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The bride and I were discussing that we are the only people we know who are regressing when it comes to technology.
When I chatted about our television situation with a few folks, the pity on others’ faces was startling. Who doesn’t have a gigantic TV these days? Us.
Our primary television is 19 inches and probably 15 years old; at the time it was groovy with a VCR built in the bottom of it. Our other TV in the bedroom is 13 inches. It, too, has a built-in VCR, but it quit working so we taped the slot shut so no one would try to stick a tape in. (Yes, we still use video tapes. We found out the hard way that the back VCR had become akin to Charlie Brown’s kite eating tree, the tape eating machine: The VCR consumed a beloved six hours of 80’s cartoon Christmas specials. The Care Bear stare will no longer save Christmas.) We own about 10 remotes but none work on the bedroom TV so you have to get up in the middle of the night and manually turn it off – all that activity has a tendency to wake me up, though. A universal remote was tried but our make of TV wasn’t on it; when did they quit making Philcos?
Anyway, both sets are adorned with converter boxes because we don’t have cable or satellite. This, too, horrified those I was discussing TV with. I’ve heard about shows like The Sopranos and Mad Men and Weeds, but I’ve never seen an episode. I also haven’t watched Monday Night Football since it moved to ESPN. I’m not a TV snob. I love TV. I never miss The Amazing Race or The Mentalist or FlashForward and I can’t wait until Lost comes back. Yes, these shows would probably look fantastic on a 42-inch screen in high def (whatever that is – I always thought it had something to do with hip-hop). I don’t know what a TIVO looks like or what a DVR is (which, apparently, does not stand for Democratic Voter Registration, a typical liberal media effort to force support for the health care bill). I do know that if you want to watch Channel 11 on our TV, you have to turn the converter box to the southwest and open the east mini-blinds. And be very still. Television isn’t the only area where we lag technologically. I love radio but only have one, a gift Bose that I unplug and carry from room to room. (My trusty old portable, with its battery compartment melted shut from a hair curler years ago, finally croaked – probably from being cranked too loud when I took it into the bathroom as I showered.) I have several sets of headphones for my Walkman – I don’t own an iPod or anything Apple-y – but they all only work out of one ear, the left. Our home computer just quit working out of the blue, and our DVD player, made well before the words Blu and Ray were put together, will play only from one hole, No. 5. (You have to unhook the converter box and plug in the DVD.) We can’t play the grandkids’ favorite Elmo in Springtime DVD in my wife’s laptop, because it’s insanely slow for some reason. It could be because we tried one of those plug-in phone cards. There are many benefits to living in the country – not even counting dishwasher snakes – but good luck getting high speed Internet. That laptop phone card didn’t work. So, when we want to download a photo of a grandchild, we fetch the laptop and plug in the phone cord – it drapes down in an arc from the ceiling like a H-A-P-P-Y B-I-R-T-H-D-A-Y banner – wedging the cord in the proper laptop hole with a piece of folded paper since part of the plastic clip is snapped off. Then we go mow the yard for a couple of hours. On our return...presto! A photo! I’m not seeking sympathy here; I could rectify these situations. However, in these tough economic times, I usually route money to food for the humans and gas for the pickup (which recently had the latch on the tailgate break [didn’t all those working parts used to be metal?]; a truck with a non-opening tailgate isn’t much of a truck). So, in these cyber-Dust Bowl-y times, we simply make do. The backroom, 10-year-old laptop replaces the dead home computer and Elmo in Springtime plays just fine there (if you don’t jiggle the cord or else the unit shuts down) or in DVD hole No. 5. I can lug the Bose to the sunroom while I work out, and I can hear the Ticket well enough out of my left ear when running with the Walkman. I can live just fine without knowing what Jon Stewart’s yapping about or what the vampires are doing on True Blood. If I want to watch NFL football Sunday afternoons or The Simpsons that night, all I have to do is open the blinds, cock the converter, and stand in the middle of the room striking the crane pose from The Karate Kid. It’s not that big a deal, really – as long as you’re in the front room because Channel 4 doesn’t come in in the bedroom. Mark K. Campbell is the Azle News sports editor. |
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