My television set isn’t the nicest or toppest of the line. It’s a decent brand (Toshiba), but it’s not one of those plasma deals that hang on the wall like a picture frame or even one of those big screen jobs. The screen, at 27 inches, is plenty big, though, and it’s a flat one. That’s nice. I like to stare at the moving pictures it shows me, often filled with comedy or drama, characters who have goal or missions, lots of talking and running around and music -- it’s all so much more convenient than venturing out into the “real” world, where everyone is not beautiful and the fate of the world never rests in my hands.

Typically, I like to come home from work, a day spent staring at a computer screen, to plopping down in my room and watching this different kind of screen. Just sit back, relax, get caught up in my stories, and -- WHAT THE GOOD G-DAMN???

My TV has come down with something. It’s sick. Occasionally, without warning, without any rhyme or reason, completely randomly, the picture will nearly disappear. What was once a fine little scene of pretty people all talking about something interesting and maybe even witty becomes a black screen with just a thin line of light in the middle. The sound’s still there, but the beautiful picture… where’s the beautiful picture gone to???

The truth is that I don’t know. I never went to TV repair school. (And neither, apparently, did Best Buy's TV repair “technicians,” but more on that later -- oops, I just spoiled part of my own story. I’m an ass.) I don’t know crap about TV’s other than how to watch ‘em. Sometimes, when the picture disappears, I turn it off, and then when I turn it back on, the picture’s back. Sometimes it takes several “on’s” and “off’s” with the clicker. (Remote controls don’t “click” anymore, though, do they? So why call one that? I don’t know… but I just did.) Some nights it doesn’t happen; some nights it happens eight or nine times! It’s hell brought up from the under regions and let loose on earth for an intense TV watcher such as myself. Luckily for me, I done got a warranty. That’s right. I wised up after some misadventures with another shit TV that randomly stopped working a while back (not a Toshiba but also from Best Buy, make of that what you will) and decided that a warranty might be worth the proverbial “it” for all future electronics purchases.

A quick call to the number on my Best Buy (fuckers, more on that later) warranty brochure was all I needed to do. Convenient. I set up an appointment for a service technician to come out to my humble abode on Saturday and fix the only object between my life and oblivion. Oblivion.

So, Saturday morning comes around. As was arranged, I get a call between 7am and 9am (closer to 7) to set up a two hour time range for when the repairman will swing by my joint to fix up my picture box. He says between 9am and 11am. I go back to sleep. Sure, that’s four hours waiting for him in my apartment, but two of those will be spent sleeping, so it’s no big deal, right? He’ll swing by, I’ll tell him the problem, and he’ll fix it. Then TV with no worries! Yay!

I wait… and wait… and wait… then my knight in shining black slacks and Best Buy polo shirt arrives! His name is Mohammed, and he looked to me like he was here to help.

Here’s the, what I like to call motherfuckingbitch of it, readers: Mohammed informed me that he had to see, with his own two eyes, the whole picture squishing down to almost nothing thing to fix it. He couldn’t take my word for it. I tried to reason with him, but there was a language barrier. Sure, he spoke English better than I spoke whatever his native language was, but it was frustrating to me. (Does that make me one of those annoying Americans that expects everyone to talk like me?)

With that, he was gone, and I was kind of, okay, ridiculously upset and dismayed…

***

A week or so went by. Picture kept disappearing. Without a life to replace TV in sight, I needed to get this sumbitch fixed, and I needed to get it fixed immediately. Unfortunately, I couldn’t do the appointments during the week because I have a “job” (if you happen to be like 80% of the folks in my town of Hell A, Google it if you don’t know what one is)… therefore, ergo, visavis, I had to make the call to the possibly useless Best Buy warranty department again.

Same set up: Saturday, call between 7am or 9am to set up the appointment. BUT! Since the repairman seemed to NEED to see the problem, it was advised I take a picture of the screen when it went shitty before the appointment to show him (or her, but… yeah, probably him). That seemed to make sense.

And, lo, when it happened again during some show I was enjoying, I took a picture. I took another just to be on the safe side. Nothing was going to stop me!!!

Tune in next PURE LARD when D.J. is reunited with Mohammed, this time in the presence of his roommate, his roommate’s mom, and his roommate’s friend on video chat while nothing happens as it should, making D.J.’s hatred grow and grow, much to the indifference of Best Buy…