Is Bigger Really Better?

It started with our old TV.

We've had a TV in our room for a few months. It was an extra television from our time in California that we now use to watch movies on the built-in DVD player (We don't have cable upstairs). I don't really want a TV in the bedroom, but since our master bathroom is where we brush-n-bathe the kids, it's convenient to have one within earshot while I'm getting the other ready in the morning. It can be pretty cool to lie in bed watching a movie, too.

Now that Phoebe is taller, she can just reach the buttons on the TV sitting on our dresser. It juts out (since the back is enormous), so those buttons extending over the edge of the dresser are very tempting for her. I'm concerned that the thing will fall over onto her or Emma, so I recently suggested to Doug that we utilize some store credit at Video Only to get a small flat screen for that space.

Making a major purchase is difficult, but with one kid whining to leave and another taking every knee-high item off the shelves, we try to get in and out as soon as possible. But even couples without kids who find themselves going in to a store with a set item in mind may spend an extra 30 minutes negotiating in the aisles. We made it out of the store with a purchase we were both happy with (me: built-in DVD player, him: 19 inches with a wall mount) in just under an hour.

The TV was inoperable right out of the box. Turned it on and nothing. Doug returned it the following weekend while I was out for the day. I arrived home to find it not only mounted to the wall, but larger than the original at 27 inches. As impressed as I was to find my spouse so motivated, I wasn't happy that this model did not include a DVD player.

Doug reasoned that we watch a lot of Netflix Instant movies, so he figured trading size for DVD was a good call. He'd purchased a new cable and already had the laptop hooked up to the TV, which we could also use to play DVDs. My spouse had watched the kids, bought them new shoes for school, exchanged our TV, mounted it to the wall and gotten the necessary cables to make it work. I decided to give it a shot.

As the week went by, I found a few flaws in this arrangement: When our internet connection slowed, the movie did, too. Or stopped completely. When the laptop went to sleep, darkening the screen, the televsion went dark, too. Then one of us had to pop out of bed to tickle the touchpad. The picture on the television was often a mess of pixels because of the information transfer time from the laptop, through the cable, to the large screan display.

I tried to enjoy watching the TV, but I just couldn't. Doug felt awkward about exchanging another TV (plus paying a possible additional price for the DVD player), but we bit the bullet and did it. We had to get a different brand, but Doug got his size and I got my built-in DVD player. Doug hooked it up. We slid in a DVD. Grainy. The people looked sort of 3-D.

Neither of us could say it. We stepped back farther. We squinted. We played animated films, older DVDs, newer DVDs, Netflix Instant. Grainy. 3-D strange. Ironically, this was the first time we completely agreed that the TV had to go. The picture was fine, but we just could not reconcile how strange it looked to us. It was a picture preference, and we were lucky that we felt exactly the same about it.

Doug did not want to go back to Video Only. They'd been nice during each transaction, but their stock was limited and we felt we'd exhausted our efforts there. We considered returning it and keeping the credit until we wanted something else. Or getting something else entirely. Then Doug's parents called saying they needed help installing their cable converter box. Aha!

We gave the TV to Doug's parents. They don't care about the grainy-up-close-3-D-images. Doug installed it for them yesterday and they were thrilled. It felt great to do something for them.

But don't worry about us. We went to Costco-because if we hated any TV there, we could always return it for groceries. Or furniture. Or a playstructure. Or a car. But that wasn't necessary because we found a TV we both really like-with a built-in DVD player that can be wall mounted. All 32 inches of it.