A Remote Corner

There is a remote corner of hell and I'm in it.  My personal shoppers, Deb and Craig, delivered the new TV yesterday.  One person carried it in and two had to lift the old one away.  The monstrous old beast is sitting in the entryway, waiting for more hands and muscles to get it downstairs.  Craig is my electronics guru and soon had the TV, satellite receiver, and DVD player connected and up and running.  As I told Deb, I felt like I'd just dropped into Oz about the time black and white turned into technicolor.  It's not just the size of the picture, it's the color and clarity; absolutely astounding.  Like it or not (and I like it!), I'm being dragged into the 21st century.

My kindhearted Kids had plans for the evening and had to leave early; it's a long drive home for them.  And that's when my descent into hell began.  I now need three remotes to operate the equipment where before I needed only one.  All three are black and similar in shape, and it takes all three to turn stuff on.  The "do something" buttons are in different places.  One remote changes the channels, but another one changes the volume.  This one will bring up the program guide, but that one won't.  I could operate the one remote for the old TV while blindfolded; I'm kinetically oriented.  These unfriendly remotes won't communicate with each other, and they definitely keep secrets from me.  Left to my own devices, I promptly got into trouble.  Obviously I had the wrong remote in hand and/or pushed the wrong button because I completely lost that wonderful picture and had a screen of grey snow and a message that said, "No signal."  Oh crum.  I didn't know what I'd done or how to fix it.  The nice technical support people for Sony take the weekend and all evenings off.  Evidently one must schedule all crises during normal working hours.  What's up with that?!  I refused to panic (I would probably push the wrong panic button) and resisted the urge to sit in the corner and cry.  It's not easy to operate a remote with one's fingers crossed, hoping to hit the right sequence.  I could not tell you how or with which remote, but with trial and error I got the picture back.  I did not change the channel the rest of the evening, used all three remotes to turn off all three electronics, and went to bed early.

If you look for me today, you know where to find me.  I'm the one in the remote corner.