My wife, son and I were at the local Best Buy over the weekend buying stuff for our future bar/entertainment center. We were in the mini-fridge area when an employee came up to offer us some help. I noticed she was wearing a blue button shirt, not the typical ugly Polos that BB forces their employees to wear, but didn't think anything of it.

After helping us pick out some appliances for the bar, I mentioned I needed to show my wife some HDTVs while we were in the store and she offered to help. I politely declined, thinking that someone who sells dishwashers and refrigerators probably isn't up on the latest HDTV technology. It must have shown on my face, because she said she didn't work in appliances, that she was a personal shopping assistant. Wha?

Apparently Best Buy, well on its way to Fry's like bad customer service, realized they were heading in the wrong direction and decided to launch this shopping thingie.

The service sounds like what was started for the Xbox 360 launch, where employees walked customers around after buying their console, showing them all the other stuff (HDTV) they could (HDTV) buy (HDTV), if they were so inclined.(HDTV)

It sorta sounds like a dream job to me. Basically, Lesley walked us around the store helping us find things to buy. She walked us over to under-the-counter televisions, talked games with me, found somewhere safe for my son to play and even ran down HDTV specs over in the store's home theater area.

It was sorta like a concierge service for shopping. A few hours later, after almost plunking down way too much money for a 50-inch Plasma HDTV with a built in DVR, Lesley walked us to the door with our purchases. (She was even able to ring them up without sending us off to Best Buy's new and confusing maze of money spending.)

I hopped into the car with my wife and as we drove off, looked back at the double doors wistfully and asked my wife: "Do you think I should have tipped her?"