And Sometimes Extended Warranties Are Worth It!

Being the extraordinarily frugal person that I am, you will understand why I routinely say no to extended warranties for appliances.  These warranties are basically a bet by a company that you will never encounter a problem with their product or you will be too lazy to call and deal with the hassle of enforcing your warranty.  These companies charge a ridiculous amount to extend the basic warranty that comes with the product and they clearly must be making some serious dough from marketing these contracts based on how enthusiastically their sales staff recommend them.

But, about four years ago, when we finally replaced the television that we inherited from my Mom and Dad back in the day when Will Smith was still "fresh," we actually made the decision to buy an extended warranty for our new television.  When I say that we made a "decision" . . . that is not entirely accurate.  It was more like after chasing our two hyperactive preschool children all over Best Buy and enduring fifteen minutes of nonstop squirming and screaming while we waited in line, we acquiesced to the sales associate's tactics.  This twenty-five year old, childless salesman could sense our weakness.  Over-tired parents who are standing in line with their sugared-up children are like shark chum to sales people.  At that point, we would have agreed to just about anything to get out of the store with a functioning t.v.

Now this "new" television was nothing fancy and there certainly wasn't anything flat about it.  It weighed an absolute ton.  It took my husband, myself, and a random sales guy about thirty minutes to lift it out of the store and figure out how to jam it into the front passenger seat of our Passat.  We had to take it out the box and unwrap it so that we could squeeze it in. 

For the next four years, our television performed admirably.  It played host to the occasional red box video, diligently hooked me up with Dr. Derek Shepherd on Thursday nights, and fed my children a constant diet of PBS shows and Caillou videos.  It was also good for a few laughs.  We have a relatively nice house; from the outside and in most rooms, it even looks fairly modern.  Most people seem to like our tan, Pottery Barnish paint and simple Shaker style furniture.  But after people leave the foyer and enter our family room, most people have trouble concealing the smirks that creep across their faces when they eye the giant silver box with rabbit ears attached.  For those of you who have forgotten what "rabbit ears" are, they are a portable antenna that connects to the television set.  I am not about to pay Comcast a preposterous amount of money every month just so that they can feed my television addiction and rot my children's brains in the process.  This house is cable-free, baby!  (Never mind that we have a high speed internet connection and my eight year old son can type the words "Clone Wars" into a keypad faster than you can say cable.)  The point is I have my principles and I stick to them.

Oh sure, there have been times when I have wavered on my no cable stance.  I have to admit I was a tad embarrassed the day that my friend came over for a playdate and wanted to watch an acquaintance of hers that was appearing on Oprah.  She asked me to turn on Oprah and I said:  "Oooookay.  Please stand where you are and try not to move."  She looked at me like I had three heads while I spent the next ten minutes tussling with the rabbit ears and contorting my body into bizarre ballet like poses while I tried to optimize the reception of the t.v.  You see sometimes tin foil can enhance your reception, but when you don't want to head to the drawer for Reynold's wrap, sometimes your body can act like an extension of the antenna and improve reception.  Needless to say, we didn't get Oprah in very well that day because my friend wasn't really interested in standing still like a statue and squinting to make out Oprah's face through the fuzz on the t.v.

Well it turns out . . . that whole Oprah fiasco will probably never happen again.  A few weeks ago, our t.v. started making this weird high-pitched noise from time to time.  And then it refused to show my husband's video games.  That was all it took to prod him into action.  He was on the phone with Best Buy.  And guess what?  They couldn't fix our t.v. because they don't make televisions like that anymore.  But they happily agreed to give my husband full credit for the original purchase price.  Yesterday, my husband cruised into Best Buy with our old t.v. and a $100 gift certificate that he had won in a raffle.  He emerged with a brand spanking new television and a new digital receiver (which is really nothing more than another set of "rabbit ears," but it looks much cooler than our old antenna).  It only cost him eleven bucks to get a 32" LCD HDTV!!!!  He went for the 720 pixel  instead of the 1080 after discussing the nuances with a salesman.  The sales guy admitted that unless you were going to spring for HD cable, it makes no sense to get the finer resolution.  HD cable?  Puhhhlleeese.  We aren't even springing for basic.  But I have to admit, as we nestled into the couch last night and flipped on the new t.v., we were astounded by the unbelievable picture quality.  We even stayed in front of the t.v. and watched the Amazing Race, which we never do.  Sometimes technology can be a beautiful thing and extended warranties can be too!