Sometimes you just can't give your money away!

[j4]

Still haven't heard back from the eBay seller whose auction for a rather lovely dress I won on Friday. I've emailed twice (once through eBay website, once separately) but no reply. Now I know not everybody checks their email as obsessively as I do, but I do think you have a responsibility to be around when your auctions end... but on the other hand, if some great calamity befalls you, your eBay auctions are probably going to be fairly low down your list of worries, & I'd hate to think I was filling someone's mailbox with pestering about a fiver's worth of goods when their house had burnt down or their family had been eaten by wolves or something.

Most of my twitchiness is just selfish though; I'm worried that I'll be labelled a sluggish payer just because I'm reluctant to send a blank cheque through the post. And if I send any more email I'm worried I'll get negative feedback for being impatient, hassling, etc.. ... I also want my pretty dress, dammit!

The seller does give a mobile phone number in their details, but I think that should be a last resort; it feels a lot more intrusive to contact somebody on their phone (even by SMS, which is all I'd do) than it does to email them.

Gah. Getting physical Stuff from A to B really is the major weakness in the e-utopia. I want to pay online and have my Stuff beamed to me in some kind of whizzy matter-transporter thingy. And I'd like a flying car so I can go and pick up my own personal moon-on-a-stick, too, please.

Comments

[hoiho.livejournal.com]

or their family had been eaten by wolves or something

Everyone who's anyone knows that when the wolves come out of the walls, it's all over

[j4.livejournal.com]

I thought it was just "everyone". BICBW.

I have a spare copy of it... I'm waiting for it to go out of print so I can eBay it. ;)

[silicon-lotus.livejournal.com]

Haven't read 'Wolves in the Walls' yet: assumed it was written for A Younger Audience.

'Neverwhere' and 'American Gods' are, of course, another matter... and I have a sneaking suspicion that Steven Sherrill, who wrote 'The Minotaur Takes a Cigarette Break' reads a lot of Neil Gaiman, too. Maybe even more than I do.

N

[j4.livejournal.com]

It is written for A Younger Audience. That doesn't stop it being interesting to adults; and if it's not interesting, you'll only have wasted about 10 minutes reading it...

Coraline is fantastic, too. That's written for an older Younger Audience, but it still scared me.

[oldbloke.livejournal.com]

Ah, only anouther 10 days or so and I'll be listening to When I Was A Boy I Watched The Wolves.
I'm surprised by just how much I'm looking forward to it.
When a younger man, I used to imagine cinematic sequences to go with it; you gotta do something with your visual cortex when you have your eyes closed, headphones on and the amp cranked up.

[burkesworks.livejournal.com]

> And I'd like a flying car

If you get one of those, can I have Patricia?

[kake]

It's not actually been all that long since Friday. Some people just *can't* check their email all that often. But I'm sure you already thought of that.

If you do get negative feedback for not paying right away - and I'd be very surprised if you did - you'd still be able to leave a comment explaining your side of the story, and that comment would be visible to anyone looking at your feedback profile in the future.

[j4.livejournal.com]

I know not everybody can check their email that often; it's just annoying since it's their fault in the first place that I don't know who to send the money to! If they'd just put a real name on their user info like everybody else does there wouldn't be a problem.

The other thing is the not-knowing-whether-email-is-even-getting-through. If s/he can't even give a name, it's possible that s/he's also given an email address that s/he doesn't check any more.

Just frustrating, that's all.