The day the TV died......

It is no secret that I am a fan of reality television. As in trashy reality television. I can't help myself, I am a product of the first MTV generation. Real World, the grandfather of reality television came about in the early 90's and I was hooked. I watched every season through Las Vegas. The Las Vegas season did me in as far as Real World was concerned. Those Vegas kids were just waaayyyy to out of control, and I lost my appetite for the Real World after that.

Good news for me, by then reality television had become quite main stream and I had a bevy of other shows to chose from, including Survivor, The Amazing Race, The Mole (Anderson Cooper, host, pre-CNN days) Dancing with the Stars, Jon & Kate plus 8, Dirty Jobs, Living Lohan, Keeping up with the Kardashians, Hopkins 24/7, My Sweet 16, I could go on, and on, and on.....

Then there is the mother of all reality television, a network called Bravo. Basically there is not a show on Bravo I would not watch, with my favorite of course being The Real Housewives of.....(enter just about any city) My favorite Real Housewives cast is Beverly Hills, with Atlanta being my least favorite.

And for the record I want it to be known that I do have standards when it comes to reality television, I draw the line at Jersey Shore. I will not watch that show.

I like to argue that my love of reality television is not only generational, but also a product of my career choice. A good attorney is curious, and voyeuristic. You want to know more, you want to understand more, you want to see the whole picture. You want to peer into the lives of others. So see I really can't help myself......

So on Sunday night, as I was sitting at my computer typing decisions, with the television on as background noise, all of the sudden I heard a "pop" and the television went dead. This can not be a good sign.....it wasn't. At first I thought I would be looking at a new television, until the light came on indicating that my lamp had an issue.

Now being the daughter of a television repair man, I figured I could handle the job. (You would not believe the number of Saturday nights my dad went out for a service call at 5:30 for a little old lady, so she could watch Lawrence Welk at 6:00 p.m.) After gaging on the amount of dust behind my television, and debating the necessity of a mask...I began examining my television for where a lamp might be located. On the side I found a lever that when pushed popped off the side of the television.

At first glance it appeared to be an empty storage area of the television, but upon closer inspection I saw an sign that said "Caution! Refer to the instruction manual before replacement. Lamp door is provided with an interlock to reduce the risk of excessive ultra violet radiation. Do not defeat its purpose or attempt service without removing door completely." SERIOUSLY!??? I have to find the owner's manual???? I live in fear of the attempting to find the owner's manual. Now I know where it is, because I never throw that stuff away, but that does not mean it is easily located in the LARGE box of owner's manuals in my storage room.

I decided a would rather risk a little radiation, than attempt location of the owner's manual. Digging a little deeper I notice another lever, that had an open and closed position. Turned the lever, pulled another door out. Ah ha, I had reached the lamp. Only problem I could not figure out how to get the lamp out. I pushed, I pulled, I grabbed, I wiggled, and that darn lamp would not come out. Again, not wanted to locate the owner's manual, (trust me its a really, really, really LARGE box) I went to the Internet, armed with my make and model number. I LOVE the Internet. One Google search later I had the owner's manual on line. Figured out I needed to pull up and out, on the lever holding the lamp in place, and a nano-second later the lamp was removed, revealing a broken bulb.

Next day a quick visit to the TV repair shop and $180 dollars later I was sporting a new bulb. Now to install the bulb....one google search, and a YouTube video later I installed the bulb into the lamp. Put lamp back into TV, powered up TV, NOTHING. Ok, well technically I had a flashing red light indicating I had not reinstalled the lamp into the TV correctly. I mess around. I wiggle, I giggled. NOTHING. I gave up in frustration. Rick came over to see the kids and gave a shot at re-installation. NOTHING. Another night with no TV, things were reaching critical mass.

Next day, Jeff and Matt gave a shot at re-installation. NOTHING. In the realm of fixing things I at least know when to cut my losses, and call in the experts. Back to the TV repair shop, this time TV in tow. The TV repair man wiggled, giggled, and snapped the lamp right into place.

Now before I took the TV into the repair shop I carefully labeled all the cords coming out of the TV, knowing that I would have to put them back into the TV. I re-attached all cords, and fired up the TV. Good news, I had a picture, bad news all the people on the TV were a lovely shade of smurf blue. Arruuugggggg!



Now back to that fine reality TV, I have some catching up to do!