It started innocently enough -- buy some cheapo $50 televisions to put into the kids' bedrooms to keep them from hogging my TV in the living room. Then, once we moved to a bigger place, my living room and kitchen became separated by a den. I realized I couldn't watch TV while prepping breakfast or dinner (I like catching the morning and evening news), so I extended the cable and brought it into the kitchen with a small television.
Except for my son's television, not a single TV in this house is newer than twelve years old, and some of them have been around for twenty years. They refuse to die, and I refuse to replace them until they do.
This brings me to the present. I am working away in my upstairs den (glorified closet/sewing room/craft area) and want to watch TV, but the cable box is dead. I try everything: reconnecting the wires into and out of the box, making sure the television connection is solid, unplugging and re-plugging in the cord from the outlet and also from the cable box, and, when all else fails, I try smacking the box with my fist.
Nothing.
I dread the trip to the cable company because the lines are often out the door. I drive there directly after work on Monday to find ... surprise, surprise ... no lines. Not a single other patron in the place. Within three minutes I am in and out and heading back to my house. The service call to get connected goes well except that the technician accidentally hangs up on me, but, because the call is being recorded for training purposes, she calls me right back. About six minutes later, we're good to go.
Now, if I can just convince myself to dump the old stereo TV in the living room and finally go HD (I am sooooo behind the times), I think I'll be living in the 21st century.
