Chapter 15

Saturday, Mar. 23

I woke up without an alarm today, the first time since last Sunday, but it seems like it has been a month since I was able to sleep past an alarm call. It was only 8:00 AM. I got up, peeling myself from my sister's embrace. I went into the bathroom and got ready to go shopping with my mother. When I returned to my bedroom, my sexy sister was just rising from her slumber. She stretched lithely, like a cat awaking from a nap. I had a hard time trying to stay calm and not attack her as she woke her nude body from her nightly slumber. I quickly dressed and went downstairs so that I could calm down. However, my sister had left my room before I finished dressing and it was none too soon for me.

I came downstairs and started my breakfast of cold cereal, toast, and milk. My mother then came into the kitchen and poured a cup of coffee and sat down with some toast and jelly. She then asked, "Where all do you need to go today to look for your computer stuff?"

"Well, I thought I would start with Best Buy, then maybe try Fry's, Office Max, or Office Depot. Why, do you have someplace to go before or after my shopping?"

"Nothing special, I just thought I might meet some of my friends for lunch. I was thinking somewhere by IKEA would be nice, maybe Razzoo's Cajun Café would be alright. What do you think about that? I think there is an Office Max there, and the rest of those places you spoke of are just down the highway."

"Yeah, that would be alright, we could go down to the place there by 45 and 35 (junction of IH 35 & Tollway 45) and hit up Best Buy, go across the highway to La Fonterra and look there, then we could come back to Razzoo's for lunch. That way if you need to talk for a while after lunch I can go to the Office Max store there. But from what I have been looking at on the internet, I think Best Buy will have the best for the money. Maybe it would be better to check out La Fonterra first, then Best Buy?"

"Is your sister going with us?"

"I'm not sure; she was just getting out of bed when I came downstairs. I think I heard the shower running when I came down."

"Well, we'll wait for a bit to see if she wants to come along. You don't mind, do you?"

"No, not really; if she wants to come, that's fine with me."

Just as I finished up the last of my cereal, Suzie came down the stairs, "Squirt, you want some breakfast and do you also want to go shopping with mom and me?"

"You're going shopping for a computer, right?"

"Yeah, a laptop for me and a desktop for here at home. I will probably get a whole setup for home, say ... do you want the old one for your room?"

"That's a good idea, Bob, but whose going to pay for the new big one? Not that we can't afford it, but I wondered who was paying."

"Well, since you asked, I thought that I would, as I usually use this one the most. I know Suzie will need one next year, and that is why I asked her if she wanted the one we currently have. It really doesn't really matter which one Suzie has. I'll have my laptop, we'll still have one for the family, and one for Squirt to use. Why did you ask, Mom?"

"You can really afford two computers?"

"Sure, Mom, I have a few thousand in the bank drawing interest, and some in my checking account, why?"

"I guess it didn't dawn on me how much you had saved and how much you still had."

"Mom, I worked 40 hours this past week, at almost $16.00 an hour. That's over $600 I have saved from working so far, plus my birthday money and the initial check from Sam for my work in California, so I have over $5,000 in the bank. I have almost $3,000 in savings that has been drawing interest for me, and next week, I will get paid the six hundred from this week plus the three from last week. So in essence, I have already made up for most of the two computers I plan on buying today. I figure about four hundred for the laptop and six hundred for the desktop package with printer & monitor, so I would only lose about $100 from what I already have coming next week, but we would have what we need now. Besides, I have to work next Saturday."

"It sounds like you have this all planned out, Brother Dear. You don't mind if I tag along, do you?"

"Not at all, Squirt. So do you want the new one, or the old one?"

"The old one will be just fine, that way the whole family can use the new one, and I can too if I need the internet."

"Maybe we can get an internet cable up to your room, maybe both rooms. I will talk to your father about that. I can call our internet provider Monday, and see what is available for us, maybe we can get wireless for the whole house. I don't think AT&T has lines out here yet."

Suzie was finishing up her breakfast, so I got my notebook that had all the information regarding what I wanted and what I was willing to pay, and we were soon on our way. We stopped at La Fonterra first and looked around. I didn't see anything I really liked, so we went on to Best Buy. There, I found the perfect laptop and a desktop I liked, but that price was about $300 more than what they had it online for, so I said no deal, I would buy the one online. The salesman said OK, so I bought the laptop, it was one with a separate number key pad. I had to go by the service area to get everything loaded on and set up. I saw this cute little mouse that had a retractable cord and I bought that too. I hated those little mouse pads on the laptops. As I was talking to the service guy, Tom, I explained I really wanted to get a desktop too, but the price was just too much more, compared to the online price. He asked what tower I was thinking about and I told him. He said just a minute and left. That was weird?

Tom came back out from the back with another, older man, probably in his mid-thirties. "Mr. Roberts, I understand that you're looking for an ASUS CM1730-03, right? But our floor price was more than you wanted to spend. I have a question for you. I just got one of those CPUs back from some lady who had spilled her sweetened tea all over the tower. It was ruined as far as a whole unit was concerned. But I have just been going through the unit and once I replaced a couple of boards and the processor, it is working perfectly. I took the whole thing apart and washed out the case and all the boards with a solvent we use that is non-invasive. The CPU is as good as new, but I have to sell it as refurbished. We can add a refurbished printer and a brand new 25" LCD monitor for the same price you have for the online unit. Are you interested, Mr. Roberts?"

