If you keep up with the Chi Alpha Blog at all, you probaly have read about my trip to Plains already. I love Plains, I love the church there, and I love logging and cutting firewood with them. Only one bad thing resulted from this trip; my camera broke.

I didn't drop it or cut it with a chainsaw or anything dramatic like that. It was working just before I left, but when I got home I discovered that the LCD (that stands for liquid crystal display you know) had shattered. Recently, I read an article on lifehacker about asking for replacements for broken things, and how it is especially helpful if you send the company a nice written letter with your broken item.

First, I called the warranty center. After getting all the info, Rita told me the average cost was $100 to have the LCD fixed. I told her that I was hoping to have it repaired for free under warranty, and she told me that it would be up to the repair center. So I sent them a letter with my broken camera.

The other day I got an email addressed to "LANCE" which told me that they were going to fix it for free. Man, I love Canon.

In other news, I've been skateboarding a lot recently. I have wanted to learn for a while, but seeing Tony Hawk skate really got me excited about it. Yesterday I skated about four miles or so. I also went over to the new skatepark a couple of mornings this week. Mornings are nice, there are hardly people and sometimes no one.

So with the $100 I "saved" on fixing my camera, I think I'll buy a skateboard.

Summer of 2006. Silence echoed through the blogosphere. What could break it? School starting again? Free coffee? Free tickets to the UC Theater? Aug 4th, the day the Crocidile Hunter died? No, no, no, no. Not even Snakes on a Plane. But today the anticipation is building for something big, and I have tickets.

Neil Diamond. Well, not him perse, but a sixteen piece orchestra and a Neil Diamond impersonator. Tonight the band Cherry Cherry will play at the Wilma theater, and I will be there.