OH THE HORROR

The world has come to an end for Ger !  We got a new remote control for the TV and it is beyond Husband's ability to figure out. To tell you the man is technologically challenged is not even coming close to describing him. He has difficulty turning on a light switch, never mind working this new clicker.
The cable company in our area is going High Def or something and it will require all of us dinosaurs to get a new cable box. That alone set Ger into spasms ! He read the letter and promptly handed it to me and told me I "need to take care of this!". No biggie, I deal with issues like this a hundred times a day. I read the letter, went on line and ordered the necessary boxes. Being very smug while patting myself on the back I figured I had this covered. Several days latter the carton arrived bearing 3 smaller packages containing new cable boxes. Thinking it would just be a matter of plugging the damn things in I didn't even bother to look at them. (The cable company made it sound like a blind monkey could hook these things up while playing a fiddle and eating a banana.) Then Thanksgiving was coming and I was busy with cleaning and cooking so when our youngest child arrived with his family to stay for a couple of days I figured I'd get Kent to hook these boxes up and we'd be good to go. TWO DAYS LATER AND AT LEAST FIVE CALLS TO COMCAST Kent was ready to kill his mother and toss the cable boxes out the window. God Bless the boy, he stuck with it and did indeed get the @%$#%*$ things hooked up and working.
That was the easy part . . . now we have to give Husband the NEW clicker and teach him how to use it without screwing up all the work that Kent has done. On a good day Husband has trouble with the regular clicker that has an  ON/OFF button, a second button for the sound and a third button for changing the channel. If I ask him to turn the sound up or down ONE CLICK he pounces on the clicker like a rat on cheese and smashes at the button until the sound is totally blasting or completely off. (This is how Husband handles EVERYTHING in his life . . . all  or nothing,  black or white.)
So now we have a new clicker that has LOTS AND LOTS of buttons. I could see the sweat starting to form on his fore head. At first he wouldn't even look at the clicker. He told Kent to give it to me and I could figure it out. (OH JOY, I FINALLY get a chance to make the TV decisions!) But then Husband thought about that and decided he really could not sit in front of the TV without the clicker in his possession. It was like taking a pacifier from a baby. Kent very patiently tried to show Ger how to use this new remote but I could see by the blank look on Ger's face that this was not going well. Husband finally gave his son the old standard "Yeh, yeh,  I'll figure it out later" speech and that was that. Two days later Husband has still not gotten it figured out nor will he let go of the remote so we are watching what ever happens to be on channel 9.
Thank God the clicker wasn't left on the Fox News station !