By Jim Hagarty
2012
A few years ago, my son and daughter gave me a TV for my birthday. A brand new 13-inch Electrohome TV for my bedroom. They got it at a place where you can also buy tires.
This little thing has amazing colour but not much else. It doesn’t have stereo sound and only minimal outlets to plug things into. But I love it. Its stay in our bedroom was brief as we never watched it but it migrated to the kitchen and has seen a lot of use there.
One day recently I was strolling through our local second-hand shop looking for a bargain when I saw it. Exactly the same TV. For $5. Now a man would need to be horsewhipped if he didn’t buy something like that so I carted it home, convinced that there would be something wrong with it. Maybe the picture would be terrible. Or the sound.
I took it into the garage and with hands shaking with excitement, plugged it in, hooked up the cable and turned it on. My joy could not be measured. It was as good as the one the kids gave me years ago. For $5.
So now, guess where I wanted to do all my TV watching? A problem soon became apparent, however. Because of the small size of the screen, I couldn’t sit across the room and watch it so I found myself standing right in front of it while I watched. This got a little annoying and I thought to myself, “It is too bad I couldn’t get the same TV, only bigger.”
There were problems with that wish. I didn’t know if a larger version of this machine had ever even been made. And even if it had been, the TV was a few years old now. What chance would there ever be that such an imaginary TV would show up anywhere where I might see it?
A few weeks ago, I was back in the second-hand shop and there it sat: My dream come true! Nineteen inches of pure, unadulterated Electrohome. For $10. A man would need to be held down and hog tied if he didn’t buy something like that so I hauled it up to the counter, bought it, drove home and sneaked it in the back door of the garage. (This was necessary because our home looks like a TV warehouse these days.)
I thought, “Well, this one will definitely suck.” I got it hooked up and turned it on. As good if not better than the other two miniature versions I now own. My life was complete.
It was like finding the blonde you had your eye on but who is too young for you, has a blonde mother who could pass for her sister. Or something like that. (If my wife is reading, I wouldn’t know anything about that. Just looking for a simile.)
And the great thing was, I didn’t have to admit to the latest purchase because the TV looked exactly like the one it replaced on the shelf. No one noticed that it was six inches bigger.
Anyway, Life and Fate throw you a bone every now and then. An Electrohome Bone. And all that needs to be done is to pick it up and chew on it. However, can you imagine what the same TV in 26 inches would look like?
Wait for my new series: Jim the TV Hunter.
(Update: A terrible storm hit our town in the spring of 2013, a year after the story above. Lightning struck a tree behind our neighbour’s house. None of our three Electrohomes were on surge protectors. They all died a horrible death. I believe a moment of silence is appropriate so please bow your head. Thank you. I will never forget them.)
