Okay, so I was wrong. And glad to be so.

When I dropped my Canon PowerShot 30 on the concrete floor at Costco last night, I figured that was it for old Bessy. I’d already dropped it once before (leaving the lens cover slightly off kilter), but this time I thought it was done for. Or, at least, that it would cost almost as much as the camera, or more than a few hundred dollars at least, and a week or so to repair it.

Just to make sure, I called up Canon today, and they put me in touch with their shop in Shinjuku (where I happened to be going today anyway), and it happens I know the place–their Zero-One shop on the 1st floor of the Mitsui Building. I used to go there all the time when I was working at a language school on the 46th floor of the Shinjuku Center Building across the street.

So I went in there and asked, and the guy said, “Looks like it’s the optical unit. Hmm. Yeah, we can fix it.” I asked him how much, and that’s where the day started getting better. 12,000 yen, he said (about $115). How long will it take, I asked. “Let’s see… can you come back at…” (he looked at a schedule) “… about 5:15 pm?” About two hours later. Cool.

So I went to work to drop off the grades for my three courses, just completed, and now we get a one-month vacation–and my box of Amazon.com DVDs came, with the Jurassic Park boxed set, Friends 6th season and Futurama 3rd season, among a few others. Even better. Then to the dentist–wouldn’t you know, no cavities. Then back to the camera shop, pick up a working camera, and home.

The weather was lousy today–55 degrees F and overcast, while it was about 80 degrees and sunny yesterday. But things worked out a lot better today than yesterday, so I guess it evens out for me.

The photo at top right, by the way, is of the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building (Shintaro Ishihara is in there somewhere), taken just outside the Canon shop entrance, to test the repaired camera.