The other day, for instance, I wanted to watch the 6:30 news. Fortunately, my wife had taken notes from the mob of technicians and left an illustrated copy on the kitchen table.

— “Tap power (she drew a picture depicting the little red semi-circle that was on the remote) and wait three seconds.”

— “Right-click (picture of something that looked like a bagel) and scroll across the bottom of the screen.”

— “Center-click (picture of something that looked like a fried egg) and scroll sideways to icon you want.”

— “Channel screen will come up. Swipe to channel you want.”

So I tapped the red button and waited three seconds. Right-clicked the bagel. Scrolled across the bottom of the screen and center-clicked the fried egg.

A note appeared on the screen saying it was loading data. Then another note appeared saying it was loading my TV. Followed by another note telling me it was checking my subscription, which I assume meant it wanted to make sure we didn’t owe them more money. Then one more note saying it was preparing my cable company experience, although by that time I was pretty fed up with my cable company experience.

Eventually, I’m confident I’ll get it all figured out and be able to watch the 6:30 news every evening. As long as I start pushing buttons at 5:45.

Contact this columnist at dlstew_2000@yahoo.com.