A few years ago, I bought 2 Craftmade Piccolo ceiling fans in white finish. Both were purchased from stupid EBAY, one was 'Open Box', and the other was allegedly new, unopened.

The open box one was very inexpensive. When it arrived, I checked it and found no blades. I contacted the seller and he or she agreed to discount the price of the sale as much as it cost to purchase replacement blades. Replacement blades were still under manufacture and I was able to purchase a set with ease.

The second fan, which was allegedly unopened, I did not check when it came in. Shame on me. I stashed the fans away until a use case surfaced. I recently came up with a use case for them both. I had the set of replacement blades set aside with the 2 boxes of fans. I opened one box, and found no blades. No problem, I had the replacement set.

Then I opened the second box, which was supposed to be never before opened, and lo and behold there were no blades. The unit was clearly opened at some point, and resold as brand new. Yet ANOTHER scam on stupid EBAY. Now it's a few years later as I'm discovering this, so there's nothing I can do about it as far as the original sale goes.

Not ideal but not a major problem either, just order more blades. Nope. Not anymore. There is not a single solitary set of white blades for the Craftmade Piccolo left anywhere in the entire universe. There's not even any on snake oil EBAY!

The only set of Piccolo fan blades able to be purchased at this time is the stupid brushed nickel ones. For whatever reason, the world has decided to go monochrome in recent years. Everything is brushed nickel or stainless steel. Houses made today could be captured with a black and white camera and not look any different than with a color camera. I despise brushed nickel and stainless steel. The finishes are bland, cold, and uninviting.

Fine, I'll order the ugly brushed nickel set since that's all that exists, and just paint it white. Nope. That doesn't work either. Apparently there's some kind of coating applied to these blades that makes them unable to be painted. They cannot be sanded either as they're not real wood like most ceiling fan blades.

I'm not sure how to proceed at this point. I already have an hour or two into the project itself in regards to wiring and installing the fans, one with blades and one without. I have probably another half hour into it in researching the replacement blades. I also have another half hour in going to the store to get paint, plus the cost of the paint, the cost of the ugly blades, and maybe another 15 minutes wasted shouting about how stupid the whole situation is.

I can stop here, redo the install with 1 fan only and just count all the time as a loss, or I can purchase a new fan for almost 200 dollars, take the blades out of the box and throw out the rest, and put the blades on the existing fan I installed. Both options do not sit well, but I'm far more perturbed by all that time going to waste as opposed to the money. I don't have the kind of money that allows me to just throw out $200 without thinking, but I can make more money. I cannot make any more time.