Dearest Rachel –
It was a moment that, in its quickly-discovered-to-be triviality, you would likely have found as amusing as I did, even as I was mildly annoyed at the steps I needed to take to remedy the situation (as well as the time away from what some might consider an addiction – not you, of course, as that would require you to confess about your own, as well). No sooner had I taken a picture of the ‘comforts’ of my life that I was hypothetically trying to determine if I could give up for ‘Megumi’ if she were to ask it of me, than the focal point of said comforts was momentarily stripped from me.
I’m referring, as you might guess, to the big screen television that dominates the one wall of the bedroom that has no windows (only doors) and the computer that it’s connected to and serves as an enormous monitor for. I came home from the ‘office’ on Thursday, turned on the television to watch some YouTube while I waited for Daniel to emerge from his day-long bath… only to be faced with a bare green screen on the display. No words, no cursor, nothing but green.
Well… not entirely nothing. When I clicked the menu button on the television remote, the screen came up with a list of things it could connect to on its own. So I could tell that at least the television itself was perfectly functional. It was dismaying to think that the computer in the bedroom had somehow broken down, especially considering that it’s probably the youngest machine in the house (apart from the one Daniel got just before our trip), but I reasoned that I would have to take it in to the local computer megastore and have their team look at it at some point in the next few days. It would be a inconvenience, and I’d have to go without for a couple of days, but it could be dealt with.
In the meantime, I decided to disconnect the computer from the television, fire up my laptop, and hook it up to the television to watch something instead. And this is where things got that much stranger, because when I did that, the computer continued to display a perfectly normal screen, but the television wasn’t reflecting any of that. All it was able to process – and all it displayed – was the same solid field of green that it had been indicating it was receiving from the bedroom tower… which meant that the tower might not be the thing with the problem, either (but since I had no other monitor, or any way to hook up to one, I wasn’t able to tell, like I was with the laptop).
I’ve never seen this happen before – and you know that we have an absurd amount of old computers and connectors throughout this house, so it seems like we should have encountered such a problem at some point – but it appears that this was a case of the HDMI cable breaking somehow. Upon checking with my AI assistant (look, I’m still skeptical about it on some subjects, but given that it basically has the ‘wisdom’ of the internet, one thing it can do well is troubleshooting technical issues), it confirmed my suspicions; the problem was with the cable, not either the television or the computer. Which is great, as replacing it would be quicker and cheaper than trying to do anything about either of the two main bits of hardware in question.
The one thing that struck me as funny about its reply to my inquiry was that I should “inspect the cable for signs of damage.” Given that we had ascertained what the problem was, and what needed to be done, I didn’t see the point. And in any case, upon disconnecting it from both ends, and peering at it in my hands, I couldn’t see anything wrong with it. As far as I was concerned, it looked no different from when I was photographing the scene from our bed in the morning, when it was working perfectly well. Damage? There was nothing I could see wrong with it.
So with that piece of advice disregarded, I had to go online and order a new cable. While I was at it, I also requested a few things for Daniel, as well; over the course of the trip, the lanyards for both his next wallet and water bottle carrier had snapped – too much jostling while walking around, I suppose – so they both needed to be replaced. For all that he’s your kid, he at least isn’t so sentimental about such stuff that he won’t replace them when they’re no longer useful.
Indeed, he’ll have much less trouble than I when it comes to disposal, as I’m not sure if the cable can simply be thrown out with the trash. I mean, it probably could be, and no one would be the wiser, but it might not be the most responsible thing to do with it. Still, to try to break it into its components for recycling is rather beyond my abilities, and frankly, more trouble than it’s worth. It may go a long way toward explaining why we still have a lot of those old machines from my old workplace in the first place; we never could figure out what to do with them when they stopped working (although as far as I know, most of them should still work; I just haven’t bothered to test them in years).
In any event, these purchases arrived yesterday evening, while we were out to dinner with the girls. Once plugged in, everything was functioning as normal, so I’ve learned something about this malfunction; don’t always assume it’s the big-ticket stuff that’s broken. Sometimes, only a small fix is what’s needed; it’s just a matter of knowing what that small fix is.
Anyway, I’m on my way for the day, honey. You keep an eye on me, and wish me luck; I’m going to need it.
Letters to Rachel 