Payback

Last weekend I completely missed the horrendous storm that hit the DC area. And, my apartment did too as I never lost power.

Tonight I guess the karma gods decided I had enough of the good and they needed to throw some trouble my way.

When I got home from work it seemed a little warmer than usual, but not horribly hot. I just figured the triple digit heat was too much for our A/C to handle effectively. I settled in to an exciting evening of reading/tv watching/internet surfing when around 7:45 my tv made a crackly, staticy noise and then the audio cut out. Cable still worked, channels still moved but no sound, at all. I turned it off and back on, I double checked the mute button and I turned the volume all the way up. I got a little static when I got to the max volume, but nothing else. I decided to turn it off for a bit and then try again. At 8:15 I tried again and... no luck.

Now, my dad has been eager to buy me a new tv for ages. Buying tvs is like a hobby for him. He loves to replace a perfectly good one with an even better one. In the past year he's upgraded at least 5 tvs. I kept telling him that mine tvs were fine and I didn't need a new one. But, that when one of them died, he'd be my first call. Coincidentally enough my parents had been asking what I wanted for my birthday and I had no suggestions to offer.

So I called them, while surfing the Best Buy site and broke the news. They were immediately on board with the plan, though I think my dad was a little disappointed he wasn't going to get the tv shopping experience this time. As he chatted about extended warranties and his favorite brand I located a 32' LCD on sale at Best Buy for a really good price, checked that they had it in stock, checked their hours and quickly realized I had to wrap up the call to go pick up my birthday present!

I left my apartment at 8:40 and was walking back in the door new tv (and new fan) in hand a few minutes after 9. My old tv was a huge, bulky monster. Both heavy and awkward. I brought one of my dining room chairs into my room, carefully maneuvered it forward and lifted it onto the chair to scoot out of the way. I'll deal with getting it out of my 2nd story apartment at some point in the future.

By 10 pm I had everything hooked up and in place and was watching tv. At 10:44, as I hung up from assuring my mother that I was home safe (because leaving the house at 8:30 is scandalous and something to be worried about. eye roll) and enjoying my new tv, the audio on the new tv cut out.

Um, what. the. hell.

Guess the problem wasn't the tv afterall. Again with the turning on and off, restarting the cable box, etc and nothing. Oh, well, nothing except the cable went out then too. And did I mention the internet has been spotty all night? And that as all of this was going on the temperature in my apartment was most definitely rising?

Not happy.

My roommate got home in the meantime and discovered that while it was set for cool and the fuses were fine the A/C unit was not running. GRRRR!

Luckily, during a similar outage many moons ago (long before I lived here) she invested in two window units for the bedrooms and deducted the cost from the rent. She rocks. I would have never had the balls to do that. Anyway, we dug them out of the storage closest, cut up the cardboard box from my new tv to cover the gaps they leave in the window frame and got them installed.

Between the necessary furniture moving, dusting, cutting, taping the whole process took about an hour. A hot, sweaty, gross hour.

But now, things are cooling off. My new fan is blowing cool air at me as opposed to the hot air I was getting earlier tonight and we'll be able to survive tomorrow's insane temperatures. I was brave and just tried the tv again and...cable and sound are back!

Despite the rocky evening it seems all signs point to my birthday being off to a good start!