The Born Loser by Art and Chip Sansom for November 22, 2020

That was my job when I was a kid.

Too difficult to change the batteries on the remote ?

Those were the days my dear please pass me a can of beer…………………..

I too had turns as the TV remote. But I didn’t have to turn a knob. We had a push button tuner.

How about getting a new battery?

Fat chance finding what button does what on today’s TVs. I can’t even turn the thing on without the remote.

Nephew…Thy name is “Clicker”.

I was about to say too as Tom above. One needs to change channels on the cable box. With a long enough coaxial cable, you can place the converter box on your lap or side table.

New TVs are hard to change manually. No knobs!

I’m not even sure you can change channels without a remote

I don’t think modern TV’s even have any controls on the TV itself. With no remote, they can’t even be turned on. So a dead or lost remote is a more serious problem than just needing to get up.

In college, before we got a remote cable box… When we would have a party in our apartment, if you sat on the end of the sofa near the tv, you were the remote.

Kid’s going to get awful tired getting up to mute the sound every time a Medicare or auto insurance ad comes on

Yeah, sit in the dark …

I remember my first encounter with a remote control TV (c. 1977). A relative of mine had a 12" set on top of a wardrobe, and I think that the channel turret had a servo motor, because when he pressed the channel up/down button on the remote, the channel changed, but the turret also turned backward or forward.

I don’t think my TV has a channel selector.. It’s remote or nothing.

Good kid. When I was a kid, we had 3 channels. Changing them wasn’t a big problem. I hope Grandpa isn’t one of those channel surfers that drive us mad. That could drive the kid to murder or to go to the store and get some new batteries……

Really old remotes didn’t need batteries. When you pushed a button, a hammer struck metal bars in the remote which produced a tone like a tuning fork. The TV listened for the tones.

We had two antennae. If I recall correctly, the rabbit ears were for VHF channels, and the circular one was for UHF channels. Even though I was the oldest, I was the remote, antennae wrangler, and channel-getter-backer, when the old, cruddy, B&W TV needed to be whacked in just the right spot. The whacker I had “constructed” was two yardsticks tied together so I could get tough with the box without getting up… ☺

When I was a kid there was only three channels so there wasn’t a lot of changing to be done.

Can we assume that Wilberforce won’t be remotely competent?

My job was to shut up and go to sleep. Farmed as sharecroppers. Had no tv in our neck of the woods. No electric for miles. Hand pump water and oil lamps and outhouse. We were poor but I miss those days. Left home at 17 and spent over 20 years in military where people told me to shut up and do what I was told. Wife tells me the same. Guess I need a battery?

And that remote doesn’t require batteries. The only problem is they tend to wander off.

I remember those days well. Five channels to pick from.

One fashion for a scout to perform daily service.

If my remote batteies died, I’d be S-O-L. My cable box doesn’t have a channel change control on it.

Some channels put so many commercials that I some time forget what I’m watching!

Just yesterday I saw the Monty Python episode “Light Entertainment War” where there was a Gunga Din-like character hooked up to a remote control that gave him a severe electric shock until he changed the channel on the telly.

we didn’t have to change channels we only had one!!