No TV Left Behind

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No TV Left Behind

No, I’m not a TV hoarder! These rumors are just vicious slurs being thrown about by the anti-TV fringe crazies. Don’t want to just take my word? Well, the Television Services Division (TVSD), a branch of Children Services Division, has even stated so! TVSD came out to my house and looked at the way I take care of my many TV’s. The TVSD case workers cleared me of any wrong doing, and in fact said I take excellent care of my TV’s! Framed copies of the TVSD certifying documents are in every room of my house—that’s every room!

So, now that we’ve got that out of the way, let me tell you why this thing about me being a ‘TV hoarder’ has been known to come up. Scattered throughout my house are 57 TV’s. This is a 2-story place, with basement. Okay, I know that sounds like a lot of TV’s. But, with so many TV’s these days desperate for a home, what else could I do? Should I just let them be orphaned, stuck at Goodwill stores, or worse yet, hauled off to the trash heap and killed?

I know you’ve seen those TV commercials, the ones by that TV adoption placement agency No TV Left Behind. Most people see those commercials and don’t give another thought to the plight of TV’s in America now days. Sometimes I wish I was one of those cold hearted jerks. My life would be so much simpler. Then a TV near me at home blurts out a happy refrain, and pulls me out of my worries. And suddenly, there I am again, happy I’m not one of those cold hearted jerks. That’s when I’m glad I’ve got 57 TV’s.

Oh, no, it’s playing again--that No TV Left Behind commercial. I’ll shut up so we can watch and listen to it together. The TV’s scattered around my kitchen are all tuned to the same channel:

On the screens we see a long shot of a big US city junkyard. Seagulls fly overhead. The debris looks like what’s left over from a garage sale, or what you’d decide to throw away while getting ready to move.

The camera shot changes to a close view of the junk. In the middle of the screen is a 28 inch TV. It is an old style large box type, not a flat screen. To the right of the TV a rat is chewing on the TV’s power cord. A seagull sits on the top of the TV, and bird droppings mark the screen. To the left a seagull chews at an old copy of TV Guide. Near the screen center is the TV’s remote control. Two rats gnaw at the remote.

Then the camera pulls back a bit. A man wearing a hunting shirt and blue jeans walks over to the TV. Kneeling on one knee he puts his right hand on the TV and lovingly strokes the top of the box. The seagulls and rats ignored him and kept doing what they were doing. The man looks at the TV.

“Hi friends, this Matt again, for No TV Left Behind. This TV here rotting away in this hellhole used to be the beloved friend of a girl, Amy, who went to a college not far from this dump”.
He hugs the set with one arm, and turns his gaze into the camera.

“That afternoon at the college football stadium when Amy’s first boyfriend ever announced he was dumping her by having the news flashed over the scoreboard at halftime, and her drunk friends thought it was hilarious--who could she turn to? After Amy ran home to her apartment, locked the door, and pulled her phone cord out of the wall--it was this TV here, who stayed up all night with her, running the channels with her looking for sympathy”.

The man picked up the remote control. The rats clung to the remote, chewing the rubber buttons.

“And later that night after downing all that beer, pizza and ice cream, when Amy was too drunk to get off the couch, this TV still didn’t abandon her. From the cozy safety of the couches deep cushions, she used this remote—“

The man held up the remote, with the rats chewing the rubber buttons.
“—this remote, to channel surf. Amy’s despair was about to deepen, though. While surfing she discovered the 11 PM local news replaying a recording of her humiliating dumping that a ‘friend’ of Amy’s had recorded at the football stadium on a cell phone, and the local news anchor, who found the recording on You-Tube, had thought the tape so hilarious he had to play it over, and over, and over. Staring into the depths of the screen she realized she had only one true friend in the universe—this TV.”

“And then, while sitting on the couch, she used her lap top, went to You-Tube, and discovered that in the few hours the tape had been on You-Tube over 3 million people had viewed her humiliation. And finding that 87% of the viewers, people who had never met her, thought her now ex-first boyfriend ever had done the right thing—how did she deal with this mounting humiliation? She looked into her TV and found a friend who didn’t laugh at her.”

I looked around the kitchen, at the TV’s crowded in to every little nook and cranny. Tears came to my eyes as I thought about the times they had consoled me. Matt continued talking.

“What about in the morning, when Amy was awakened on the couch by a call on her cell phone from that Hollywood producer, who had seen the You-Tube tape, and wanted to buy the rights to her story? While listening to the producer’s sales pitch, Amy heard noise outside her apartment, near the street. Holding the phone she went over to the window, and pulled back a curtain. Outside were hundreds of people holding signs, all supporting her boyfriend dumping her. Amy looked at the faces and realized she didn’t know any of them, these hundreds of strangers who had decided to side with her now ex-first boyfriend ever.

“Amy realized she could never attend classes at that college ever again. She accepted the producer’s money offer, money that would give her a new life somewhere else, where she could get plastic surgery to hide her You-Tube famous face, and change her name.

“When the producers assistants showed up later that night, to whisk her away in a taxi, through the still large crowd outside her apartment, Amy could only take a few things with her—2 suitcases, the lap top—and this TV.

“Then what happened, after the plastic surgery, the name change, and transferring to another college? At the new school, a haven for New Agers, she fell in with a crowd of pot smoking, cigarette smoking, vegetarian intellectuals who told Amy that TV’s were a ‘bad influence’. Those intellectuals had thrown their TV’s in the garbage. Delighted to have human friends again Amy threw the TV, and this remote control, into the trash”.

The No TV Left Behind man stood and looked passionately into the camera, holding the remote control, still with the 2 rats chewing the rubber buttons.

“Now, this once beloved TV, more loyal than any now ex-first boyfriend ever could be, lies in this trash heap. But you can help—“

Oh, no, he’s talking to me, David, who already owns 57 TV’s.

“Yes, you, by sending just 27 cents a day to No TV Left Behind, can help us to give this dear TV a good home.”

The man held the remote control in front of him, and pushed it toward the camera.

“Or, you can be a greedy jerk, spend that money on another worthless fancy coffee, and leave this TV to be eaten by rats. It’s your choice.”

What could I do? I picked up the phone, and called No TV Left Behind. I asked the woman on the other end of the phone what was the name of the TV in the trash heap. She told me that out of loyalty for her former owner, the TV had asked to be named ‘Amy’. Would I be willing to donate 27 cents a day to keep ‘Amy’ out of the rain, and away from rats?

Right then I knew I could do better. I told the woman that I would adopt Amy’s abandoned TV outright. When the woman heard my offer she yelled to her coworkers about the good news, and I heard cheers coming from the other No TV Left Behind phone operators.
As the warmth of the phone operators love sank in to me I knew I’d done the right thing. ‘Amy’ was now my 58th TV!