DVR Chronicles

“What I need is something that actually tells me how a DVR works,” I cried.
“Well, how about the instruction manual for our combination DVR/VCR?” my wife said.
“Sure,” I thought. “‘Install DVR in receiver-slot, then program machine to record on DVR.’
That’s not telling me how a DVR works.”
I guess I’ll hafta figure it out the same way I figured out computers at the Mighty Mezz; the old “try this and see what happens” method.
With heavy observation to make sense of what is actually happening.
“Just insert disc and shaddup. Don’t think, just do.”
But if I don’t know what’s happening it won’t make any sense.
I won’t be able to wrastle it into submission if I don’t understand what’s going on.
We have switched from recording our news on a VHS cassette to a DVR.
The news is the only TV we watch. We record it so we can view it later while we eat supper.
I have deduced a DVR is just a storage medium. And unlike VHS tape does not store information like on a vinyl record.
I surmised this seeing it couldn’t be rewound.
Nothing was happening.
Apparently all the information on a DVR (or DVD) gets read into computer memory somewhere, and that’s what plays.
At this point the young elitist techno-mavens appear to tell me I’m stupid and technically challenged. —Also an old fogey.
I go my own way, oblivious to the judgments of others.
And that includes making sense of technology.
I’ve done it hundreds of times.
The other day I noticed our machine was “making a menu.”
Hmmmmmnnnnnn.........
All my train DVDs have menus. Insert the DVD, and the menu displays.
I insert my news DVR I just recorded and no menu.
Where is that? It’s playing yesterday’s news.
Perhaps there’s a menu-button on the remote.
There is; “Disc menu/List.”
I hit that, and VIOLA, the menu displays.
Two recorded news segments are on there, yesterday and today.
I hit “today” and “play” that.
Today’s news begins.
While in there I notice a “delete” for each segment.
The DVR will only swallow two hours, five minutes; each news segment is 62 minutes.
So I only have a minute left. It wouldn’t have recorded any future news; only a minute thereof.
So I deleted the two earlier news segments.
Back to two hours five minutes free.
This is not like my VHS tape, where I rewound, and it recorded over yesterday’s news.
I also used to fast-forward the news ads recorded on the VHS. (Like the Cialis® ads —ever wonder if there’s any water in them bathtubs?)
That’s not how it works on a DVR.
Fast-forward is throwing short clips at you. The sound gets fast-forwarded too, but as clips of the regular sound at doubled speed it’s still quite discernible.
The fast-forwarded video is also laughable.
We were watching the beginning of our recording of the news, fast-forwarding the conclusion of a horse-race.
Them horses were boomin’-and-zoomin’. Looked just like Silver in the Lone Ranger.
I decided it made more sense to just fast-forward the entire news recording.
It was still discernible, and we had more time to walk our dog.

• The “Mighty Mezz” is the Canandaigua Daily-Messenger newspaper, from where I retired over four years ago. Best job I ever had. (“Canandaigua” [“cannon-DAY-gwuh”] is a small city nearby where we live in Western NY. The city is also within a rural town called “Canandaigua.” The name is Indian, and means “Chosen Spot.” —It’s about 15 miles away.)
• RE: “Train DVDs........” —I’m a railfan, and have been since I was a child. I have a large collection of railfan railroad videos.
• “The Lone Ranger” was a TV program I watched in the early ‘50s; his horse’s name was “Silver” (all white). At full gallop they were always speeded up.
• Our current dog is “Scarlett;” a rescue Irish-Setter. She’s five, and is our sixth Irish-Setter. (A “rescue Irish Setter” is an Irish Setter rescued from a bad home; e.g. abusive or a puppy-mill. By getting a rescue-dog, we avoid puppydom, but the dog is often messed up. —Scarlett isn't too bad.)