kind of bruin

Sue finally let me buy an HDTV.

I’ve been wanting an HDTV for a long time, but Sue wouldn’t let me get one. After a few years of her saying no, she finally caved in. The problem with this is that when she said yes, I would instinctively say that they were too expensive. Thus a vicious circle of her saying no and me wanting one and her saying yes and me not.

So on Tuesday I made the irrational decision to purchase a 34″ Sony tube hdtv. After work I went to the Polaris Best Buy and asked the sales guy, Jeff, if they had the one I wanted in stock. He said yes and after filling out a BB credit check I paid for the TV and had them hold it until Sue got off of work so we could take the behemoth TV home in her wagon. So at 6:30 I went to Barnes and Noble and waited with great hope that I could get the TV home by 8 to watch the prime time TV.

Sue was working some extra hours so I read magazines until about 7:00. Sue called and she was going to wait in front of Best Buy while I went in and then the guys were going to bring the TV up to the front.

After about 15 minutes waiting for a guy to replace a wide-screen Incredibles DVD with a pan and scan one, and a lady with a broken iRiver, they finally helped me. They called the guy in the back and of course he had no idea where the TV purchased was located. He then brought the sales guy in and he figured that the one he thought they had was a 30″ TV instead of the 34″ TV. Sue at this time was pretty pissy about having to wait for 15 minutes for something she thought was going to be a 5 minute pick up.

They first thought about ordering a TV for me, but they could not get one in until the middle of April. They located one at Morse Road which is about a 15 minute drive from Best Buy. So Sue headed to my work so we could leave my car there and we could go to Morse Road together.

At this time the service people had to refund my BB credit card, and they stated that my refund would process in a few days. Thus causing the problem that tv price times 2 would be greater than my spending limit. Thus causing about a half hour wait for them to be on hold with the credit department to void the transaction manually.

By this time Sue and I were hungry and cranky. It was close to eight o’clock by the time we drove over to the other Best Buy. After walking around to try and find someone to help us we waited around another hour for them to check us out and wheel the tv to the front of the store.

We got home and changed clothes and unloaded the tv. We cut the box open to find that no remote was in the box, but that was the least of my worries. Sue and I had to get a 218 lb. tv into the house. Eighty percent of the weight is on the front of the tv. The lifting diagram shows one hand in the hand hold and one had in the front of the tv to balance the weight of the tv to keep it from tipping over.

Sue is a strong woman, but she is still a woman and her ability to hold 109 lbs with her finger tips on one hand is a lot to ask. So she was to use both of her hands with picking up the tv and I was going to balance the front of the tv and pick up my half.

After three pick up and set downs we made it to the television stand. The problem with the television stand is that it is about a centimeter too small for the large box of a tv. After taking a couple of nuts off my stand the tv fit by a few millimeters.

I then began messing with the settings of the tv with the stupid front controls, thanks to the missing remote. Oh what a stupid 5 hours spent messing with a tv. The next day I had to wait at the service counter at BB for 20 minutes for them steal a remote from another tv.

No that its all set up its pretty cool, but now I am noticing a little bending in the immage in the corners of the left side at the top and bottom…

post removed because brandon is a baby.

This photo was taken in December of 2003. This was the last time Sue and I saw Garrett. Today is the one year anniversary of his death. It seems like it was yesterday and it seems like forever ago that we got the call from Terri’s neighbor and friend telling us that he had been hit by a truck while riding his bike on a training run. Garrett was 25 years old. Go out and ride a bike, be curious about the world and laugh. Because that’s what Garrett would have wanted.