HDTV Secrets

In June of last year I bought two 50/50 tickets while my husband and I enjoyed lunch at our favorite eatery. The restaurant was hosting the drawing for a fifty-two inch plasma television in an effort to cover the cost of a life-saving surgery needed for a local child to survive his eight year of life. Tickets were available through New Year’s Eve when the drawing was scheduled to be held.

I didn’t even remember buying the tickets until I received a call on New Year’s Day informing me that I had won the television. By the time I brought the big-screen home, my husband had it sold via a local website. We delivered the television to its new owner and then went shopping for a high definition television.

I agreed to spend the proceeds from the sale of the plasma on a new television but made my husband promise not to exceed our 975 budget. When we walked into our shopping destination, my husband literally ran to the electronics department. By the time I found him, he was negotiating a price on an “open-box” deal (a set that had been returned and was thus offered with no warranty or return privileges).

I pulled the truck to the front of the store while my husband finalized what he proclaimed to be the “deal of the new year.” He boasted about his negotiating skills all the way home. As we struggled to hang the relatively new high-definition television on the wall, my husband could barely contain his excitement; he had wanted an HDTV for quite a while.

Once the television was firmly in place, my husband was able to enjoy the best five minutes of his life. Then the television turned itself off…permanently. My husband was so disappointed I almost literally felt his emotional pain. Apparently the television had experienced water damage while in the possession of its previous, unscrupulous owners who returned it to the store without an explanation.

A week passed before I received a credit card bill. Not only did my husband spend the 975 we had gotten for the plasma I had won, he had charged an additional 300 to complete the “deal of the new year.”

Overcoming my anger, I went shopping without my husband before Valentine’s Day. I purchased a new high-definition television, including an extended warranty, to replace the dysfunctional one he had paid way too much for. I’ll never admit it to him, but I enjoy that set as much as he does. If I had left him home in January, we could have been enjoying our current view two months sooner.