Things are stopping in our house at the moment. I have no idea why but over the last few weeks two DVD players have given up the ghost (one in the middle of a movie), a couple of CD players have decided they are only going to play the CDs they like*, the kids' computer just refused to even switch on, the toaster died a couple of days ago and, the same afternoon, the Sky-box remote controller somehow managed to get confused and think it was the TV 'sremote controller - all it would do was switch the TV off. Not on again. Just off. Then the Kettle died. Argh!
Oh - and the speedometer on the car crapped out on me on the way to Oban the other day. I was barrelling along, looked down and found I was (at least according to my dashboard) stationary. I pulled in at the next lay by and re-booted the car. I'm convinced 90% of everything can be fixed by switching it off and then back on again. (The other 10% involves duct tape.) It worked and I drove off at 30 miles an hour, and the speedo agreed with me.
I have also managed to fix the toaster, though that took a little more work. I had to saw a bit of the internal structure in half with a padsaw to get the casing off. (I laugh in the face of your fancy security tamper-proof screws! Hahaha!) And then, after prodding it relentlessly for half an hour, while marvelling at the fact that my toaster had two microchips in it, bent one of the components so it actually came into contact with the other component it was supposed to come into contact with - and now it works again. Hurrah! All that work to rescue a £5 Tesco toaster. (Why are there microchips in there?)
Flushed with sucess, I took the back off the kids' computer and peered into it as if I knew what I was looking at. (I don't.) I had a good look to see if there were any obviously exploded components. (There weren't.) I wiped the thin layer of dust from the bottom of the case with a wet-wipe - and put the case back on.
I turned to Merriol, said: "I dunno, what I'm doing in here. I think we're just going to have to buy them another one," and pressed the On button just to see what would happen. And the thing started up as if it had just come out of the factory. I should threaten inanimate objects more often.
The Sky remote got over its identity crisis the next day and is as good as new.
The CD players are holding out though; they still refuse to play anything other than The Smurfs Go Pop, and anything recorded by Simon and Garfunkle. I'm not sure what their demands are but I refuse to be blackmailed. We're buying a new CD player. Or rather we're buying another new CD player because as I typed this I remembered we did buy a new CD player last month - and had to take it back when it died on us after three days. The shop had run out of that particular model which allowed you to plug a USB stick into the side of it and we couldn't get another.
The DVD players we've bought to replace the two that died turn out to be the only DVD players on the planet for which there is no region hack. Which means I now have shelves full of crappy Region One movies bought from the States which I cannot watch - even if I wanted to. Which I now suddenly do. Because I can't.
I've been all over the web and all of the hacks I have found that are claimed to work - don't.
If you happen to know the region hack for a Technika DVDRAW08 please let me know. And if you know any way of hypnotising CD players into stopping sulking I would be grateful for that too.
*They have lousy taste.
Oh - and the speedometer on the car crapped out on me on the way to Oban the other day. I was barrelling along, looked down and found I was (at least according to my dashboard) stationary. I pulled in at the next lay by and re-booted the car. I'm convinced 90% of everything can be fixed by switching it off and then back on again. (The other 10% involves duct tape.) It worked and I drove off at 30 miles an hour, and the speedo agreed with me.
I have also managed to fix the toaster, though that took a little more work. I had to saw a bit of the internal structure in half with a padsaw to get the casing off. (I laugh in the face of your fancy security tamper-proof screws! Hahaha!) And then, after prodding it relentlessly for half an hour, while marvelling at the fact that my toaster had two microchips in it, bent one of the components so it actually came into contact with the other component it was supposed to come into contact with - and now it works again. Hurrah! All that work to rescue a £5 Tesco toaster. (Why are there microchips in there?)
Flushed with sucess, I took the back off the kids' computer and peered into it as if I knew what I was looking at. (I don't.) I had a good look to see if there were any obviously exploded components. (There weren't.) I wiped the thin layer of dust from the bottom of the case with a wet-wipe - and put the case back on.
I turned to Merriol, said: "I dunno, what I'm doing in here. I think we're just going to have to buy them another one," and pressed the On button just to see what would happen. And the thing started up as if it had just come out of the factory. I should threaten inanimate objects more often.
The Sky remote got over its identity crisis the next day and is as good as new.
The CD players are holding out though; they still refuse to play anything other than The Smurfs Go Pop, and anything recorded by Simon and Garfunkle. I'm not sure what their demands are but I refuse to be blackmailed. We're buying a new CD player. Or rather we're buying another new CD player because as I typed this I remembered we did buy a new CD player last month - and had to take it back when it died on us after three days. The shop had run out of that particular model which allowed you to plug a USB stick into the side of it and we couldn't get another.
The DVD players we've bought to replace the two that died turn out to be the only DVD players on the planet for which there is no region hack. Which means I now have shelves full of crappy Region One movies bought from the States which I cannot watch - even if I wanted to. Which I now suddenly do. Because I can't.
I've been all over the web and all of the hacks I have found that are claimed to work - don't.
If you happen to know the region hack for a Technika DVDRAW08 please let me know. And if you know any way of hypnotising CD players into stopping sulking I would be grateful for that too.
*They have lousy taste.
2 comments:
Let's swap DVD Players. I have one that doesn't have a hack either. Pisses me off no end.
I think all we'd need is a power converter...
and way too much money to mail it.
BTW, today Tyler said: "I need to tell Liam and Merriol something"
It sounded ominous. I asked him what?
He said "That I love them and miss them and wish I could see them"
Very soon, he and I will have our lives back. But not nearly as much money. Noos soon.
Oh, that's spooky... Chaz was thinking the technological universe had conspired against only he....
1. Laptop power supply broke
2. Analogue land line stops working
3. Incoming calls to hub get so noisy they can't be heard
4a. V expensive digital SLR breaks - not repairable.
4b V expensive lens parts company with filter mount - not repairable.
5. Mobile phone stops working - not repairable. Blackberry doesn't work with mobile internet service...
6. Home phone line stops taking incoming calls
7. Home phone line stops working - no phone calls, no internet. (repaired!!! - quite liked it broken....)
8. Home phone line has apparently fried Hub circuits (had a spare one, so OK, can now read friend's amusing blog)
9. Sits on camera bag and breaks lens hood.
Is Ballachulish at the centre of some metaphysical focus of techno-terror?
Post a Comment