Friday, August 31, 2007

I need a remote that does garden chores

I have been left home alone for a couple of days while MrB visits his family in St. Louis. Even for for 2-3 days, there's a long list of "what to do and how to do it" that I've had to write down or remember. One of them is strictly for my limited entertainment purposes, and that is how to operate the TV and its playback peripherals. He is in charge of that system, and I do the computers. When I put a DVD in the computer, it reads the disk, the controls appear, and TA-DA, it starts playing!! What a concept. But, if I want to watch something on a much bigger screen with better speakers and a comfy couch -- it's another story.

Usually he has charge of the remotes, because the way things operate is always being tweaked, I can't keep up with it, so I quit trying. We sat down together before he left and I took notes on how to simply watch a DVD or the TV.

A DVD requires 3 remotes. (A), (B), and (C). Using (A), press POWER, then TV/VIDEO gets pressed 5 times until the right screen appears. Using (B), press the DVD/LD button, then the RECEIVER button, the the SOURCE button gets pressed until the right screen appears. Using (C), press POWER, and make sure that the VCR/DVD button is pushed instead of the TV/VCR button or the controls won't work (I learned that on my own). Insert the disk using the OPEN/EJECT button. The DVD can be controlled by (C), and has fairly clearly understandable controls, but (C) does not control volume, you can use (B) for controls as an option. Remote (B) gives me laughing fits, because it has a bazillion tiny buttons (as they all do) but these are really not marked well, or require bright lights and magnification. It has 4 colored buttons in a row. Green means STOP, and red is PLAY (not the logical color choices!!!), yellow is PAUSE and we don't know what blue is for. I'm writing all this stuff down, which covers a whole sheet of paper, and am thinking it would be easier to launch an ICBM than play a DVD, except that for nuclear missiles it takes 2 people to turn the keys (and don't even ask how to play or record VHS on that system, because I don't know. I use the simpler machine upstairs... and yes, we don't have TIVO). I muddled through the process, and Orlando Bloom was before my eyes before I knew it.

The other thing I have to do daily, and this is not in the category of entertainment, is to venture out into the backyard, which is very jungle-y because of all the rain we had this summer, and change the water in the bird baths. Seriously... it is very overgrown and rather dense. I'm proud of it, don't get me wrong, my MrB is a wonderful green and wildlife habitat gardener, but I can't be out there more than a couple of minutes before I'm being assaulted by something.

Usually it's a swarm of mosquitoes, or sharp pointy plants, or it could be an assault of the eyeballs as in the case of having TWO huge Argiope spiders living back there. Here they are in their glory and zippers.

The worst part of discovering a spider for a spiderphobe like me is trying to confirm its identity on the internet using Search Images. Aaaaaooooohhhaaaahhhcckk!!! The only thing worse than the hairy legged shots are the ones showing the results of brown recluse bites. At least some of the pages have unintentionally humorous random-generated ads, such as "Get Spider Ringtones", "Find Spiders on eBay", and "Top Deals on Spider Webs"

When I was over at Blockbuster picking out some vids tonight, there... attached to the black wire racks holding the movies... was a pretty large spider. It was dead, I believe, and I am not one to poke spiders, and after googling hideous spider close-up pictures tonight, I think it might be a Hobo Spider -- which IS venomous. Right there on the racks at Blockbuster.

I just might freak right out this weekend. Help!

7 comments:

Nava said...

Googling this kind of things when you're home alone might not be the best pastime, y'know...

Good luck with remoting the TV/DVD et al. And - HAPPY LABOR DAY!!

enigma4ever said...

good luck with that Remote idea...if you end getting one for the garden please let me know ;-)

hmmmm about the Hobo spider- you think it means something that it was at Blockbuster...????

Blueberry said...

As an arachnophobe, I would say that spiders are positioning themselves to purposefully freak me out. It's a conspiracy.

Yes, the dead one (assuming it was dead) on the video shelf at Blockbuster seemed very odd.

One of the Argiopes in the garden is now missing. Man, I don't like surprises, but I guess it will turn up somewhere.

Ptelea said...

Wishing you a spider-free weekend!

Michael Bains said...

Argiopes, eh... I was mulching some hedges one summer, and upon emptying the wheelbarrow, I looked up at eye level with sometimes almost identical to that. YIKES!!! lol!

I'm not all that afear'd o' teh spiders, but boy-o! did that give me the willies. Niiice...

{-;

I bet that All Three of those remotes are considered "Universal Remotes". lol! It's should take me three of to watch a DVD, but I lost the the one for the DVD player. I've actually got to *gasp* get up and touch the buttons on the player for some functions! UnTHINKable!

:-D

Mando Mama said...

I do not fare well either with entertainment technology. Even my 7 y.o. daughter is getting the hang of it. I think a remote just needs four buttons -- on, off, play, stop. Ok, maybe a few skip-ahead kind of buttons. But otherwise, it's just too much overhead.

Glad you survived SpiderFest. I'm not generally afraid of them, but I don't like surprises either -- being snuck up on by any kind of bug -- and I don't live with spiders that look like they might leave one of my kids in a coma. Zoiks, scoob....

Blueberry said...

Kay, I'll trade you a couple of spiders for a snake (non-venomous) or a couple of lizards.