And we need technology because...?

It's been an exciting evening. I came home from work, got a few things accomplished, and sat down with my dinner to watch my Heels take on the Fighting Illini in a sort-of rematch of last year's NCAA championship. (Which we won. In case you didn't know.) As it's back to freezing cold around here, I busted out the space heater for the first time this winter.

That didn't go so well.

About twelve minutes into the first half, everything goes dark. TV. Overhead. Space heater. Even the Christmas tree. So I'm thinking the power's out, which is weird since it's not storming. Then I look over and realize the microwave clock is still on. Which means it's a breaker problem. So I go in the kitchen and start flipping all the breakers. Finally one makes the light come on. Great. Back to the game. Except I turned on the TV to find that there is at least one and occasionally more horizontal white lines going up and down the screen and making the picture terrible. And my TiVo is not coming on, even though the DVD and VCR were.

So what do I do? I call my dad, of course. My father is not an electrician. Actually you should ask him to tell you about his electrical engineering course sometime. But he has a much better shot than I do of figuring out what's going on - except he had no idea. So I moved the TV into the bedroom at halftime to see whether the TV was going nuts or it was the power strip or something. Fortunately for me, it was the power source, and I have a cable jack in my bedroom. So while I was on the phone with the TiVo people for forty-seven minutes, I could watch the second half of the game.

(And while we're on the subject: Even though we lost, we lost by four points. And those freshmen looked dang impressive. I'm looking at you, Tyler Hansbrough and Marcus Ginyard. Good game.)

Anyway, I tried out the TV after the game with an extension cord with extra outlets. Seemed to work fine, so I think the power strip is kaput. So tomorrow I shall be off to Best Buy to buy a new power strip and to exchange my TiVo. Because if it won't turn on, well, there's not much they can do.

(Then I will need to find a nice friend with a phone line in my cable area who will let me take over their living room overnight to set up my new TiVo. Hint.)

And why am I willing to do all this? Because I love my TiVo. Possibly the saddest thing here is that I will probably lose 40 West Wing episodes and an entire season of House I haven't watched yet. Boo.