And on top of everything else...
Argh!
I've had my Toshiba big screen tv for many years. It's 46 inches and huge, in a big black console. I got it before my divorce, before my first husband and I separated, which was in 1992. So, yeah, I've had it awhile. It doesn't even have closed captioning. It's certainly not hi-def. After a number of years went by, I finally bought a huge black entertainment center that goes on 3 sides of it.
In the last several years, I've had it repaired twice. Those times cost several hundred dollars, but I reasoned that it was better than having to buy a brand new set, which would have run much more.
It doesn't work as well as it used to. Yeah, the color's not as good as it once was. And the sound...iffy. I don't have a remote for adjusting the sound, and it's gotten so that if I turn the tv off when I leave the house or for any other reason, when I come back the sound cuts off randomly every few minutes for at least an hour. This means that I have to get up and walk over to the set to turn it off and on again to get the sound back on.
So I just leave it on. I tend to need the background noise anyway. When I need to adjust the volume, I walk over and have to press a tiny, fairly invisible button on the front to turn it up or down. Once in awhile, I miss the volume button and hit the channel button by mistake. This creates a horrendous noise because I play the tv through the dvd player and when it's on the wrong channel, you get that horrid static sound.
Today, as I was rushing around trying to get some stuff done before leaving for work, the sound was too loud -- randomly, it gets louder or softer. I attempted to turn it down but missed the volume and hit the channel button. Static! I had in my contacts, which meant that if i was going to lean down to try to peer at the teeny buttons to fix the problem, I wouldn't be able to see which was which anyway. Since I was headed out and feeling harried and rushed, I just switched it off and left. I could handle the volume cutting out awhile when I got home.
So, now I'm home from work -- from bagging stuff bought by the horde of locusts that passed for WalMart customers two days before Christmas. I let the dogs out and leaned over to turn on my tv to relax awhile. Nothing happened.
I did hear the sound of it attempting to turn on, but the power light remained off. Hmmm... I flicked the power stript that the dvd player and dvr machines are hooked up to. They went off obligingly. I turned them back on. Tried the tv again. No light. Nothing.
I went up to take out my lenses and get a better look. No other buttons to try, obviously. I kept pushing the power button, holding it longer in case that would help. Still nothing.
I shouldn't have turned it off. I guess it was like those ancient light bulbs that keep burning for years past their prime but if turned off, they finally burn out. Argh. Two days before the holiday and I have no tv in my living room. I have one in my bedroom but imagine that 19 inch set in a space where the 46 inch behemoth sat.
It was bound to happen I suppose. I can't say I didn't get enough use out of it. But now? When I have next to no money and many other things I need to use what little funds I do have for??
And the hits just keep on coming, folks.
Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays.