JeremyOswald.com

I’ve been looking forward to premiere week all summer. Two weeks ago, I finally had my High Definition Dual-Tuner DVR hooked up, just in time for the fall TV kickoff. I’ve been recording shows all week, planning on watching them tonight and over the weekend. I check my DVR and look at all of the great shows I’ve accumulated. I can’t wait to watch them. I want nothing more than to crank the AC, cover up under a blanket on my recliner and watch every show I’ve been anticipating all summer in HD quality. So tonight, I wait until about 8:30, enough time so that I can begin watching shows that started at 8 and not have to watch any commercials.

I figured I’d watch Survivor first. I hit play on the DVR, see the opening montage, reviewing what happened previously on Survivor. My DVR pauses on the face of one of the dipshits from the Hispanic team. He has some stupid-ass grin on his face and is frozen in 55 inches of high def. I wonder why Survivor isn’t playing. A minute passes. I’m nervous. I try to fast forward, I try to go back to live TV, I try to go back to the DVR. Nothing is working and Oscar’s face is still fozen on my screen. I’m getting frustrated. Why won’t my DVR respond?

Then the screen goes black.

The DVR won’t turn on. It is dead. I try to remain calm. I call Comcast. The woman who helps me is drunk. She confuses Fresno with San Francisco. Then she confuses Fresno with Stockton. Then she can’t read a map or Comcast’s Fresno address, so I know where to return the piece of shit that is currently hooked up to my TV. She sends a signal from Comcast to my DVR. It turns on. It will not record, it has lost all of my shows from this week. I’ve missed just about every show on during premiere week. That means I must turn to the Internet. I’ll be able to see some of the shows eventually, but not all of them, not tonight, and not in HD.

Now I really know how Pee Wee felt when he found out that there is no basement in the Alamo.