When Roone bought this TV in the mid-90s we made so much fun of him for buying such a giant TV. What the hell do you need such a big TV for, Roone, you gonna open a movie theater in your living room or something, haw haw haw (bubble bubble cough cough) haw haw.
Now, compared to the products of the flat-screen race to in-home ridiculousness, Roone's enormous folly looks like one of those coin-op black-and-whites they used to have in bus stations. (At least as far as the screen is concerned. The tubes and shit in back take up a solid quarter acre.) But Roone sold it to us cheap when he moved out of our old place, and for the price it was more than fine. It survived a lightning strike, for Christ's sake. The picture was sort of warped and blacked out in one corner for a couple of weeks, but it gradually righted itself and has been perfect ever since. We were kind of hoping it would last forever.
Until this week, when Eric turned it on and the picture flashed on for a second and raced away, far away, to the top of the screen and disappeared forever. You can listen to the TV all you like on this thing--it sounds great--but no one will be able to watch it again.
So for now we are using the smaller, older, and cheaper TV we had upstairs. That one is just fine too, except it doesn't have enough jacks for both the cable box and the PS2/DVD player. Plus it's developed this weird curve at the bottom of the picture that tells me that it won't be very long before we'll be in the market for something new and bright and hideous. Although it probably won't be nearly as big as whatever Roone has now.