[By Merlin Lessler]<\/p>\n
We acquired a new TV to replace our old one; it got a little cranky, limiting what we were allowed to view. First, there was a light gray shadow down the center of the screen. Slowly it darkened and was joined by a mate on the left side of the screen.<\/p>\n
A golfer on the PGA Tour would strike a putt toward the hole and it disappeared behind the censored center of the screen. A baseball player would send one flying toward the fence and it was blocked from our view. The final straw came during Game 4 of the Knicks basketball finals. The tip-in that won the game with just over a second on the clock didn\u2019t make it to our screen. It had to go!<\/p>\n
Sounds simple, doesn\u2019t it? Unplug and unhook the old; plug in and hook up the new. Off you go. NOT ANYMORE! Not like the old days when our TVs were dumb. Step one: close out all the streaming Apps on the old TV. They don\u2019t like to be disabled; they hide the exit button deep in the settings menu.<\/p>\n
That wasn\u2019t too bad, except that the spot to click on the exit button was behind the fog on the left side of the screen. I had to get up repeatedly and go up to the screen to see it. All in all, it took 20 minutes to \u201cunhook\u201d it.<\/p>\n
It was an even longer process to find and\/or add streaming apps on our new \u201cMr. Smarty-pants TV.\u201d It required entering our user names and passwords for each app, using an alphabet screen where you find and click on each letter and number.<\/p>\n
All in all, it took the better part of an hour to change TVs. And, mucho bucks to pay the monthly cost of the Apps, which we are forced to sign up for if we want to watch certain shows or sports events.<\/p>\n
The General Electric Company once had a slogan, \u201cProgress is our most important product.\u201d Oh, how I long for that kind of thinking. It is so lacking in today\u2019s appliances and vehicles. If they keep progressing, or I get any dumber, I don\u2019t know if I can survive. <\/p>\n