Banner week for me...yay.

So you've read about the car/accident/totaled/new truck/car payment crap. Well, tonight just capped off the week about as I would expect one of these weeks to be capped off.

Okay, so I used to play Xbox/Xbox Live at least 2-3 nights per week. Since buying the practice, I have become so busy that I have basically been reduced to one night a week of game play time. Friday night. Gaming has always been my way of winding down and kind of shutting my brain off for a while. Kind of my Calgon Moment of sorts.

So Kel is off at the office working late doing office manager stuff (her typical Friday night gig), I get the kids in bed, plop my butt on the nice theater couch, fire up the widescreen and Xbox 360, planning to play a bit of Fable:The Lost Chapters (which I have recently rediscovered as a great diversion and hilarious game when you get past all the Molyneux hype).

Everything is set, and the screen freezes.

This has happened before, and actually started right about the time I re-purchased Fable and started playing it (BC style) on the Xbox 360. I had noticed that it would freeze with these weird lines on the screen, and I would have to shut off the 360 and turn it back on. I tried an Xbox 360 native game when I first noticed the problem, and did not seem to get the same freezing problem than. I thought that it just must be a glitch in the software emulation routine for Fable. Annoying, but workable until it gets updated. Tonight, though, it happened again. I did the turn off-turn back on routine. No help. I took the game out and threw in Perfect Dark Zero. Hmm. Now I am getting no video/audio signal at all to the TV and I am getting the dreaded "red lights" on the 'Ring of Light." Now it has gotten to where it will actually turn on about once every 10 tries, and then it will only stay running for about a minute before it freezes again.

Call Xbox Support. Cliff Notes version: There's a problem. We troubleshoot for about 5 minutes. It is a hardware problem that COULD include a hard drive issue. Return box being overnighted to me for return/replacement.

This is an all-too familiar story it seems, especially with my personal gaming group of about 80 people. Of those in my group who have actually been able to get a 360, I would say about 40%... yes that's 40% not 4%... have had the same or similar problem that has required a return to Microsoft for repair/replacement. Great track record you got there, Billy Boy...

My next issue is all my game saves. Since it may also include a hard drive issue, I have to return it as well, and "there is no guarantee" I will get the same hard drive/my hard drive contents back. So I get to go buy a memory unit for $40, take my hard drive with me, and talk to my guys at EBGames (they are great guys who always take care of me... thanks Ben and Daniel!) to see if they will let me put my hard drive on their demo unit long enough to get all my hard drive contents to the memory unit. Well everything except the FFXI demo. Piece of trash. But that is another blog entry on its own!

Anyway, in one week... totaled car and defective Xbox 360. At this point I am without a replacement for either.

Who said the Irish have good luck? Where are they? I wanna slap 'em.