New TV

I seem to have neglected to mention that our living-room television, that we've had nigh on ten years, finally gave up the ghost. This was a few weeks ago. On Burr's suggestion, we put it up on craigslist, clearly marked defunct. Within the day, someone claimed it, and hauled it away. I should try that more often.

So as a stopgap, I took a 20" television that I had in storage and moved it into the living room. Downscaling from 32" to 20" didn't bother me as I watch most of my programs in the family room downstairs. But Renee watches most of her programming upstairs, and she complained that the 20" made her "eyes hurt".

Jean and I have been budgeting money for a new television for awhile now, as we knew that the 32" was on a downward spiral. So this weekend, we made the tour of Costco and Fry's, and settled on a flat-panel that was in our price range. It's a Samsung, and I put it in the family room today. Then I moved the 27" from the family room upstairs to the living room. My buttocks still ache.

After getting the hookups correct on both televisions, I noticed that even though we'd downgraded to 'limited basic' cable, the new television downstairs was picking up several digital channels that were not listed in the package. This includes a handful (NBC, CBS, PBS) of HDTV channels. Renee watched a football game between San Diego (?) and somebody else in HD as a result. She roots for the San Diego team because her best friend is from there.

I mostly won't benefit from this arrangement, as I do all my viewing using the ReplayTV, which only records standard definition television. But Jean and Renee both do live television viewing, so they may in fact become HD fans. Time will tell...