Bogue and Weejer: Some Pictures

Normally, I won't go on about a recent purchase I've made or something, but I just have to tell y'all about this place in California that I just found out about. It's a camera repair store in San Diego called Pro Photo Camera. A little over a week ago, Harper was doing something funny and I ran to grab my camera and compact flash card. I jammed the card into the slot and closed the little door. After several failed attempts to take a picture, I read my screen..."Unable to read card." I opened up the card slot and lo and behold, I tried putting the card in too fast and I bent two pins in the card slot. It was one of those moments where I just stood there, looking at those stupid, tiny little pins that cause me so much happiness and grief. Who designed it that way anyway? Why is there a need for the pins? We have holograms now, we can do away with lame memory storage designs. Whatevs. I knew there was no need in getting all dramatic about it, so I just sighed and got my regular digital camera, but, of course, Harper was finished with the funny.

A bent CF pin (a pretty common memory card format) is pretty much impossible to do anything about. I proceeded to call about 94 camera repair shops within a 30 mile radius. These are the answers I got:

"Billy Bob's Camera Shop."

"Hi, I was wondering if you do minor repair work on cameras."

"Yep. Sure do."

"Great. I have two bent CF pins and I'm pretty sure they're too bent to solder back together."

"What's a CF pin?"

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"Jimmy Joe's Camera."

"Yes, I was wondering if you perform minor repairs on cameras?"

"What do you mean by minor?"

"Well, I have two bent CF pins. I didn't know if you could replace the whole part or solder the pins back on."

"Well, sure, we can do that. Now, you said your camera is a CF 10. What brand is that?"

"No, it's a Canon. But the CF PINS are bent."

"A Canon CF 10. I haven't heard of that."

"No. It's it's the COMPACT FLASH PINS in the camera."

"OHHH...pins. Well, no. I don't think we can do that. I'm not quite sure what those look like."

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"Wolf Camera."

"I was wondering if you could repair a CF pin slot with some bent pins."

"Of course we can!"

(YES!) "That's awesome. Great! About how much is the cost of that and about how long will it take?"

"That runs about $200 for the labor and $1,000,000 for the part. And it normally takes about 4-6 weeks."

"Oh, no. Okay...well, I'm shooting a wedding in three weeks and I need it back before then...hmmmm..."

"Hmm, well, sucks to be you."

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So, you can see why I was a little stressed about the situation. So, I went online to see if maybe, just maybe, I could fix them myself. Ha, I read about 2 articles and, after it explained how to disassemble my camera and use a soldering iron, I quickly nixed that idea. So, I just Googled "CF pin repair" and up pops this ad for a service being sold through Ebay. I figured I might as well see. Sure enough, it was a CF pin repair for any type of DSLR for SUPER DUPER CHEAPO CHEAP. I emailed the shop just to make sure that price wasn't just for the labor, that it included the part, too, and yes, it did. So, I bought the service through Ebay...a risky move, I know, but I had to have my camera. I bought insurance through the mail and waited. Six days later, I got my camera back, in perfect working condition. I could not be more happy. It's hard to find good customer service and people who take pride in their work, so I wanted to share. If you have a DSLR, any brand, and you need it repaired or just cleaned, send it to these people. You will not regret it. I promise.

Here's some pictures! I guess technically it's "Here ARE some pictures" but there's not a contraction for that...Here're.

And now, we will demonstrate how to eat your sibling. Start small...a thumb, perhaps.