Riddle me this- why do hotels spend thousands of dollars putting flat screens in every room and then give you the shittiest remote control known to man? Is there some law that states that hotel remotes must be clunky, unreliable, and non-functioning?
This is another part in the never-ending series known as “There really is nothing too small or inconsequential for John Cole to bitch about.”
freelancer
Also, Green Balloons. Every thread today has been exhausting and disappointing. No more politics. Not today.
So… Georgia Tech is making it interesting.
AMC has the best shows currently still airing on TV.
Like Mad Men.
Love The Walking Dead
LOVE Breaking Bad.
Discuss.
kommrade reproductive vigor
I’m so not looking forward to the post about your dick.
Anne Laurie
I think the assumption is that guests will break/steal/lose a predictable percentage of the remotes, so the hotels go for cheap “disposables”. Still annoying, of course. It’s not like they couldn’t just charge the guests’ credit cards for missing remotes.
Anne Laurie
@freelancer:
__
Sooki the boxer puppy sticks her tongue out at you!
pjcamp
So you won’t steal it.
Duh.
stuckinred
Georgia Tech ties it up with 2 minutes to go. Hokies return it 90 yards to take the lead again!!!!!!!!
arguingwithsignposts
And also, wtf do hotels with these large flat screen TVs and shitty remotes give you 13 fucking channels to choose from, other than to get you to experience their PPV offerings.
Fuck that, the world has more than 13 channels, HiltonSheratonHolidayInnRamadaWhatever!
freelancer
@Anne Laurie:
I think I was in a meeting for that thread.
Cat Lady
Wake Up Everybody. Can’t do it alone. Need some help, yeah. Everybody, we need each other.
@freelancer:
I’m very curious about where The Walking Dead is going to go. It feels very very politically contemporary.
Left Coast Tom
If you try to steal the TV they’ll probably notice. If you try to steal the remote they probably won’t.
Why you’d steal a remote when it’s not universal and you don’t own the relevant TV must remain a mystery.
stuckinred
@freelancer: At 5:45 am? The gumbo thread was fun too!
Bnut
Any Top Gear fans out there? What do we think of the new American series? I’m going to give it a few episodes (esp. because one of the hosts was awesome in Rescue Me and I’ve met him and he KNOWS cars). I realize it won’t have the same wit and charm as the British series, but let’s remember, it’s not replacing the BBC hit, it’s just an AMERICAN version.
mai naem
Was listening to CSPAN this morning. Guess Issa is asking the WH not to shred any documents so that they can have documentary evidence for an invesigation. Investigation s of what? Hell, who knows? I am guessing Orly Titz is going to finally get her investigation about whether Obama is the anti-christ kenyan muslim latte sipping organic arugula chomping french mustard eating terrahrist! OMG what are we going to do??? Will Mike Isikoff be able to hold off the story about whether the stain on Obama’s shirt is French Muslim mustard or good old American mustard? Will Sally Quinn’s neigbors ever recover from Michelle Obama tearing up the WH lawn and turning into a defeat garden with collards??
arguingwithsignposts
@Bnut:
Which means it will likely be shit. Sorry, but TG is one show I don’t know how they can transport across the pond.
I will probably watch it a couple of times, but I’m prepared for disappointment.
Bnut
@kommrade reproductive vigor: What about the part where he comments on the totally irrelevant thing?
Tom Betz
Don’t forget, that hotel remote control has more disease germs on it than Rosie’s ass.
Bnut
Because the average person who rents a hotel room is middle aged, and they grew up in the age of the Dewey decimal system and microfiche. They need a simple remote so they don’t get lost. The flat screens are because the women want to see Glenn Beck in super high def (for their dreams later), and the men want to see the Glenn Beck in super high def (for their dreams later).
freelancer
@arguingwithsignposts:
I’d be in favor of a couple of blue state motorheads doing something like this all through the Deep South.
Jay in Oregon
Regarding your tweet about Sarah Palin’s reality show, John:
I don’t understand why we don’t just give her what she says she wants and leave her the fuck alone. She can spend all day out in the Alaskan wilderness shooting wolves or dressing caribou or needlepoint or whatever.
