Plugged Into the Beaverton Vibe

"What's that big black shiny rectangle propped up on the chair?" I asked outloud, in an ironic voice, looking across the room from the couch.

Red laughed at my joke. The television had been turned off barely five minutes, and already it looked like a useless piece of furniture.

The Olympics were finally over. The last NBC broadcast had ended, and the network had sequed to  new sitcom they had been promoting during commercial breaks all during the game. We made it about six minutes into it until turning off the set in disgust.

I went on to joke that perhaps we could put the tv away completely until the next Winter Olympics. But with no intention of signing up for cable, we received only the digital broadcast signals in SW Portland---the basic network channels but shopping networks, etc. I honestly couldn't foresee any need for the "rectangle" anymore.

I had lasted five days after our return from the Downtown Marriot (how long ago the snowstorm seems now---all of it has melted over a week ago). That Friday, unable to stay away from the spectacle, I broke down and drove out through the hills to Beaverton,  which seemed like the perfect place to buy a television set. Twenty minutes later I was walking out of the Best Buy with a 29" Visio on sale, as well as one of the better digital antennas.

It took me two hours of agitated wrangling with the digital antenna to pick up the crummy signal from KGW, the Portland NBC affiliate. The first evening we had to hang the flat-sitting antenna console from a coat hanger in the patio window, and duck underneath while going in and out. The slightest jostle would send the picture into a horrible pixelated blur, and then the whole screen would go black.

I joked in my best Muscovite accent that this was "Russian cable television." Red laughed at that too.

We finally got it to be somewhat stable in a normal flat position on the heater. We found ourselves entranced by the soothing voice of  the NBC announcers calling a snowboard competition.

For the next two weeks we barely dared the touch the whole set-up. The television stayed propped up against the back of the chair, like a seated guest, without any of the stand apparatus that had come in the box.

During that time I managed to find myself working from the kitchen table most afternoons, during the non-prime time events. It was quite productive and inspiring, all in all.

Finally last night we chewed the marrow of the Olympics down to the bone, watching the late night rerun of the piece that NBC had produced about the twentieth anniversary of the Kerrigan-Harding drama from '94.  We mocked Nancy Kerrigan all over again, and felt disgusting heartbreak for the unrepentant Harding.

Today the set didn't go on at all. I worked silently without even noticing the silence. Now it seems overbearing. Time for a podcast.