The new TV has a weird feature I cannot fix. When the mute button is pressed, it goes into closed-captioning mode. Even for commercials. I can't get away from the inane chatter of those pitchmen and pitchwomen. I think it's a conspiracy by TV makers and those who sell advertising to infect every one of us with their buy, buy, buy insanity.
With that in mind, here is the story of buying a new TV:
A few weeks ago my brother and I were watching the New Mexico Lobos play the New Mexico State Aggies. Both of us are graduates of UNM, so we were rooting for the Lobos.
Watching them play (even if, at the time of the UNM-NMSU game, the Lobos were supposed to be good) is merely a distraction. We had the sound turned down (local announcers suck--and so do many national announcers) and were listening to ska-laced Mexican dance music. And then the TV blipped and turned to snow. We thought the cable went out, so we sat listening to the music and talking about whether a TV casting snow was something someone could do for, say, an hour and a half.
After ten minutes, I realized that we had rabbit ears for the TV and could take the cable out and at least watch the game. But when the rabbit ears were attached, we couldn't get a signal. Obviously there was a bigger problem.
Our TV was a cheapy (or Sanyo as they call them at Best Buy), and we'd had it for at least 5 years. Since I've observed that well used electrical appliances rarely last a decade (or even a half decade), I quickly realized (after almost 20 minutes of snow) that a new TV might be in order.
There were two problems with this.
One, the Kansas City Chiefs were playing in the morning against the San Diego Chargers. I have an unusual closeness to the Chiefs--as does my brother--due to a childhood growing up in that part of the midwest. After the loss to Denver in the playoffs last year (which we watched with friends who were Broncos fans), we had to excuse ourselves from the room to grieve in peace. Since the game started at 11 a.m., we needed to get a new TV that night. Stores don't open until 11 on Sundays.
Two, it was a Saturday night and about five minutes to nine. All stores close at nine on Saturdays. We were about to enter a black hole of TV buying time. The improbable had happened in today's rush rush 24 hour society--our TV had blown out on a Saturday night! I looked through every sale circular from the week previous in our stack of newspapers and finally found salvation. Wards was having a 14-hour sale. This meant the store was open until 10. We got shoes on and hi-tailed it out into the streets.
I will stop right here and mention that, usually, we are not so quick to replace our dead (or near-dead) appliances. We've got a dryer that sounds like a cacophony of curb drummers on speed when it runs. I've learned the sacred art of VCR cleaning (lots of alcohol and cotton swabs) to keep ours running at optimum levels. And my computer is over six years old--almost ancient in computer years.
But here's the rub. I know nothing about fixing a TV. And I have this feeling that fixing a cheapy Sanyo might cost about half what we paid for it in the first place. It's not that great a TV. Besides, we had the Chiefs game and sweeps week coming up, so being without a TV would be like quitting heroin by putting the needle two feet away and saying, "No, I don't need this any more." It's just not possible. So we went to the store.
No one was there. Usually Wards and the rest of the mall it is part of closes at 9 p.m. Period. Not too many people waited until the last hour of the 14-hour sale to shop. We streaked through the mostly unfamiliar store looking for and finally finding the TV section. We had seen a deal on another cheapy TV in the circular, and thought this was a good choice. The salesguy had a different thought on the subject.
"I can't believe people would buy a piece of crap like that," he said and then told us he had just sold the last of the cheapy TVs an hour or so earlier.
We told him our predicament. There was nowhere else to go. We were out of time--and we were already in our shopping shoes.
The game, we said. We need to see the game.
The salesguy looked at us for a second and realized something. "So am I to understand you need a TV tonight?"
My brother tried to answer no, but I overruled him. "Yes, we need one now. Tell us your secrets."
He then went through the entire litany of good and bad things about the TVs he had in stock (in our price range). Thorough, sometimes exhaustive, and very helpful. He knew he was getting a sale and the pressure was off.
We ended up with a slightly larger TV in stereo. And the picture is ten times better than our old one. Very cool.
But there is this problem with the mute button.
Matt Worley apologizes for his TV dependence. He'd go into counseling for it, but apparently this is not as big a social problem as, say, almost any other addiction.