Remote Ideas

Dad's in a panic. "DENISE!"

It's 8am. He can't get Animal Planet on his TV. He's frustrated. "I can't get this damn thing to work!"

Background: Yesterday Dad asked me, after reading the post-Oscar blurbs in the Seattle Times, "Have you seen The Hurt Locker?"

"Yeah," I say, "Great movie, you'd love it. In fact, I have the NetFlix DVD now. Do you want to watch it before I send it back?"

"YEAH!" Both arms wave into the air joyfully.

He's pretty excited. A great western, or a great war movie and my dad becomes a giddy little boy on Christmas morning, and I don't care what anybody says, there's something really cute about a giddy old man.

"Okay," I say, "I'll go set it up for you on your TV. All you'll have to do is turn it on tonight when you go to bed (Dad has a TV in his bedroom, which he watches in the morning while he's dressing, and at night before he falls asleep.) and watch it.

"GREAT!" The arms again.

So I get the DVD loaded and set up, ready to go. All Dad has to do is turn on the TV, put on his trusty Sennehiser headset, sit back, and enjoy.

Back to this morning.

So Dad can't get the TV to turn on.

"Did you watch the movie last night?" I ask him.

"No, Christ, I was so pooped last night, I just went to sleep. It took me forever to figure out how to turn that goddamn blue light off. (There is a blue light that glows on the DVD player when it's on. For some reason, those kinds of glowy blue lights always keep him awake. Some part that glowy blue light penetrates his nearly-blind eyes.)

He goes on, "I finally figured it out, but it took me forever! So I never did get to the movie. But I'm going to watch it tonight." His eyes twinkle with excitement. If I didn't totally love The Hurt Locker so much, I would interject some sort of sexist "What is it with men and war movies anyway?" comment here. But I did. So I won't.

Okay so, what happened next is a perfect illustration of how old people are so much like little kids who are just learning a new skill, it's just uncanny. Here's how it went:

1. I explained to Dad that in order to get the DVD to play on the TV, he has to change the INPUT coming into the TV. To do this, he has to use the TV REMOTE. I showed him where the button is on the remote--all the way down in the left corner (cuz he can't possibly see the word "Input" written above the button.) Check.

2. I showed him where the Play, Rewind, and Stop/Pause buttons are on the DVD PLAYER REMOTE so he can watch the movie at his own speed (which means stopping, rewinding, and starting again so he can replay parts that he misses the first, second, or third times.). Check.

3. Finally, I showed him how to turn the TV back to regular satellite reception so he can watch Animal Planet, the Aviation channel, and PBS, and all the rest of his favorite channels. He has to do this by first using the SATELLITE REMOTE to turn the receiver on, then using the INPUT button on the TV REMOTE so the TV can connect to the satellite receiver. Check.

Then I had him do the whole thing all over again on his own. Check, Check, Check.

I'm walking out of his bedroom when he says, "But why the hell do I need three different remotes to do all that?"

Out of the mouths of babes........and old people...