GETTING SERIUS
Sometime in February:
Sister and brother-in-law, Renee and Dave, want to know if I think Bob would like to have Serius as their “ Birthday Gift.” “Serius”? Is that the Howard Stern thing and what Dr. Laura just deserted all her loyal listeners (me, not Bob) and left us for? Answer: “Yes, but with all kinds of other things: Our kind of music, Frank Sinatra, all the old radio comedies, sports (Bob, not me), and some other, you know, interesting stuff. And we want to surprise him, so keep it secret.”
Rest of month:
I try to think of a way I can cleverly probe to find out if Bob would like to have it (I would, Dr. Laura), but get caught up on the part where, yes, Dave and Renee would give him the actual, gift-wrapped box of whatever it is, “small-no-bigger-than-a-cigarette package” (to go with his “no-bigger-than-a-packet-of-matches pacemaker”?). And as I gather, this is a rather expensive gift, however, we would then be responsible for the yearly “rental” of “somewhere around $125”, which must be paid in advance.
This last part stops me in my tracks. Converted to monthly, would Bob be happy to pay, my math is always a little shaky, $10 a month for Dr. Laura, (definitely not), Frank Sinatra, maybe, but Fibber Magee and Molly? I quickly decide to change that last to Jack Benny, where I think I might have a better chance.
Early March:
I give up trying to probe without divulging the surprise factor, but preface the conversation making Bob promise not to divulge the fact that I divulged the surprise. And the “the somewhere around $125” turned out to be closer to $200 a year, which translates into – his math is much better than mine - $17 something” a month, and that, as I suspected it would, became the Deal Breaker.
Middle March:
But by this time something drastic has happened. The Republicans have threatened to cancel all funding for Public Radio, which is all we listen to in the car (we’ve gone through all the Learning Tapes Trev has given us: History of Opera, History of Jazz, History of the Bible, and we’ve taken out the CD’s because Valet Parking had already “removed” several).
In addition, just about any news on any station, means listening to mostly seriously terrible stuff: what both the US and State legislatures are doing to “lower the deficit”, such as taking away heating for the poor, children’s school lunches, and decent education in general, while increasing the tax deductions for the super rich and oil and gas companies. This is upsetting as is, then add in the terrible, terrible tragedies in Japan; major earthquake, their nuclear reactors going haywire…… and I got so depressed I just gave up on radio news, still hoping, of course, PBS would continue to be funded, and would survive without me.
Next, for some reason we simply couldn’t find any classical music station, and even The Wave no longer plays decent jazz.
Thus it was, I made the decision for both of us, Serius it was to be.
March 25th
Dave has done his best, but somehow couldn’t give Bob the gift-wrapped Serius at his birthday dinner. Instead he gave him a large photocopied “HAPPY BIRTHDAY, BOB, WE OWE YOU…..(SEE NEXT PAGE), LOVE, RENEE & DAVE.”
Next page had a photocopy of the monitor of the Serius –small-as-a-cigarette pack- with the dog logo, (kind of a stylized cartoon version of the old “My Master’s Voice” -did they really want to reincarnate that?). Next two pages were photocopy listings of all the programs, Old Radio Shows, Sports, Music (Rock, Classical, 40’s, and of course, Sinatra gets his own channel).
Bob did act, not surprised, but grateful, which worked out fine, since I really gushed grateful, both to gloss over the absent surprise factor, and because I really did want to turn on the radio in the car again.
March 30
Dave informed us he was having trouble getting the version he wanted for us. Apparently, as in almost every electronic device there is always several different types from which to chose, and the older you are the less likely you are to understand the nuances of whatever explanations are available, that is if you can find a salesperson, or a web site, and you are conversant in Digital Speak.
That lets us out entirely, and Dave is fully aware of that. However, I don’t think, when he first thought of this gift for Bob (and me, as it turns out), I doubt very seriously if he anticipated being on call for so many hours for so many days, once our Serius was delivered to us, on:
April 10
We did manage to open the box, but from then on it was phone calls to Dave on the hour, sometimes on the quarter hour, depending on how long it took us to do whatever he told us was the next step, and find that even that was a problem.
Such as: once you have the Serius, you have to have it installed. Dave actually anticipated this, since he had the same problem with his Serius, and although he lives up north, he located several Installers near us, but told Bob he’d have to find the best deal, because the installation charges are not standard. He remembered that he had paid somewhere around $125. So after each interview with each installer Bob had to phone Dave to compare negotiations
April 12
The Serious is now installed. At $175. Another call to Dave, to announce the latest development.
April 13
Eager to find something really interesting on our installed Serius. Nothing works.
I phone Dave on my cell phone. Me: “Were we supposed to push this button or turn that knob?” Dave: (silence) “When did you phone to activate the Serius?”
“Activate”?