I had read the name tag on the new guy, his name was Todd. "First, Todd, the name is Bob. My dad's name is Mr. Roberts. Secondly, why talk to me about all this? I mean is this something I should be leery of?"

"Mr ... er Bob, I am the repair manager, and we have been having a lot of people walk away from sales due to the increased cost of store prices versus the online deals. My general manager is trying to get corporate to come down on the prices, but the stores have certain costs, so they won't. You seem like a good kid, you have already spent good money for a great laptop and want to spend more. So Tom here knew I was finishing up on the desktop CPU and really wanted to sell it to someone who could really use the computer. From you and Tom talking, he felt that you were just the guy to accept this offer. You can have a full one year warranty from us for the CPU, printer, and monitor, plus for a hundred more, we give you a full one year 24/7 tech support."

Tom started to say something, but Todd looked at him and he clammed up. Now what was that all about, and then I remembered, they do not provide tech support for refurbished products. Wow, was this either a scam or was Todd trying to really help me out? I thought about it for about 30 seconds and said, "Todd, we have a deal. Let's get everything set up. I need MS Office 2010 on both computers; I'll go get the software."

Tom said, "No need, Bob, I already got one for your laptop, remember? I can just load it on the CPU too."

"Thanks, Todd, Tom, I'm so glad I came in here today. You got the anti-virus software to add to both of them too. So how long do you think it'll be before it is all done?"

"Can you give us a couple of hours? I'll have everything ready and boxed back up for you by then."

"Sure, my mom and sister want to go eat up at Razzoo's, so yeah, a couple of hours is great. See you then and thanks to both of you. I really appreciate this; I can go to work Tuesday with my new laptop and still get my homework done too."

Todd asked, "You work, where?"

"I work down at Traynor Electronic Systems three days a week, and go to school the rest of the time. I only work half days on Tuesdays and Thursdays and usually all day on Saturday. I worked all this week as we were off for spring break, so I got today off."

"What do you do there, Bob, I mean I'm not trying to be nosy." Todd asked.

"I'm a management intern there, why?"

"Well, my degree is in electrical engineering with minors in business management and computer science. I really have three majors, but most people don't understand that. You don't suppose they would be looking for some people like me, do you?"

"Todd, can you have a resume for me when I return? I can take it to my boss and see what he has to say about it. He listens to me sometimes about the people I meet."

Tom said, "Bob, if you would consider submitting two resumes; I would like to have a chance of working there too, but I don't have a degree yet. I'm still a senior at Stony Point and work here four days a week. We must be on the same type of work study program. Do you graduate this year too?"

"No, Tom, I won't, I'm just a sophomore and this is my first semester working. But sure, I'll take your resume to work with me and I'll talk to Gail in HR about both of you."

"No way? You would go all the way to HR with this? That's almost too much," said Tom.

"Sure, my dad says that I'm a good judge of a person's character, so when I say to you two that I'll do it, I really will, and I'll recommend that they really look at what you two have to offer the company. I've done this before and they have been pleased with my recommendations on the three that've now become a part of our company."

"So you've done this before, just found people and recommended them for employment." asked Todd.

"Yeah, the plant manager said I was his best recruiter. He said I seem to find the right people when they need them. So I hope you two fit in too. See ya in a couple of hours, Guys, bye."

I left them both standing there dumbfounded. When Tom had come out of the back with Todd, I scanned their minds and looked to see what type of scam was going to be presented. Imagine my surprise when it was no scam, but a real good deal. The more I looked and the more I found out about both of them, I knew they just might be TES material. So why not give them a shot. I found Mom by the executive desks and Suzie at the music aisle, and asked them both if they wanted to get some lunch as I was done shopping, but had to come back in a couple of hours and pick up our computers.

Mom asked me, "Bob, I thought that you weren't going to get the desktop here. What changed your mind?"

"I thought so too, but I made a deal with the techs and we are getting both and all loaded with software and everything. We are even getting a bigger monitor, a 25 inch one."

When we were in the car going to lunch, mom asked, "Bob, you didn't make them give you a good deal by messing with their mind, did you?"

"Mom! How dare you think such a think about me? I've never used my power to my advantage like that, and I never will; well, except to protect me or my family. I'd never even think about something like that."

"Son, I was just checking, I know that you were very upset about the big price jump from what you had found online. I hoped that you wouldn't take advantage of people that way."

"Mother, I would never do such a thing, I feel that I was brought up much better than that. I would have thought you knew that by now."

"Hey Bro, check mom's brain again, she might have a relapse or maybe a re-growth of that cancer she had. She would never accuse you of something like that if she was in her right mind," Suzie suddenly blurted out.

I immediately scanned my mother's brain to see if there were any black spots of abnormalities. I didn't see any, so I scanned her mind for an answer. Nothing there either, wait, when is her period due? I looked for when she started last, the 4^th of March, so it's way too early for that, so what got her would up?

"Mom, what made you think I would do such a horrible thing? Yeah sure, I scanned their minds to see if it they were trying to scam me with some junk stuff, but I found out that they were on the level. In fact, I asked if they would have a resume ready for me when I got back as I thought they'd be a help to Sam and Traynor."