(no subject)

[timepiececlock]

The Short Version

Do see this icon I'm using?

This icon is emblamatic of my attempts to use the VCR to record the mindless brain-eating shite called "television."

The VCR (anybody's, not just my own) is King Arthur. I am the Black Knight. I go at the VCR. It hurts me and doesn't record my shows.

So I try again. It hurts me more.

I try again. For a moment it looks like I'm winning cause maybe it gets one episode recorded, but then it beats me down again.

Until there is nothing left of me, just a pathetic joke of a human being, broken but determined, being mercilessly taunted by piece of oh-so-smug-Look-At-Me machinery.




So I have this long, terrible history with VCRs.

I learned their ways. I know how to program a VCR, I know how to make sure the clocks are set properly, what channel it has to be on, what input and output are, when to use SP verses EP, and how to set a future recording time segment or just set a recording endpoint.

During all of this, VCRs have not been kind to me. I try to set up a recording, and all of the following has happened (MORE than once, some quite FREQUENTLY) to keep me from getting my shows-- settling at a 7 tries to 3 sucesses ratio:

1. The VCR gets inexplicably turned off during recording.
2. The VCR gets inecplicably turned on when I had left it off for a pre-programmed recording session.
3. The cable input gets inexplicably turned off before recording.
4. The cable input gets inexplicably turned off during recording.
5. The cable channel is the wrong one (my fault, accident, or changed by someone else), so it records the wrong show.
6. The VCR channel is changed so it records nothing instead of the cable.
7. The VCR time is wrong for a pre-programmed recording session, so it records the wrong show.
8. The VCR time is right for a pre-programmed recording session, but no one ever reset it for daylight saving's time. Records the wrong show.
9. The VCR program settings are inexplicably wiped, so my pre-programmed recording session is no longer programmed.
10. The power goes out.
11. The power blacks out for just a moment or two, but when it pops back on the VCR settings are wiped, so my pre-programmed recording session is no longer programmed.
12. The cable has problems or cuts out, meaning it records scrambled garbage, or white or black noise.
13. Someone leaves a "reminder" feature waiting on the cable, so there's a large text box taking up 3/4 of the screen for the entire recording, telling me to watch this other show instead.
14. I or the person assigned to record forgets to check for all of these possibilities before leaving the VCR unattended for a pre-programmed recording session.

Last weekend, we suffered from Problem #11. My dad was trying to record episdoe 3 of Full Metal Alchemist for me, but it didn't work cause of a power outtage. Two weeks before that, he forgot about Problem #8, and recorded Futurama instead. So the only episodes I've actually recorded of the FMA dub so far have been the ones where I'm sitting right there in front of the tv daring it to do something (just ONE thing, buddy, ONE!) to piss me off when I'm looking it in the eye/display panel.

He was feeling slightly sorry for me, but I explained to my dad that really, I'm used to this stuff. Power outtages that happen just minutes before my show starts? Nothing new to me. I have bad VCR karma. It's unexplained and sometimes painful, but I think has instilled me with a patience that ultimately has helped me grow as a person.


Well, it's made me REALLY paranoid, and that has to be worth something.

Comments

[blkros.livejournal.com]

*hugs* My webhosting account is taunting me a second time. You have my sympathy, hon. We could eat chocolate and to heck with the evil technology!!!

:)

Love,
Rose