April 15
It had been a busy two days, and this was the first chance Bob had to phone to, yes “Activate” our Serius. I heard him go from menu to menu, transfer to transfer, until he actually talked to someone who said , yes he could activate it for us. However, after more conversation, it turns out we have to be in the car. So Bob told him we would phone back in 15 minutes. We phoned from the garage…..no, you have to be in the car outside.
We were already late to yet another doctor’s appointment, so Bob drove off, leaving me to carry on with the Activation Guy, as we’re zooming onto the 405. Not only am I in my Front Seat-Backseat Driver mode, keeping one eye on the five-lane morning traffic, but the other eye cannot possibly see any of the tiny buttons, let alone read the smaller than you know what monitor, which is mounted way over right next to the steering wheel. Bob is driving, not too well, as he’s also keeping one eye –barely – on the road, and the other on what I’m trying to do, and my frantic seems to be catching. Not only Bob, now more erratic than ever, but the poor Activating Guy is beginning to sound a bit rattled, so I rightfully abort the mission, advising the Activating Guy, now definitely as frustrated as we, that we’ll try later.
Of course, we phoned Dave.
April 18
It has taken us this long to gather courage – and the good sense, to stop the car outside in a parking lot, out of the sun, but with enough light to see the tiny buttons and read the monitor. Then we phone Serius Activate once again, and not easily, but eventually, get activated. We phone Dave and he congratulates us.
April 19
We’re back on the 405, traffic is very heavy, and as usual we’re in a bit of a hurry, however, that doesn’t stop us from trying to find something good on Serius. I’m pushing those tiny buttons, which I still can’t really see, and Bob tells me whatever I’m doing is not what I should be doing. I have the manual in one hand, and the list of programs in the other, but all we keep getting is Heavy Metal.
I soon realize that this is not a good time to initiate Serius programming. We stop screaming at each other, manage to find the power button, also teeny, and black like everything else on the box, and turn it off. We wait until we get home to phone Dave.
April 21
I take the plastic off the remote, because Dave says this is what we should be using, At least I can see the power buttons and the channel numbers. Wrong. The remote doesn’t work, no matter what I push. We get to Dave on the golf course. I don’t want to take the blame for his lousy score that day, but he may have another opinion.
April 23
I make Bob promise not to play with Serius while he’s driving. I stay home and worry that he will.
April 24
A few more calls to Dave, but we’re still yelling at each other, Bob and I, not Dave who is either remarkably patient, or is carrying a flask in his pocket these days. By now I’m tempted to turn PBS back on and channel my frustration on to reports of latest House votes on budget cuts knowing there is nothing I can do about it.
April 25
Dave once again coaches us on how to pre-set our favorite programs, even though we still can’t even get any decent music, and haven’t any idea what our favorite programs are.
April 28
Last night I once again picked up the manual, in which by the way, the first 63 pages are instructions on how to install Serius in one’s car, which, of course, we chose not to do, and paid the $175 to have it done by someone else. Only pages 64 –65 contain a brief explanation of the Controls, and pages 67-68, equally brief, cover the Remote. This homework does not at all make me Remote conversant, when today we again park the car, and attempt to program what we hope will be favorite channels. We both try to be polite, and although unspoken, cooperate to push and hold whatever we’re supposed to push and hold, and push and release whatever we’re supposed to push and release, and do therefore, somehow, order the remote to understand that “1” means we want to hear Frank Sinatra, and “2” we’re in the mood for Old Radio Shows, and that was about as far as we got. Dave is very proud of us.
April 30
Emboldened by our success, we now manage to have the ten allotted programs set on Channel A, and five on Channel B. However, we can’t find out how to go from Channel A to Channel B.
We don’t phone Dave. We really feel by now we should be on our own, and if I re-read the manual, surely we’ll be able to figure that out. Meanwhile, we have enjoyed several episodes of “The Green Hornet”, and part of a great Philip Marlow detective story, but we arrived to where we were going before it ended, and now I’ve got to figure out how to find the replay mode. I do know how to change the size of the font on the monitor, although that isn’t really useful because we’re perfectly happy the way it is.
And I’m still trying to find Dr. Laura on one channel or another.
To Be Continued.
It is now June 27th, and I feel compelled to finish this, wishing with all my heart that I could report to Dave that we are happily enjoying our car time with Serius. However, what has happened in the interim is that just when we more or less had some pre-set programming, they, the Serius owners, or managers, or probably some well paid CEO, unilaterally decided to change all the channel numbers. Later we found out they often do this – for what reason we do not yet know.
To conclude, we did finally get a photocopy of the new program numbers, but have not yet been able to re-set them into the A, B, C “banks.” And in trying to do so, we lost whatever we had originally. We still can’t seem to get the remote to work, but will keep consulting the manual, and with Dave’s help…
Be patient, Dr. Laura, I’ll get to you eventually. Hopefully before our year’s subscription expires.
By the way, is the news any better these days?
Cimadb PS: Just wondering if Dave has thought of what he’d like to give Bob for his next birthday.
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