways.

A couple hours pass and we get back from the gym. I give the guy a call and he says that the other interested party didn't wind up buying it. I asked if he had located a warranty yet and he said "no." So, I said to him, "well, maybe if you can find it tonight, we can talk tomorrow about buying the TV." Shady detail #8 - "Oh, we had a change of plans," he said, "we're taking off tomorrow morning." Riiiiight. So I say, "well, I don't think I'm comfortable buying it without a warranty." So he says that he will run over to Best Buy and have them prepare all that paperwork. Sure enough, I get a fax and an e-mail from Best Buy not ten minutes later. I call the Best Buy and they confirm that they talked with him and that he explained what was going on.

Great, so I call him back and say everything looks great. We could probably pick it up tonight if he liked. I bring up the logistics of paying him and say, "will two checks be ok?" Shady detail #9 - "No, man. Cash only. I don't do any business with paper." Sure. That's totally reasonable. Let me go to the bank and pull $800 out of the ATM. Shady details #10, 11, and 12 basically revolve around his complete rigidity on paying with cash. We offer a money order or cashier's check. We offer half check, half cash. We offer half money order, half cash. We even offer bank transfers. No, no, and no. This is crazy. So I say that I don't think we can work this out. He immediately says, "Wait!" He puts me on hold and then comes back with shady detail #13 - "How about a credit card?" At this point, I don't think - I say, "Hell, no. I am not giving you my credit card number." Eventually, Ben comes up with a thought about paying through PayPal. Great, we offer half through PayPal and half cash. After a little wariness, he agrees. Amazing - pretty reasonable.

So, we eventually settle all the details but there is a small snag. The PayPal account belongs to his "friend" who happens to be a "police officer." "He sells police surplus on eBay," he says. I'm thinking, "awesome. Why do I need to know that?" Anyway, he says that he will call his "friend" to confirm that we had made a transfer and would call us once he got the ok from his "friend." Shady detail #14 - the guy's name apperas on the PayPal transfer record and the seller and his "friend" share a last name. WTF? Sweet. This really has the workings of a family fencing operation. Anyway, it takes him about an hour and several goading phone calls before he agrees to have us pick up the TV. The rest is pretty much history. We have a super-sweet, super-huge TV that will bring much joy to our house. Rest assured that I left out all the sordid details that were important for covering our butts like warranty transfer and ensuring that the unit worked. Swing by to see the new toy.