Remote Control

Yesterday our family decided to join the 21^st century and purchase a flat screen TV. My husband—who is by no means a television junkie, but enjoys the occasional baseball game or geeky nature show—has been gently pushing for this for over a year. “I wonder if I would enjoy watching football if I could see the plays,” he’d muse. “I wonder what kind of man I would be if I could see the man things.”

So I was all, what the hell, let’s get the TV. It’ll be fun (to have a bigger version of the television I never watch).

And I don’t. I don’t watch TV.

Not because I’m superior and awesome and too busy “watching nature” or alphabetizing my NPR tote bags, but because I just … hate it.

I hate television.

I want to like it! I used to like it! But then one day I just didn’t. And I don’t, and I don’t know what’s wrong with me, but anyway.

We bring home this TV.

And it takes TWO HOURS to install it in the base. Because the screws that came with it are just not quiiiiiite the right size. And once we get it in the base, the screen sort of wobbles back and forth like one of those bobblehead Chihuahuas gazing out all bug-eyed from the dashboard of a Mustang. So my husband calls customer service at Samsung and explains the problem, and the woman says to hold on while she asks an “Expert”, and then she comes back and she says, “It’s okay.”

It’s okay. Your new television is basically a big, expensive bobblehead doll, but it’s okay!  “As long as it’s screwed in, it’s secure,” she tells my husband. “No worries.”

The new shoes are making your feet bleed? Well as long as they don’t fall off when you walk.

So the new TV bobbles (BUT IT’S OKAY!), so we get into the whole business of turning it on.

Which—do you remember how easy this used to be?

There was a button that said “ON”? And you pushed it or turned it and BOOYAH! Gilligan.

Not anymore.

Now—detour with me for a second.

I have an iPhone. An iPhone that fits in my pocket and does pretty much everything but make dinner and clean my house. It’s my phone. It’s my email. It’s my camera. My video camera. My guitar tuner. A flashlight. A calendar. A sketchpad. A diary. I can listen to my music on it. I can watch movies. I can read books. I can take courses at Princeton. It’s wireless. It fits in my pocket. And it cost about $300.

This TV? Cost about $400.

And it doesn’t DO anything.

It just sits there. Or bobbles there, if you accidentally touch it.

But until you plug it in to this Comcast kerjobby with that port kebobby, with a DS-H-SLR-defity-mcshicknut cable, it’s basically worthless.

After another hour we get the TV plugged in to all the boxes and things that make it go … and we get the kids to sleep … and dammit I am going to enjoy a movie if it KILLS me.

So Larry hands me the remotes.

Not one.

Not two.

Not three.

But FOUR remotes.

One for the TV. And one for the cable. And one for the DVD player. And one for the stereo, which controls the volume when you’re watching a DVD (but not when you’re watching TV), and none of them are the same brand and they all have enough buttons to launch a NASA space station, and I just …

How remote can control get before you admit you don’t have any?  

Or am I just doing it wrong?