Mom’s here. As I suspected and wrote about in last week’s blog, from the moment she arrived, she’s been much more relaxed. She vocalized at least 10 times today, as she lay in the sun, how she just couldn’t believe she was here. It was a beautiful day. She put on her swimsuit and acquired a bit of a pink tinge as she basked in the warmth of Florida winter. Patti and I went to Walmart after dinner, and that’s when the trouble started.
Mom wanted to watch the national news while we were gone. We have a newer “smart TV.” I turned it on to a local station and got everything set up for her, then Patti and I left. I never watch the national news, so I have no idea what time it’s on.
When we got home from Walmart, mom was having a mini senior temper tantrum. Neither she nor Randy knew how to work anything on the TV, not the volume, not the channel changer, not the guide…nothing. Nothing on TV is on at the same time in the Eastern Time Zone as it is in her native Central Time Zone. She didn’t get any national news and couldn’t find out what’s happening with the California wildfires. She railed about how stupid it was to have a TV (nice things) that you don’t even know how to use. She was mad, and admitted it. It was a rather comical, I know I’m being unreasonable, but damn I didn’t get what I want, rant.
Here’s the truth of the matter. I’ve mentioned before that Randy and I turn on the TV to watch Packer games and Dancing With the Stars. We always do that together. There’s no other reason to have a TV in our house. When we got this TV, which is about a year old, we never expected the extreme learning curve it took before we were even able to watch those 2 programs. The reason is the remote that came with the TV, pictured here.
Now I’m not a technological neophyte, but I have to admit it took me literally 3 weeks to learn how to control the TV with this remote. Whoever heard of a remote control that doesn’t have labels or numbers on it so you can turn up the volume or select a specific channel? Figuring out this dumb piece of equipment was one of the most frustrating technological challenges I’ve ever faced. And that’s not an exaggeration. Randy has no interest in learning to use this remote. There’s no reason to do so, he’s not going to watch TV if I’m not there.
In the end, it all turned out ok. The national news was an hour later than she’s used to watching it, and by the time it was on, I was home to get her all comfy in front of the TV, watching what she wanted to watch, at a volume she needed to be able to hear it without her hearing aids.
But this incident made me realize that the next couple weeks while she and Patti are here are going to be a challenge for finding time for my normal routine. As a result, I’m going to take a couple of weeks off from this blog so I can spend the precious time I have left with mom. I don’t expect she’ll watch a lot of TV, but when she does, I want to be able to give her what she wants. And it may take me more time than I expect to try to teach Patti and Randy to use the 2 TVs in our house that now seem to be my sole domain.
I’ll be back in a few weeks. Till then, have a great time enjoying that TV I’m sure you know how to use in your own home.
P.S. Have I mentioned lately how much I love living in Florida? Winters are the best. Thank you, Lord, for the opportunity to live in paradise.
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