The Remoteless Wonder

[DGoddessChardonnay]

First tv set I had was a black and white Admiral portable that Mom put in my room when I was a baby. As long as that tv set was on, I was quiet and she could get housework done.

But turn that set off and . . . . she had NO peace in the house and not only would she rush back in there to turn it back on, she'd give Dad (or whoever turned it off) the Riot Act.

We got our first color console by the mid 70's and it was in the living room . . . and it had a "manual remote" (meaning I would have to get up to change the channel.)

First color tv w/remote Mom bought was back in the late 70s or early 80s and it was in Grandma's room (by this time, Grandma had trouble getting around so it was easier for her to have a remote, which she learned how to use pretty quickly.) That was followed by one for Mom's room and then I got my first color portable (which was one my aunt had when she moved in with us when I was in middle school.) Then my brother got one for his room (after Mom moved him out of Grandma's room and decided he needed his own room and space for his toys.)

The microwave didn't follow until mid 80's and this was after my Dad remarried and he'd bought one for my stepmom the Christmas before their wedding. That was the first time I'd seen a microwave oven and my stepmom showed me how to use it (I was 15 at the time) and I mentioned to Mom that they had one, as well as a built in dishwasher.

Following summer, when my then stepdad updated the kitchen, we got both a microwave oven and a portable dishwasher installed.

I don't purchase anything unless it has a remote nowadays. My oscillating heater has a remote control, my tv and the PS3 both have remotes and the last stereo I bought has a remote (and that JVC is still going after 15 years.)

I recently has a wall A/C unit installed week before last in my office that I bought on sale . . . and it has a remote control.

It's not that I'm lazy . . . it's rather that the arthritis in my back and hips make it hard to get up sometimes and it's easier to point a remote and turn on or off what I need rather than use my phone to text my brother to come do it for me.

[dalesys]

So far no one has mentioned the very original sound operated TV remote...

Hmmm. Wonder if we could swap hands with paws with the kid & the dog. The dog would whine less and the kid might not cause as much trouble...

[YamiNoHime]

That's what I had growing up

[Ironclad Alibi]

So far no one has mentioned the very original sound operated TV remote that my parents used. My dad would tell me to go change the channel for him.

[emax4]

You should have called thee staff around to have them witness the adult who doesn't know how to use a remote control, just to see for themselves. I think he would have learned REAL quick.

[nutraxfornerves]

My grandmother’s favorite TV show was Lawrence Welk. When the network started announcing that the next season would be broadcast in color, she was in heaven. She couldn’t wait for the opening show.

And it was in black and white.

Grandma was furious. They lied to her! It took a while to explain to her the concept that there were two parts to this. Not only did the show have to be broadcast in color, but the TV had to be capable of displaying color. She hadn’t noticed that she had never seen another show in color.

Her son bought her a new TV and Mr. Welk’s reputation remained intact.

[Dreamstalker]

When my dad and I were in Oregon visiting my grandmother and cousin, we were all over at g-ma's house for awhile. The TV was on, and my dad and uncle were getting annoyed at the closed captions and decided to disable them.

It quickly became a "how many engineers does it take to work a TV?" joke--between the two of them there are probably 8 engineering-related degrees and many decades of experience, and they couldn't figure it out after 4 hours. There had to be some setting on the set itself that they weren't seeing...and nobody knew where the TV remote even was. It's actually a good thing they couldn't do it, as Grandma would probably never be able to figure out how to turn them on again.

Our remote has issues....I suspect that it's a combination of old equipment, shitty wiring in our building, and the fact that our remote and box are not (and never have been) paired properly.

[AdamAnt316]

Omg the nostalgia there. That was the tv my grandparents had and whenever we tried to pull the ‘one more minute’ thing as kids are wont to do he would make the channels go all flippy. I never did figure out as a kid how he could do that. I also remember having a case full of those old old games where you had to blow on the cartridge and put it in. Back when controllers only had the start/select buttons, the A and B buttons, and the plus pad.

Believe it or not that was an upgrade from the tv they used to have. An old black and white monstrosity that was huge but the actual screen itself was small. A real POS and this was at a time where there were flatscreens available. But gramps was of the opinion that if it weren’t broke don’t fix it. Until his old black and white needed fixing and we got all excited he would move into the modern century... the. He brought that monstrosity up from the basement. Apparently he’d purchased a colour tv at some point and just never bothered to hook it up. It broke our little modern day hearts. I’m pretty sure it still played duck hunt though, and bubble trouble. That was my game back in the day. God I feel old.

You're only as old as you feel.

My grandparents had fully upgraded to color TV by the time I was growing up, though they still had several of their older sets in various rooms around the house. The "Space Command" console I pictured earlier sat unused in their living room unused throughout my entire childhood, though I plugged it in a few times to fiddle with the funny remote, and found it had color issues. It'd been replaced by a Sony Trinitron console, which eventually joined it in the living room as furniture when the picture tube went weak. After my grandparents passed away, I advertised the Zenith on a TV-related forum called VideoKarma, and someone from New Jersey drove up to MA, gave me $20, and I helped load it in the back of his van. He was able to fix its color issues, which is nice. I'm just glad that it managed to avoid the dumpster.

