When we were growing up, the family television was a big Magnavox cabinet with a little black metal wireless remote control that beeped when you pushed the buttons. How cool is that blue "power" button? Around third grade or so, the family updated to Qube cable. Not only did we suddenly now get dozens more channels, but we also got a fancy wired remote control.
Our personal little 13-inch color TV - the one that went with us to California in the mid-90s - had no such space-age luxury. That little TV (which weighed way more than it looked) sported an actual hand-crank channel dial. When's the last time you saw one of those? A knob for VHF and a knob for UHF. Tuning in your channel was always accompanied by that satisfying plastic clack-clack-clack. This was also the age of newspaper TV guides before onscreen lists were ever a thing, but that's for another blog ost.
Flash forward 30 years to a family coffee table wire basket filled with remote controls. These are not the dusty remotes we all have that go untouched. The list below, for example, does not include the PlayStation 3 remote that gets dusted off every so often whenever someone wants to play a game or watch a Bluray DVD, nor does the list include the even more dusty remotes that go to unplugged DVD players and VHS decks and even an original Tivo-branded DVR stacked neatly in a back closet. Those remotes are all stashed away out of sight.
No, the four remotes in the basket see frequent use. Multiple scrapes and dog-tooth marks are proof.
1. DirecTV - This is the granddaddy, the big gray plastic beast that controls channel selection and play functions for the built-in DVR. The biggest frustration with this one - aside from a perpetual need to replace the batteries - is the fact that, even as bulky and colorful as it is, it's easy to mix up the buttons. Invariably, when watching a DVRd show, we go to push "pause" but instead accidentally push "exit" and get zapped back to the main menu, requiring multiple steps to drill down into the right menu and resume the recording. Profanity in these situations is unavoidable.
2. Vizio TV - This remote has endless rows of tiny rubber buttons with nooks and crannies that trap filth and grime, but we really only use two buttons - the one that turns the flatscreen on and off and the one that lets us toggle between video inputs.
3. Vizio soundbar - In theory, we were all excited to connect the new fancy soundbar to our iPhones to play music via Bluetooth, turning our living room into a hip, funky hangout with a 21st century digital jukebox. And yet, we've used that feature... maybe five times in two years. Note also: whatever you do, please do not attempt to adjust the volume with any remote other than this one. You'll just mess everything up.
4. Amazon Fire Stick - This is a late addition to the basket, only arriving last fall. But it's certainly made up for lost time and has very much become a fan favorite. At this point, the Cheese kids probably consider streaming platforms like Amazon, Netflix, and Disney+ as "TV" more than traditional outlets like ABC, NBC, or even old school cable stations like TBS. Our big irritation here is the remote's size. It's barely bigger than a pack of chewing gum. It's also one of those remotes trying to be clever with just four or five buttons that do everything. Even better, it's surprisingly difficult to remember which button is the "pause" button - remember that this is a family that sits still for nothing, so we have to frequently stop the action for popcorn making, for dog wrangling, for bathroom going, for blanket adjusting... the list goes on forever - especially when the Cheese family insists on a pitch black living room to watch anything, which means that we're unable to actually look at the remote to help us remember which tiny recessed plastic nub is the right one.
This surely sounds familiar to all of the readers out there. Every viewing experience requires a complex series of inputs and adjustments across multiple remote controls. Good luck finding them all when you need them. The sofa is black, the remotes are black, the room is dark. When we booked a house sitter years ago, the directions we had to create for TV operation looked like technical specs in their flowchart if/then confusion.
You can tell Generation X by our nostalgic affection for those handcrank dials.
