Teevee 2
Teevee 2
Yesterday, The Luddite wrote about the fact that he does not have cable television. This spurred some speculation that all The Luddite has is a little black-and-white portable.
Sigh.
The point was how important cable television has become to this society, not the equipment The Luddite has, if this remark was even serious at all. For your information, he has a Magnavox 20-inch color set that he inherited from a friend who was moving to Oregon and had no room for it on the truck. The set was superfluous to Gerg anyway, so he asked The Luddite if he wanted it. Since The Luddite’s existing Zenith System 3 crapped out a month after his friend left, it is good that The Luddite said ‘sure,’ even though his main motivation was that it was summer and he was tired of moving stuff.
Since it was brought up anyway, The Luddite will address the equipment. The Luddite has seen the large home-entertainment systems with the 60-inch screens. His sister-in-law has one. The Luddite thinks they look nice but if you are looking for some kind of compliment, you aren’t going to get one. TV screens don’t particularly interest me unless there is a football game on that I want to see. Otherwise, it’s just a box with colored lights in it. Some people have mentioned in bars that The Luddite’s attention sure drifts to one when they are talking, but this is because they aren’t saying anything particularly interesting, a fact that The Luddite has wisely kept to himself.
The television set has settled into a niche in this society that is almost totemistic. My parents always have one on in the background, even when no one is watching it; sports bars have them at every possible angle; they are even built into the roofs of minivans, ostensibly to help keep the kids from asking if ‘we are there yet.’
Fans in stadiums even have little battery-powered TVs that they look at rather than looking at the actual field—even if they have good seats. This really flips The Luddite out and makes him wonder why they even made the trip to the stadium in the first place so they could look at the game on a window smaller than a piece of scratch paper.
But what really got to The Luddite was when he stopped at a small campground in California and someone pulled in later in an RV about the size of a prison bus. The Luddite went to the bathroom that evening and when he passed the RV, he glanced in one of the windows and saw a guy and his wife looking at a TV set, just as if they were back home in their living room. ‘Jesus,’ The Luddite thought, ‘are you ever roughing it.’
The Luddite does not believe in suffering for suffering’s sake, although he has to admit it somehow it appeals to his Catholic nature. However, there is a difference between going camping and bringing the entire house with you. Going into the Great Outdoors makes you more appreciative of what you have when you get back. One of the things The Luddite liked most about going camping was coming back, dropping a friend of his off and sitting on her father’s padded toilet seat, even if he didn’t have to go. Somehow, having a TV with you ruins all of that.
Yesterday, The Luddite wrote about the fact that he does not have cable television. This spurred some speculation that all The Luddite has is a little black-and-white portable.
Sigh.
The point was how important cable television has become to this society, not the equipment The Luddite has, if this remark was even serious at all. For your information, he has a Magnavox 20-inch color set that he inherited from a friend who was moving to Oregon and had no room for it on the truck. The set was superfluous to Gerg anyway, so he asked The Luddite if he wanted it. Since The Luddite’s existing Zenith System 3 crapped out a month after his friend left, it is good that The Luddite said ‘sure,’ even though his main motivation was that it was summer and he was tired of moving stuff.
Since it was brought up anyway, The Luddite will address the equipment. The Luddite has seen the large home-entertainment systems with the 60-inch screens. His sister-in-law has one. The Luddite thinks they look nice but if you are looking for some kind of compliment, you aren’t going to get one. TV screens don’t particularly interest me unless there is a football game on that I want to see. Otherwise, it’s just a box with colored lights in it. Some people have mentioned in bars that The Luddite’s attention sure drifts to one when they are talking, but this is because they aren’t saying anything particularly interesting, a fact that The Luddite has wisely kept to himself.
The television set has settled into a niche in this society that is almost totemistic. My parents always have one on in the background, even when no one is watching it; sports bars have them at every possible angle; they are even built into the roofs of minivans, ostensibly to help keep the kids from asking if ‘we are there yet.’
Fans in stadiums even have little battery-powered TVs that they look at rather than looking at the actual field—even if they have good seats. This really flips The Luddite out and makes him wonder why they even made the trip to the stadium in the first place so they could look at the game on a window smaller than a piece of scratch paper.
But what really got to The Luddite was when he stopped at a small campground in California and someone pulled in later in an RV about the size of a prison bus. The Luddite went to the bathroom that evening and when he passed the RV, he glanced in one of the windows and saw a guy and his wife looking at a TV set, just as if they were back home in their living room. ‘Jesus,’ The Luddite thought, ‘are you ever roughing it.’
The Luddite does not believe in suffering for suffering’s sake, although he has to admit it somehow it appeals to his Catholic nature. However, there is a difference between going camping and bringing the entire house with you. Going into the Great Outdoors makes you more appreciative of what you have when you get back. One of the things The Luddite liked most about going camping was coming back, dropping a friend of his off and sitting on her father’s padded toilet seat, even if he didn’t have to go. Somehow, having a TV with you ruins all of that.
posted by S. Olson at 4:40 PM
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