hey bowfanatic, no they were not gouging me, it was a cheap radio, 8 c batteries cost me 10$ i think i paid 13 something for the radio, oh well. at least we were lucky on the storm, just alot of high wind here, the only thing that really hurt me was the wind took out the top of one of my persimmon trees. by the way if your son is using batteries in a walkman i'd say thats an worthy test of any battery