Television

In my new apartment there's a flat screen TV equipped with cable and a DVR recorder.

This is a big deal for me. In my old place I had an old TV that I never, ever turned on.

There was no cable. Once, when my Dad visited years ago, he insisted I go out and buy rabbit ears so that he could get decent reception for a final four game. They remained there for years and served as a conversation piece at parties.

“Are those … rabbit ears?”

“Why, yes. They are.”

“Wow. Do you read by candlelight at night?”

Sunday night when I got back from the beach I decided I wanted to watch “Welcome to the Parker,” the fabulous new show on Bravo that everyone's talking about. My brother had stayed in my place a week prior and set the DVR to record it.

There was one problem, though: I had to figure out how to use the remote control.

This is no simple task in the age we live in. I stared at it for a good five minutes feeling helpless and dumb.

But assistance in the form of an instruction booklet sat nearby. Things still didn’t gel right away. There was a snag getting the ordering of the ‘Power’ and ‘System Power’ buttons straight. I got lost in the nether regions of the 1000s channels.

By last night, though, I was able to program my DVR in under 5 minutes.

This morning I woke up and watched last night’s Daily Show over breakfast. I deleted it when I was done because that’s what you do, see. You delete recorded shows when done to make room for new ones.

And they say you can’t teach an old dog new tricks.