|
|
|
| "AMERICA'S FUNNIEST HUMOR"TM
SHOWCASE
|
|
|
December 2006 / January 2007 Contest Results |
Dishes,
Arms, and the Azimuth Bear
By Alex Moody,
South Carolina
We sure haven’t
come very far, have we? What was I doing after adding yet another
component to my stack of overheating television set-top boxes? Standing
outside whacking my satellite dish with a wrench.
In a previous fit of techno-rage I had tried to remove the dish
completely. Unfortunately for me, it’s mounted on a pole that is secured
to the planet by means of a deep hole and lots of cement. I threw myself
against this contraption trying to pry it from the ground... only to come
away a few minutes later embarrassed, defeated and bruised. Even worse,
tired and sweaty. The physical dish removal was the last stage of
removing satellite television from my life altogether. It was supposed
to be cathartic, not aerobic.
Of course the dish company made it impossible to remove their equipment.
The one-armed gray scarecrow in my backyard lived on. Months passed,
football season came and I signed up again for my yearly fix of
addictive programming.
After enough prompting from commercials and colleagues I even upgraded
my service. A new satellite became much more important and, lo and
behold, the all-out assault on my dish months earlier had knocked the
thing out of whack.
I consulted various Web resources and a realignment seemed to be in
order. My technical advisory board (Texaspete1212 and Dishmancometh -–
very trustworthy) mentioned using an “azimuth” of 233 degrees. It went
something like this: “Yeah, have a technician come out and do that.
He'll realign the dish and azimuth and blah blah blah.” I'm a guy. I
stopped listening at the part about calling for help.
I still don’t know what an azimuth is, but that’s beside the point. My
keen sense of direction and knowledge of satellite placement told me to
move the dish slightly to the left. If that didn’t work, I’d move it
slightly to the right. There’s beauty in such simplicity. And,
sometimes, great danger.
Out I went with my trusty wrench and after some wrestling I had
succeeded in bending the dish slightly. Not much movement of an azimuth
variety so I adjusted my grip and got serious. There was a little more
movement and some more warping of the dish itself but definitely nothing
to worry about in my new role as homegrown dish installer.
I realized the stupidity of my plan quickly. Why grasp the dish itself
and attempt to twist it? Why not just grab the arm and push against that
in the proper direction? Why not, indeed!
Here's why not: I broke off the dish's arm. A creak. A snap. A moment of
bewilderment. I was left holding the severed limb in my hands. Two
cables still held the arm to the main body but all was lost. A rusty
connection between dish and arm betrayed me.
Well, there was that and my decision not to: a) loosen the bolts holding
the dish to the mounting pole, b) re-adjust to my heart's content, and c)
tighten the bolts again. Hindsight is 20/20, right? Sometimes in the
heat of the moment you have to go with your gut.
The conversation with the dish technician was interesting. Something
about my case was unique. I tried to be helpful.
“How did this break again?” He hadn't held many broken arms in his time. Amateur.
“It was a bear. Azimuth bear, I believe.”
“A what?”
“A bear. It ran through my backyard. I know, I know. I couldn't believe
it either. Not many bears in suburbia, am I right?” I think he bought
it. “This thing was in quite a hurry. Just clipped the dang dish. And I
just thought, 'Well I'll be a son-of-a-gun'”
He tilted his head. “Well, you'll be son-of-a-something.”
I watched the rest of the proceedings from the porch, wrench and pride
hanging limp by my side.
http://www.domesticatedman.com
.
|
