Monday, January 13, 2014

Wake up call

Due to the death of our 15-year-old television, Mrs. Grumpy and I bought a new TV for our bedroom a few months ago.

So, early Sunday morning, around 1:00 a.m., we were both sound asleep when the TV woke us up. It was making a loud obnoxious beeping sound. Then the screen suddenly flipped on, all white, with gazillion megawatt intensity. Snowball's shadow was burned into the wall where he was sleeping.

Then, in huge letters, the screen said "CABLE CONNECTION HAS BEEN LOST."

Like I give a fuck when I'm sleeping.

After the adrenaline rush calmed down I got up, turned the TV off, and went back to bed.

20 minutes later I'd just started dozing again when the beeping and prison floodlight effects started again, but this time the screen said "CABLE CONNECTION HAS BEEN RESTORED."

So tonight I'm going to figure out how to turn this thoroughly worthless message off.

Attention TV manufacturers:

This is NOT a feature I want. If I'm watching TV, and the cable goes out, I will notice it and do not need you to tell me. Conversely, if I'm not watching TV, and the cable goes out, I DON'T CARE. Waking me up to let me know is only going to piss me off.

Thank you,

Ibee Grumpy, M.D.

15 comments:

Dr Bob said...

Our new bedroom TV randomly woke us with bursts of radio conversation in the early hours pi$$ing us of enormously - the makers apologised profusely and replaced it with a better specified item...

Anonymous said...

OMGoodness! How many lifeline buttons will be pushed in response to that particular bit of messaging do you suppose? Sleep is a precious commodity in my household, I would probably throw out the baby with the bathwater, er, the tv with the cable service if that happened to me.

Moose said...

Reason #935 for Why I Don't Own a Television (and haven't since the late '90s).

Anonymous said...

Sounds like the marketing department of the cable company decided what is important in this world, such as being aware of having a cable connection 24/7. The funniest part is probably that this was due to planned maintenance by the same cable company.
Makes you wonder who actually owns the TV (or any other modern media device).

HeyHeather said...

Another reason to not have a tv in the bedroom, or no tv at all.

jimbo26 said...

You didn't set it up properly . ;-)

Ivan Ilyich said...

Is there a separate cable box? Usually, the television is left "on" and the cable box remote is used to turn the system on or off. If you use the television control to turn the tv off, that might fix it.

Old RPh said...

Modern Marvels

Anonymous said...

Mine does the same thing. It drives me insane.

C.

Feli said...

there are such beautiful things like remote socket boards that react to the frequency of your televisions remote control. My TV only has power when it is needed!

Anonymous said...

I have never had cable or dish television. Though I own a television, it is over 20 years old and I can't remember the last time I turned it on to watch something on the VCR.

This week I learned how to deactivate the Amber alert on my cell phone. If I'm home in bed at midnight, the likelihood that I'm going to spot a missing child is nil unless said child rings my doorbell, in which case I'm gonna call 911 anyhow.

Anonymous said...

Dear Dr. G., Thanks for showing us, (mainly me)that the doctors we look up to are real people too. And, they use words that if I ever heard my doctor say, I'd fall off the chair!
LOL

Mad Jack said...

Some years ago Centenarian was having trouble with her telephone. Main Lady got the phone company on the job and they promised to fix it. So, along about 4:00 AM the phone rings. It's a recorded message from the phone company informing the occupants that the phone is now in working order.

Azuka said...

If you're like me you'll swear for about a week to fix it, then get used to it.

JamieC said...

We got a new TV last summer so the old one could be used in the basement for video games, it pops up with a message that the signal has been lost if you turn off the cable box/blu ray before turning off the tv. If it was just a message of the screen that would be fine, but it has a pop up box like in Windows with the option of ignoring or switching the tv to standby. The standby option doesn't actually turn the tv off, so you have hit ignore and then power off. It makes no freaking since.

Or if you turn the tv on before you turn the cable box on so have to hit ignore before you can watch tv.

 
Locations of visitors to this page