As for video games, I've owned numerous classic systems over the years. We had the original Nintendo, Super Nintendo, and Sega Genesis as our first systems One of my first experiences with pre-NES systems was when I found a Mattel Intellivision in their basement. I could only find one game, a Space Invaders clone imaginatively titled "Space Armada", which was fun. I later found a bunch more Intellivision games, and started to build a pseudo-museum around the setup, which continues to this day.

Back when my parents were together, we only had a black and white TV. My stepdad had a color TV, and when he and my mom got married, we started watching our shows on his TV. Up until then, my mom had no idea that the smurfs were blue.

It was before my time (mostly), but my great-grandparents actually had both in their living room, apparently. After my great-grandfather bought a new color TV sometime in the '60s (I think), they decided to keep their older black & white set in the living room as well so they could watch different shows at the same time. How they kept track of the audio for each show, I have no idea.

Personally, we had color TVs by the time I was growing up in the '80s, though the first TV I could call my own was a 12" GE black & white set I'd bought at a neighbor's yard sale for $2. It was later replaced by another similar B&W set, which I used to play Nintendo games once I found a NES of my own. It was later replaced by a color RCA set which, like the other two, was a yard sale find. They were eventually thrown out when CRTs were classified as hazardous waste, but I've hung onto one B&W set:

My grandparents had a "radar range". (For those of you younger than dinosaurs, early on some microwave ovens were marketed as "radar ranges".) The front was fairly melty-looking, because they had used it on some of their good plates. You know, the ones with real gold edging? Evidently the light show was spectacular until the (very brief) fire started.

You know how that name came about, right? The microwave oven was based on the cavity magnetron tube used in radar apparatus. A Raytheon radar engineer named Percy Spencer had a chocolate bar melt in his pocket while working on some radar equipment, and after some experimenting, turned it into a commercial product the size of a conventional home oven, which they named "Radarange" in homage to its origins. After buying appliance maker Amana, Raytheon was able to develop a countertop version of the microwave oven, which they continued to call "Radarange" at least into the 1980s.
-Adam

[SailorMan]

I was in the Navy in the late 70s (Submarine Force), and our barracks finally got microwaves in our TV lounges.

Now, when using shoe wax to shine shoes, many people would use their lighters to melt the top layer of wax in the can, and then dip their cloth into it, before applying said cloth to the shoes.

During the first week after the microwaves were installed, someone had put their tin of shoe wax into the thing; it caught on fire, and ruined the oven.

The whole floor smelled like shoe polish for a week.

[Nunavut Pants]

My grandparents had a "radar range". (For those of you younger than dinosaurs, early on some microwave ovens were marketed as "radar ranges".) The front was fairly melty-looking, because they had used it on some of their good plates. You know, the ones with real gold edging? Evidently the light show was spectacular until the (very brief) fire started.

[Racket_Man]

Hah I grew up with a black and white tv my whole entire childhood. I didn't even know shows were in color at first! My mother didn't do color tv and she didn't do cable. She also didn't do microwaves ....she was screwed in the head.

Yup, I grew up watching Batman and Star Trek in black-and-white. Took me a while to "get" red-shirt jokes... Mom did have microwaves, though.

I grew up in the 1960s when yes there were color TVs BUT my parents were not going to spend the money for one. 20 inch B&W was our family TV. and yes I did watch Batman and Star Trek in B&W. we finally got a Color TV in the early 70's and my parents did not get a microwave until the mid 80's

[MadMike]

Yup, I grew up watching Batman and Star Trek in black-and-white. Took me a while to "get" red-shirt jokes...

Back when my parents were together, we only had a black and white TV. My stepdad had a color TV, and when he and my mom got married, we started watching our shows on his TV. Up until then, my mom had no idea that the smurfs were blue.

[Mental_Mouse]

Hah I grew up with a black and white tv my whole entire childhood. I didn't even know shows were in color at first!

Yup, I grew up watching Batman and Star Trek in black-and-white. Took me a while to "get" red-shirt jokes... Mom did have microwaves, though.

[telecom_goddess]

Hah I grew up with a black and white tv my whole entire childhood. I didn't even know shows were in color at first! My mother didn't do color tv and she didn't do cable. She also didn't do microwaves ....she was screwed in the head.

[AkaiKitsune]

Omg the nostalgia there. That was the tv my grandparents had and whenever we tried to pull the ‘one more minute’ thing as kids are wont to do he would make the channels go all flippy. I never did figure out as a kid how he could do that. I also remember having a case full of those old old games where you had to blow on the cartridge and put it in. Back when controllers only had the start/select buttons, the A and B buttons, and the plus pad.

Believe it or not that was an upgrade from the tv they used to have. An old black and white monstrosity that was huge but the actual screen itself was small. A real POS and this was at a time where there were flatscreens available. But gramps was of the opinion that if it weren’t broke don’t fix it. Until his old black and white needed fixing and we got all excited he would move into the modern century... the. He brought that monstrosity up from the basement. Apparently he’d purchased a colour tv at some point and just never bothered to hook it up. It broke our little modern day hearts. I’m pretty sure it still played duck hunt though, and bubble trouble. That was my game back in the day. God I feel old.