I've corrupted the boy, no doubt about it. He was living a nice, simple, uncomplicated life in China, and I had to go and bring him to the high-tech West where machines throw our lives into turmoil.
I came home from school late last night to find Charlie still up (no biggie, it's summer) and frantic to show me the remote to our videophone. It looked like it had been used for target practice or something--little pieces of it were gathered up and stuffed into a ziplock baggie. Closer examination revealed bite marks. Charlie caught one of the dogs chewing it up. Greyhound jaws can bite at 55 pounds per square inch. It looked sad. And when I looked at the TV that displays the videophone, there is a message bouncing across the screen that says "2 missed calls." Charlie, with a look of extreme concern on his face, is pushing buttons on what is left of the remote, showing me that it won't answer the videophone or bring up the menu.
A lot of machines have buttons on them and can be worked manually if you lose the remote. Not so the videophone. It is a very simple and sleek-looking machine, and the only button I can find is on/off. No remote, no videophone. It's that simple.
This would just ruin Charlie's day, not to be able to use the VP. It's amazing how quickly he has become accustomed to our high-tech world. He spends a lot of time chatting with his friends on the phone, and now he is tutoring someone by phone, so he really is dependent on it for communication.
After sending him to bed and saying a quick prayer, I decided to go to the company's website and see what I could find. Nowhere did I see anything about replacement remotes, but they did have a tech support team. Thank goodness they had e-mail support, because the primary way to reach them is by videophone. (Okay, follow me here--if you need tech support for your videophone, how do you contact them by videophone?) I dashed off an e-mail to tech support.
Then I started thinking--I have the e-mail address for the man who came out and installed the VP and taught us to use it. Maybe he would have spares he could sell? So I dashed him off an e-mail, too.
Turns out, both got back to me. (What a great customer service company!) Tech support is mailing me one, but the guy from training says he has tons of 'em, they're free, and since he works near my house, he will drop one off to Charlie on his lunch break.
Now that's service!
If only I could videophone Charlie and tell him the news....
Bad dog!
I came home from school late last night to find Charlie still up (no biggie, it's summer) and frantic to show me the remote to our videophone. It looked like it had been used for target practice or something--little pieces of it were gathered up and stuffed into a ziplock baggie. Closer examination revealed bite marks. Charlie caught one of the dogs chewing it up. Greyhound jaws can bite at 55 pounds per square inch. It looked sad. And when I looked at the TV that displays the videophone, there is a message bouncing across the screen that says "2 missed calls." Charlie, with a look of extreme concern on his face, is pushing buttons on what is left of the remote, showing me that it won't answer the videophone or bring up the menu.
A lot of machines have buttons on them and can be worked manually if you lose the remote. Not so the videophone. It is a very simple and sleek-looking machine, and the only button I can find is on/off. No remote, no videophone. It's that simple.
This would just ruin Charlie's day, not to be able to use the VP. It's amazing how quickly he has become accustomed to our high-tech world. He spends a lot of time chatting with his friends on the phone, and now he is tutoring someone by phone, so he really is dependent on it for communication.
After sending him to bed and saying a quick prayer, I decided to go to the company's website and see what I could find. Nowhere did I see anything about replacement remotes, but they did have a tech support team. Thank goodness they had e-mail support, because the primary way to reach them is by videophone. (Okay, follow me here--if you need tech support for your videophone, how do you contact them by videophone?) I dashed off an e-mail to tech support.
Then I started thinking--I have the e-mail address for the man who came out and installed the VP and taught us to use it. Maybe he would have spares he could sell? So I dashed him off an e-mail, too.
Turns out, both got back to me. (What a great customer service company!) Tech support is mailing me one, but the guy from training says he has tons of 'em, they're free, and since he works near my house, he will drop one off to Charlie on his lunch break.
Now that's service!
If only I could videophone Charlie and tell him the news....
Bad dog!
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