um, wtf?

[before I go into a rant about planned obsolescence, I wanted to thank everyone who commented on the sweater and the photos. thank you. it means a lot.]

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okay. things keep breaking around here. w.t.f?

first thing to crap out this year: our antenna'd cordless phone [when you live in a house with rabbits, you have cordless phones].
- method of death: the antenna plastic broke off, exposing the wire antenna. i actually took a pair of jewelry pliers and bent the antenna end into a little loop so no one would stab themselves in the eye. that bought us about 5 more weeks. then the battery stopped holding even the tiniest charge.]
- replaced with: two antenna-free cordless phone handsets that are much nicer, plus a computery voice announces the name of the person calling, which is only fun when you're not trying to sleep.

next: the monolithic air conditioning unit in our dining room window [it came with the house].
- method of death: hub was moving it to another room and just as he got it installed, he cleverly punctured the freon coil. i panicked, grabbed the rabbits and moved them to the bedroom with an open window and all other doors open and fans on everywhere. then i googled it and relaxed a little [freon is a sufficant, not a poison, so as long as they didn't breathe it in, they're fine].
- replaced with: a super-cheap whirlpool a/c unit that's half the size, 4x as energy efficient, and cools our whole main floor. quietly. this turns out to have been a GOOD thing, the breaking, then.

followed by: hub's Blackberry, purchased only after my previous employer [also a client of hub's] insisted he be available all the time, even when we were in Italy.
- method of death: who knows. he dropped the damned thing so many times i've lost count, and it was 4 years old. in Blackberry world, that's almost ancient.
- replaced with: a red Pearl. whatever. he's the Crackberry addict in the family. he's happy, i'm happy.

but wait, there's more! our 10-year-old tube tv
- method of death: this weekend, while watching Little Miss Sunshine, it made that sound you hear when the power gets suddenly cut off. and then kept making that sound over and over. very creepy.
- replaced with: a ridiculous LCD HD-ready thingy that we got at a great price, but are just not convinced about.

it gets harder and harder to spend money on technology when you know that
a] the unit will likely break, and sooner than you think it should, and
b] something cooler will come out making you wish the thing would break.

i actually didn't want to buy a new tv now...i'd rather have waited another year or so until the really cool ones come out, but i was forced into it because i do loves my tv.

hub was smart and made sure we got the 1080p model, which is going to be important when our dvd player becomes obsolete and we're forced to buy a blu-ray system. oh, and the new tv means that if we want HD, which we now might because the tv can actually display all those extra pixels, we'd have to upgrade our tivo and cable box. do you see the sinister plan here?

i DO love new technology and new gadgets. i just want to buy one when *i* want to, not when the previous gadget they sold me broke, leaving me without the thing i didn't know i needed until i bought it and now can't live without.

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p.s. I forgot to add this: the tv in the bedroom is the one we bought at Consumer's Distributing [Canadian flashback!] before we were married. 18 years ago. and it still works just fine.