[hermes]

After 13 days the screen became unreadable suddenly, it looked as if it had gotten water inside (no) or the circuit board went insane. Fortunately, I still had my receipt. Privacy buffs may be interested in the fact that Best Buy requires both a phone number and a digital signature. Given that in my case both were not entirely correct I wonder why they bother. Oh, and teller didn't even immediately have $200 cash on hand to refund. Perhaps everyone is using plastic these days.

Do I feel bad about lying about two things identifying myself? Absolutely not. As the author of "Making Yourself Invisible' puts it, according to his high school teacher a lie is "not telling the truth to someone who deserves to know." When I am asked if I have any spare change and I say 'no' this is not a lie in the moral sense. But I do not like the fact that increasingly we have to lie if we value our privacy in the commercial, governmental and work worlds. I would rather not be asked in the first place. As this is not an option, I am training myself to to not always be forthcoming with total strangers - like my name with the woman I slept with last night.