About my life spent on hold with Kohl's

Like last night. I had a birthday gift certificate, good for online shopping only, at Kohl's. Plus, I had a 15% off coupon I could use in tandem. These shopping discounts were burnin' a hole in my cyber-pocket, so I spent some time surfing the aisles at Kohls.com. (Editor's site review: Their site is terrible. At first glance, it's okay. But try to find something.... They have too much stuff, and it's not well organized. Products appear in several, seemingly unrelated, places. I had to dig and dig to find a pair of earrings that had been featured on the jewelry page just last week.)

I finally found the object of my desire, and added a little sumpin', and proceeded to checkout.

Filled out all the name address blah blah, Kohl's credit card, then added the gift certificate info and the coupon in what seemed to be a very nicely organized fashion.

Except when I hit "order," and was able to review my order, while the 15% off coupon was clearly applied, I would see no where that the $20 gift certificate had been deducted. Bummer!

Stymied, I called the toll-free number, only to be told right off by my new electronic friend that "waits are longer than you may be used to at Kohls.com and you might want to call back later."

Well no I didn't want to call back later, so I pressed all the right buttons (as my new friend instructed me) and finally got to the Musak place.

Where I stayed for fifteen or twenty minutes. Thank God for Firefox and tabbed browsing! I could keep my Kohl's checkout screen up and amuse myself at the same time.

FINALLY, a real human announced herself. After selling her my firstborn child to prove my identity (sorry, Ang, we'll miss you, but I know you love Kohl's) she was able to look at my order and discern that, indeed, yes, that gift certificate had been applied, my Kohl's card had been charged the correct amount, and it was all good.

Okay, bye then. Can I have Angela back?

I run a web site, so I know we're still figuring out this internet thing. But, knowing a little about how ecommerce works, I'm stumped as to why the screen I was looking at was not jiving with what she was looking at.

Well, I won't get that 15 or 20 minutes back, but I did learn that Kevin Federline is taking Brit back to court for something or other. And, I am gonna get those earrings. And that other sumpin'.

How about you? Had any lengthly online shopping experiences lately?