3D, or not 3D. That is the Question!

I’m so ashamed.

We’re SO Bogan. We had THE most Bogan day yesterday. But it was inevitable, given our pattern of reoffending.

Yep. Brad the Tradie just bought a new TV. Another one.

Not to replace a broken one. Nope. ‘New Telly’ (it doesn’t have a name yet but we're thinking of calling it Sammy), was bought yesterday because BtT had to have a bigger television. To watch sport on. Which brings our Telly Tally (thanks to Smurfette for asking… I hadn’t previously indulged myself in a head-count) to… four. For three people. And what’s even WORSE, is that we looked at each other on the way home from the Telly store (ginormous telly box secured into the back of the ute) and realised that this is the fourth consecutive year that we’ve bought a new telly. And we got rid of three when we left the East Coast (no HD or 3D, or LED… HUGE iss-you). See? SO ashamed.

It all started yesterday morning when I asked BtT to pick up a towel rail from Bunnings.

Seemed an easy enough request given that he has a couple of rest days and we’re preparing the house for an invasion of yanks (VGF’s from Oregon, so not truly the annoying ‘from Texas’-type yanks, but American all the same). We’ve travelled to America several times and know that they like towel rails. And the bathroom in our new house is a little short in towel-hanging devices (I don’t know why, it just IS). So, BtT + Going to Bunnings = Towel Rail. Or, in simple mathematical terms, BtT+GtB=TR. Not a lot can go wrong with that. Perhaps the odd ‘we don’t need those screws but he bought them anyway’ hardware item.

Then comes the phone call.

BtT: Darl! Wanna come for a drive?

Blossy: Uhhh, OK. Where to?

BtT: TV store.

Blossy: Why?

BtT: I’ve just been and I’ve narrowed it down and you need to come and help me decide which telly.

Blossy: A telly? Did you get the towel rail?

He did, as it turns out, get the towel rail, and checked on fold-up beds, and dismissed the bar stools at Fantastic (the package deal kings!) as not of the right colour, AND he’s been working REALLY hard for actual real money (as to opposed to me, who… hasn’t…), so what could I say? Except, “Great! New telly!” And grab the car keys and prepare myself for the sight of BtT in a recliner watching the cricket wearing 3D glasses.

What is it with this Bogan obsession with huge tellies? It's the new Bogan drug of choice.

For something that's only 60 years old or whatever, it's certainly made an impact on the human race. Well, not as much as penicillin or anything really important, but you know, things are different with a telly. And i also wonder whether I could be one of those parents that gets out board games after dinner. You know, do the unthinkable... live without telly.

Not that I’m letting mine (all four of them) go anytime soon. I was raised by a telly.

My Baby Boomer parents put one in my bedroom when I was six. A little black and white one. I thought they were FAN-tastic parents, but I’m fairly sure I got a telly for Christmas to stop my whining about wanting to change the channel (yes, we had TWO channels) to the ABC every five minutes to check whether Kimba the White Lion had started. Anyway, that telly began my ‘cave’, my own space where I could put MY STUFF. Near MY TV. I realised that Christmas that I suddenly had power. I could choose whether to join my family, or I could be in my cave. Yes, excellent Bogan parenting. Get annoying kids a whole lot of their own stuff, set up a room and leave them to it. I remember when the SBS channel (or ‘the wog channel’ as my dad called it) came and I stayed up late one night in my cave so I could watch naked foreign people rolling around on grassy knolls. Now THAT’S sex education at its Bogan finest. My cave was SO popular for sleep-overs I had a waitlist. And that's the power of a tiny black and white box in 1978.

So no wonder as a society we're happy to spend our family tax assistance payments on a new plasma (or LED in our case).

 In the Bogan world, Foxtel is a more common monthly expense than private health insurance. When choosing our house floor plan, nearly every single building company had renamed the Lounge Room a 'Home Theatre'. In Brad the Tradie's home theatre the lounge suite has recliners, inbuilt stubby holders and a snack bucket console. We don't entertain in the theatre like you would in a lounge room, unless the guest has come over to watch the footy and have bourbon and a bag of chips.

What happened to The Good Room?

You know, the room in the house where the lounge suite was floral, where cups of tea were had, there was a spare corner for the Christmas tree and posh families had a piano against a wall. (My parents had an ugly glass cabinet full of unused Noritake china and port glasses... In case the Queen came to dinner). Good rooms do NOT have a 58 inch 3D HD LED wifi-ready television thats worth more than the lounge suite.

Does anyone besides my nanna have a good room anymore?

And does it really matter? If my favourite bogan Brad the Tradie is more comfortable at the end of his work day in his cave watching sport wearing 3D glasses then all power to him. Bugger it. He doesn't drink tea anyway.

Television - The Drug of the Nation, The Disposable Heroes of Hiphoprisy , 1992.