Tuesday, September 1, 2009

Batteries Not Included


When I was working in retail we sold a lot of pieces that ran off batteries. There were clocks, christmas displays, santas on ropes, talking animations...all needing batteries, generally of the AA variety. Most of the time with each sale I would caution on using fresh batteries, and good ones, not those $2 for 10 you get at the bargain shops. Often someone would come back with their item and when I would replace their batteries with our own the item would work fine, "did you use fresh out of the packet batteries?" "I'm not sure, they were in the drawer." Are you kidding me! So you waste your time coming and telling us your item doesn't work and you didn't even use fresh batteries!

My family has a habit of not being able to throw batteries out. Ever. They take the batteries out of a mouse, a camera, the remote, and just leave them lying around, throw them in a drawer (then you get batteries leaking all over the place) or even put them into something else. Is it so hard to let go of batteries? Do they really think they will power other items? Are the secretly stashing them for a Tommyknocker invasion?

I implore all of you secret battery stashers, throw out those old batteries! Dont store them in a drawer, they are not going to magically aquire more energy! (unless you have the powers to do that kind of thing).