…I had to abandon this week’s Overlooked Films post. I got preoccupied with a project earlier this
morning and by the time I finished completing what I set out to do I was just
not in the mood for anything that involved me watching a movie and then
thinking of something witty to say about it.
This has happened often in the past, and I thought that I had thoroughly
wrestled that problem to submission but it would appear that I still have miles
to go before I sleep.
A week or two ago, the ‘rents got a look at the most recent
of our cable bills and noticed that CharredHer had decided to raise our bundle
rate to roughly the size of the national debt.
After having a brief meeting to discuss the problem, we formed a
committee of one (me) to look at two proposals.
The first (endorsed by Mom and Dad) involved switching from our current
service to AT&T U-verse. The
disadvantage to this would be that I would have bid my fiancée Me-TV a sad
fare-thee-well (and also my mistress Antenna TV)…plus I would have had to spend
precious time resetting the wireless router, something I was not particularly
looking forward to with relish. Todd at Sweet Freedom did explain to me that it would be possible to get these
two stations with the aid of a antenna but I’m not completely positive about
the signal strength, and I’d hate to invest in something like that without being 100%. The only advantage to U-verse would be that I
would at least be able to watch The Greatest Cable Channel Known to Mankind™ on my bedroom TV.
My proposal was that we jettison the landline telephone part
of the CharredHer bundle—which my Mom has been wanting to do for sometime now—and
eliminate one of the tiers on the cable service…something that was received
quite favorably when I suggested it during dinner. My dad was a little verklempt when he learned
that he would no longer have access to “The Hitler Channel,” as ClassicBecky
calls it, but other than that he was a brave soldier. I thought I was the actual winner in this
deal because not only did we get to keep the classic television channels but
TCM is intact, too. TCM used to be on
Channel 52 on the cable lineup but they moved it into the upper tiers sometime
back…and apparently recognize it in the basic tier package.
We really weren’t too concerned about the phone situation
because my Dad has a cell phone (the fact that he has one and I do not is one of life’s little ironies) and he
had planned to put Mom on his account to get one as well…but yesterday, he
decided to invest in a Magic Jack and he picked one up at a Radio Shack here in
Athens. I was hoping my name would not be
on the assignment sheet to install this…suffice it to say, I was doomed to
disappointment. He hands me the
MagicJack apparatus and instructions, telling me to install it in my own free
time…and then proceeded to ask me every hour upon the hour if I had read the
instructions yet.
So I put the doggone thing together this morning—and I know
what you’re probably thinking: “It couldn’t be that hard…” But you need to
keep in mind that a) I am technology-challenged, and b) there’s never a
fershlugginer extension cord available in this house when you need one. (I didn’t come across such a cord until the
last box I looked in…because I am rarely fortunate to look in that box first.)
After I had it installed (and figured out the reason why it didn’t
seemed to be working was this crappy telephone that we’ve had since Alexander
Graham invented them) I am pleased to report that the halftime score is
Technology 7, Ivan 3. Rest assured, I
will have things back to normal with our regularly scheduled B-Western Wednesdays tomorrow.
4 comments:
proceeded to ask me every hour upon the hour if I had read the instructions yet.
I'm starting to think your dad was my dad's younger brother.
When I called to complain to Cox about the price hike, they still tried to sell me a landline. Right, because when I call to complain about a huge price hike, I want a BIGGER bill.
Have you considered DirecTV?
As long as you don't want the Premium channels like HBO & ShowTime, you can get East & West Coast feeds of the networks (ABC, CBS, NBC, Fox, WB) which comes in handy since, if you miss something, you can catch it again three hours later!
Guess what Ivan, we are going through this mess too. I'm without TCM until sometime next week.. Thankfully, I have a husband to figure out this stuff..
I also wanted to stop by and thank you for your support during my illness.. It really helps in my recovery. Hugs to you..
Yowsa, all this is conspiring to make Verizon look not so bad in comparison, something I wouldn't've thought possible...catch you next week...(and, of course, you can invest in the antenna and try the local signal clearance of the broadcast affiliates without giving up on any cable...and keep the receipt in case your local signal strength is essentially nil, for return...)
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