My TV Broke

Oh, yeah ... forgot I haven't mentioned this till now.  My television set broke last Saturday afternoon.

So I got home that day (the morning after My Fucking Father yelled at me for "disrespecting" him) and I wanted to just march into my bed and hide.  I plopped onto my bed and turned on the TV, switching to Channel 4 and the basketball game between, I think, host Florida and LSU.  Tired of the fighting, I laid down and closed my eyes, hoping to maybe get a quick nap before dinner.

When I try to pass out I turn the sound down low, quiet enough for me to fade into unconsciousness, but loud enough to hear the game in case I can't but still don't want to open my eyes.  As I was doing that and the TV was doing its thing, I hear a sudden loud screeching noise coming from the TV.  At first I thought the broadcast was experiencing some technical difficulties.  But as the screech didn't dissipate after several seconds, I had to open my eyes and turn (without my glasses on) to the TV.

Then, I saw the screen go black, from the top of the screen to almost halfway.  It was as if a black curtain was being lowered down my TV screen.  Also, the TV may have turned black and white.  Regardless, as the black slowly cascaded down the screen, the TV abruptly turned itself off.  No screen, no red power light, no nuthin'.  And when I tried turning it back on, with both my remote and then the power button on the set, I too got nuttin'.  It's not just off, dude -- I think it's broken.

My guess is that it's the cathode ray tube.  Something drastic must have blown inside the television.  I would love to get it fixed, but with no old set-top boxes being made, and with the possibility that a repair would cost hundreds (from a repair shop I don't even know exists; where would I find someone who's able to fix and old cathode-ray TV?), shit, this would be the time where I would actually heed My Father's advice and get a new TV.  And, like with the smartphone I got from my uncle over Christmas, I would actually be living in the 21st century.

But am I going to get one yet?  No.  I'm still cash poor.  Looking through Consumer Reports there are a couple good Samsungs I could get for $200 and $260, but both of them are so small I would have to squint from my bed.  There's also a Samsung (or is it an LG?) that's 50" big, which would be more than enough (even overwhelming) but would set me back $650.

I'm holding off on getting a new TV even though it has altered my evening schedule.  At night I would be able to veg out while watching my shows, but now I have to go outside to either the dining room or the living room to watch TV.  I've done a little of that the past few days, but mostly I've either lain in bed in the dark trying to go to sleep early, or in my former bedroom (and current office) on my computer.  I'm missing a lot of shows this way, most notably the late-night talk shows, most notably the first weeks of The Tonight Show With Jimmy Fallon and Late Night With Seth Meyers.  I would like to see how they develop, but I don't have a TV in my room and it'd be too loud for my parents if I tried watching outside of my room.

Ironically enough, however, this problem could be solved.  On Wednesday, just a few days after my television set broke, my parents bought a brand-new humongous TV for the dining room.  That displaces the old TV to the living room, which in turn displaces that old (and non-HDTV) television set to ... Father's computer room.  I guess he'll just sit there when he can't sleep, doesn't want to wake up Mother while watching TV and is too lazy to go upstairs.  Better yet, it could go into my room, which would save me the expense of buying a new television and would make My Fucking Father happy that I'm finally upgrading the technology I have around me.  But I don't think I can go, "Hey, my TV's broken, and since you bought a new TV for the dining room, I figure I could get the old TV from the living room.  How's that?"  That would be the presumptuous entitlement of a soon-to-be-38-year-old who should leave the house permanently.

I guess I'll wait until they notice how many nights I'm outside instead of inside watching TV.