You only hurt the ones you love...

I love my camera. I have a Nikon D50 DSLR camera and I mean, I LOVE this camera. Generally, whenever I buy something, I get at least some sort of buyer's remorse for it. If I don't get buyer's remorse, I at least see something a couple of months later that I wish I had bought instead. I've never had either with this camera and I've had it for well over a year now.

So, after taking some great pictures of my adorable children, I decided to clean the camera. I got out my little microfiber cloth and air spray can. I put the battery on the charger and then started cleaning the camera. I wiped all of the LCD screens, eye piece, and lenses. I took off the UV filter and cleaned the actual lens and both sides of the filter. At this point, I'm not sure exactly happened. It's like I can see what happened in my memory, but it runs simliar to watching someone do something stupid in a horror movie. You're yelling at him not to walk into the basement, but he just doesn't hear you and then something bad happens to him. That's how my memory runs in my head. I'm yelling at myself because of the stupidity, but I just don't stop. Well, what happens next is that I remove the lens from the body of the camera and give the interior glass a quick wipe with the cloth. No big deal. Then, for some reason, I look inside the body of the camera at the mirror and apparently hallucinate a smudge, so I give it a quick wipe down with the cloth. First of all, nothing ever touches that mirror, why would there be a smudge. Second, you NEVER touch the inside of the camera. It's like the first two rules of fight club apply. 1. You never touch the mirror or sensor in the camera body. 2. You NEVER touch the mirror or sensor in the camera body.

It was sort of like I snapped back to reality just after I did it, and I thought to myself..."OH CRAP!!!" And I immediately snapped the lens back on and checked the picture. Yep...spots. Well, I've already screwed it up, perhaps I can fix it. So, I snapped the lens back off and gave it another wipe. Checked it again and I apparently just moved the spots around a bit. So, I busted out the canned air and give it a healty dose of spraying. I checked again...still spots. So, I got out some Q-Tips and give it a once over. Checked...spots AND fibers. Great!!!

I noticed something else as well this time. My focus brackets were bleeding a line off the screen. CRAP!!! What else!?! Apparently in my cleaning, I'd pressed too hard and cracked something somehow. I don't know what it was, but my LCD brackets were bleeding off the screen. Now, it wasn't horrible...barely noticeable really. For me though, it's those barely noticeable things that drive me nuts. I generally require perfection from my equipment, and especially equipment that I use and love as much as this one. I was screwed.

At this point, it was time to throw in the towel. I looked up the number and called the store I bought it from, Creve Coeur Camera. I know I had purchased an extended warrenty, and I had hoped that it covered cleanings, as most extended warrenty purchases do. So, I gave them a call and as my luck would have it, the warrenty does NOT cover cleanings...Nor do they cover damage by botched cleaning jobs by idiot owners. It's going to cost me around $80 for a cleaning and who knows how much to get the LCD fixed. She assured me that it would probably not cost over $150. Great. Just what I need. The camera worked perfectly this morning and now I'm an estimated $230 in the hole for this thing. The best part is that when they send it off, it takes 6 to 8 weeks to get it back. Just in time to miss Easter! Fantastic!!!

This was a huge bonehead move on my part and I was so upset and angry with myself a short while after it happened that I was litterally shaking. I couldn't believe how stupid I was. It was definitely a rookie mistake and I most definitely knew better. I guess this will just serve as a reminder for my next cleaning. A very expensive and costly reminder, that is.