What time is it?

…it’s time for a new watch.

I don’t mind paying a lot for things. In fact, I rather enjoy spending a lot of money to get what I want. In a situation where one gets what one pays for, one should not pinch pennies. Yes, many times you pay more and get the same crap, or a product that is worse crap, and at those times I don’t recommend throwing away money. But when it comes to getting quality at a higher price, I’m a firm believer.

Well, I spent some reasonable sum of money on my watch. Nothing extravagant, but not cheap either. I probably dropped $120 on it or something like that. It’s a handsome square-faced analog in silver with just barely enough of a warm tint that it can be worn with silver or gold. I bought it probably in the winter of 1999, so I’ve gotten a few years’ service out of it.

The only complaint I have had with it over the years is that after a couple months of wear, the band starts to smell. And I mean, it’s actually rather foul. I don’t know what they treat that leather with, but yuck.

Well, the band has been showing signs of wear and it’s time to get the band replaced. Plus the watch stopped last week. So I looked on the back of the watch to see what kind of battery it takes, and I went to Walgreens to pick up a battery.

Then I discovered that I couldn’t get the back off the watch. I’ve scratched the hell out of the back of the watch and I think deformed the casing in the process, and the back just won’t come off. Annoying. So I went on in to the Kenneth Cole store here in the San Francisco mall, where I got no end of disgusted looks and hassle as I tried to get them to order me a new strap. In the end, they refused, but they did give me a booklet about my watch which contains an 800 number that supposedly I can use to order a replacement band. Thank you, representatives of Kenneth Cole. Fuckers.

Beaten down as I was, I did ask if they had some special tool for removing the back of the watch so that the battery could be replaced. They did not find that amusing. Of course, referring to me Kenneth Cole Watch manual, I see that if my battery runs down that I should go to an authorized Kenneth Cole Dealer to have it replaced.

Hello? If the Kenneth Cole store isn’t an authorized Kenneth Cole dealer, than who is? They suggested I take it to a watch shop.

Which I will do. There’s a watch shop in my neighborhood that will be happy to replace the battery for $5 or so. At least that’s what we used to charge people to replace batteries back when I worked for Timex.

That’s right. It was about 10 years ago that I used to be a professional watch battery changer. Hence my apprehension: if I can’t get the back off this watch, it was designed not to come off.

I’m not getting a new band unless I can get the watch running again.

Anyway, this just leads me to believe that Kenneth Cole is just the latest in the line of bullshit expensive fashionista designers. Make something expensive not because it’s built to last, but because it looks good and by virtue of looking good it is disposable. Why, no one wants to be seen wearing last season’s watch anyway, right?

Well, it’s enough hassle doing something that should be simple, like replacing the battery, that I might just get a new watch. But sign me up for a thumbtacks-and-saltwater enema before I’ll buy something else from Kenneth Cole.