Do you smell something?

[slipjig3]

Here's a list of sensory experiences you don't want to encounter upon hitting the "ON" button on your flat-screen television:

* a bug zapper-like buzzing noise
* a small diode of some sort flickering like a basement light bulb in a bad horror flick, visible through the top cooling vent
* the unmistakable smell of barbecued electronics.

So yeah, the TV's hosed. (A list of sensory experiences you don't want to encounter when you're broke: "Honey, the TV's hosed.") A call to Sceptre tech support, once it had been ascertained that we're not under warranty, resulted in a sympathetic sucks-to-be-you and a suggestion to take it to a repair shop. Fun. We've got workarounds for a lot of the TV's intended uses, but it's pretty clear that this development ruins a sizable number of short-term plans. Dammit, I might have to, like, read something. Between this, my computer imploding, and the Internet on my backup Mac suspiciously refusing to load this morning, I'm seriously starting to feel my digital-age white male middle-class privilege chafing at me ("Analog entertainment? What am I, a Mennonite?")

Comments

[light-in-motion.livejournal.com]

My sister-in-law, who has small kids, has instituted a one "electronics-free" day a week policy, presumably so her kids will learn thefine arts of, y'know, conversation, and amusing themselves, and so she and her husband won't forget how. :-)

That said, my sympathies. [she wrote, flicking the vein in her arm for her next fix]

[fangirl715.livejournal.com]

I blame Mercury Retrograde for this; it may not be strictly scientific, but I've definitely seen a corollary between Mercury Rx and this kind of problem. (Mercury rules things like electronics, communication, travel, etc., so all of these things can be, and in my experience, have been affected by Mercury Rx, none of them in a good way. It's also not a good time to sign contracts or start new ventures, although working on ongoing projects is just fine, and highly recommended. I can tell you through sad personal experience that moving cross-country during Mercury Rx is A Really Bad Idea; I did just that over Labor Day weekend of 1997, and "U-Hell" is the main reason that cthulhia will never, ever, EVER help me move ever again, not that I really blame her.)

tl;dr version: blame it on Mercury retrograde, and don't get a new TV, etc. until after Monday at the earliest, when it finally goes direct.