Video Killed the Radio Star

A bad thing has happened. We have no TV.

I should clarify. We have TV’s. Plenty. A variety of sizes. Lovely tellies they are. The problem is that we have no reception in the new house. BAD. Ten grand worth of tellies and NO bloody reception. Totally unexpected crisis.

Brad the Tradie undertook research on this matter the minute we realised that there was no reception in Beachville. A neighbourhood walk tallying different types of massive antennae. Hurrumphing, phone calls, furrowing of the brows.

We met the neighbours to the left of us the day we moved in, partially to be nice, but mostly to figure out how to get telly. After some initial greetings, name confirmations and mutual approval of render and roof colours ("oooo, noice, I loike your colourbond colour...ooooo"), the conversation soon graduated towards the main concern of our household… TV:

BtT: So, I notice you don’t have a mast antenna.

New neighbour Bloke: Nope. Don’t do it mate. Birds sit on ‘em and crap on ya roof.

BtT: Good point. Especially with a dark colour. What do you use to get telly then?

NnB: E-wire.

Us (collectively): Huh?

NnB: New suburb thing. See that bit o’ conjute sticking out of the ground there near the green dome thing? That’s where your e-wire is. Don’t run over it in the car. Hang on, I'll get you their number.

BtT: Ahhh. (mutter, bloke noises, touching of conjute…) Hey, you guys got Foxtel?

NnB: Nah… got a boat. You gettin' a jetski?

Once I’d acquired a translation, I learned that our telly reception happens from the thing in the front yard in the white pipe and that we magically should’ve known this THREE WEEKS in advance of moving in. Yes, that’s how long it takes to get the people to come and make the wire thingy turn into my favourite shows. THREE WEEKS.

Once my anger, shock and denial wore off, reality set in.

We would have no telly for three weeks. What on EARTH would we do? OK, so the first five days were OK. We emptied boxes, revelled in the luxury of indoor ablutions and built flat-packed cheap furniture from Vietnam sold to us by a nasty chain store. Then, the Better Homes and Gardens child (BHG) discovered the family box of DVD’s and suddenly we had SOMETHING to stare at whilst enjoying our lounge chairs. We only own a couple of dozen DVD’s, so the movie marathon wore off pretty quick. BtT caved and bought Season 2 of the Big Bang Theory to remind us of what we generally watch on TV (Yes, copious amounts of American crap), but the lack of advertisements is really quite disconcerting and doesn’t substitute for actual telly. As BHG dramatically stated, we may as well just shrivel up and die.

Then there’s the problem of sport. From Friday evening through to … well… the next Friday evening, BtT watches sport on telly. And it’s footy season. What to do??? No internet yet except for the trip to Macca's or the library (yes, also has something to do with the conjute-covered wire in the front yard), so can’t stream the games on the computer. Could go next door to the new people and beg to take over their house. Hmmm. OR….

We could listen to the ABC radio.

I know. It’s an embarrassing admission and one best reserved for emergencies like this. We have… tuned our radio to the ABC. When the sport’s not on we’ve been engrossed by the evening trivia quiz, talk shows about bauxite, the news (love that music that heralds the ABC news bulletin… dah dah dah dah dah dah ….) and many songs from the pre-WW2 era. On the upside, the ABC does put you to sleep at night. That's why old people like it.

But today I cracked.

Up till now I’d been trying to model TV-free parenting to the adolescent. Trying to prove that life without television is not only possible, it’s desirable. Sure… it’ll be FUN. Some families don't have TV at all you know. ("No darling, not because they're poor, because they choose to...")

We’ve read. We’ve joined the library even. We’ve walked the dogs (and searched for them for hours the day they ran away…) It was all going swimmingly in parent-land. Until she wanted to play Scattergories. I hate board games. I don't even know why we've kept the three board games we own.  I grew up with a TV in my room (as did my brother) and lacked social interaction with my parents… just the way we all liked it. We gathered for family occasions. Sometimes I’d take pity on a Saturday evening and watch The Bill with them. That counted as ‘family together time’. We didn’t ride bikes to the park and have picnics. We did NOT play board games. My family watched telly. And no one got hurt.

But it’s been ten days. TEN days.

I’m getting to the point where I could go to Harvey Norman and pull up a chair in the electronics section, you know? I haven’t seen The View. I haven’t seen Ellen. I can’t flick Mel and Kochie on each morning to provide background noise as I have my morning cuppa in bed. I haven’t seen the multitude of shows I watch between 7 and 10 each evening. God knows how the finale of Brothers and Sisters panned out. I’ve had to ring my VGF (very good friend) Smurfette for Masterchef updates (she’s taken to summarising it in quite succinct texts each few days). This week I’ll miss Glee again (AHHH!!!) and several Law and Orders. Life as we know it is about to end.

The man comes on Wednesday to look at the wire in the white pipe out the front (havent run over it in the car...excellent news...) I got all excited thinking that I’d be watching Lie to Me this week until he explained that it takes another ‘four or five days’ to process the paperwork. GEEZ! What are we meant to DO? Watch more bloody videos? Listen to the radio? Go for walks?

Which leads me to the question… if video killed the radio star, what will ever kill telly?

Not board games that’s for bloody sure.

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Video Killed the Radio Star, The Buggles, 1979