(Yeah, yeah, I know, attention whore is just advertising herself, but I’d love to see the American people call her bluff.)
stuckinred
HOKIES 7 Straight!!!!!
arguingwithsignposts
@freelancer:
Just rewatched that episode the other night on Netflix instant. Classic. possibly the most memorable moments I’ve seen in my (admittedly short) TG watching career.
MattR
John – It really is unbelievable. I have stayed at the same hotel in Toronto 5 or 6 times this past year. Sometimes I’ve had a suite with two TV’s and two remote controls. Every single one of those remote controls had at least one button that didn’t work or had to be pressed in a special way to get it to work. If they are gonna use such cheap remotes, at least replace them every couple weeks.
Guster
Why did Life go off the air?
That’s what I wanna know.
Lolis
I am a fan of the show Nikita. Yeah, I know it is on the CW. Don’t judge. Some of us don’t have cable and like it that way.
Bnut
@arguingwithsignposts: If I had to say what will kill it, it’s that its on a network that gets its ad revenue from what I can only guess will be car companies. The British TG on the BBC2 doesn’t have to worry about pandering to there $$$ masters.
poicephalus
aka Andy Rooney We Found Your Replacement.
Need an agent?
C
Jay in Oregon
@Cat Lady:
If you want to know, you can find out; it’s a comic that’s been running for about 8 years now.
http://www.amazon.com/Walking-Dead-Compendium-One/dp/1607060760/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1288925840&sr=8-1
The writer is one of the producers, so I’m curious to see how faithful they will be to the comic storyline.
I will warn you; don’t get TOO attached to specific characters, because a lot of bad crap happens to them in the comic…
Zu8zu's Petals
Well thanks to Colbert’s Rally to Keep Fear Alive, we also know that hotel remotes are not just unsanitary but truly disgusting.
arguingwithsignposts
@Bnut:
Very good point.
Bnut
@freelancer: The South, the South…Christian, short hair, don’t like Communists…
jake
Just read on article on Yahoo about Bill O’Reilly and Bernie Goldberg criticizing MSNBC for having liberals — Olberman, Maddow, Matthews, Lawrence O’Donnell, Eugene Robinson and Schultz — provide election night commentary. Goldberg gave kuddos to Fox and CNN for their nonpartisan coverage.
Where does one even begin. The Republican, Saudi partly owned, Fox News criticizing MSNBC for being partisan. And, this is covered by another on-line media service. What exactly is the story or rather should be the story? That Fox has been partisan throughout this entire election season. Or that Fox has balls for criticizing MSNBC. No, the story is that somehow MSNBC is partisan on election night.
If MSNBC tries to justify their coverage I will scream. GO ON THE ATTACK. It is time. It is beyond time. Pin the Republicans and their complicit media to the wall. Reduce the deficit — fine, what will you cut? Social Security? Medicare? Defense Spending? Repeal the Health Care bill? Fine. How will you explain to families that pre-existing conditions now matter again. GO ON THE ATTACK. Hate Muslims? Then why do the Saudis have a stake in the parent company of Fox News?
gbear
I don’t care about the TVs but what bugs me about motel rooms is the damned noisy little refrigerators rattling away all night. Last time I stayed in a motel I got the efficiency room because it didn’t have a refrigerator. If I can find a way to unplug it, I do.
Also too, I’m glad I wasn’t around for the DADT thread.
TooManyJens
Have you guys been following the Cooks Source magazine clusterfuck? It’s been making my day. My armchair psychologist theory is that a lot of people are taking this opportunity to take down a smug, arrogant fraudster in a way that they couldn’t do to all the smug, arrogant fraudsters who got elected on Tuesday.
http://illadore.livejournal.com/30674.html
Montysano
I went to Montgomery, AL today to meet with the design team and financial backers for a new community theatre. My contact person turned out to be Morris Dees of the Southern Poverty Law Center. He’s on the board of directors for this venture.
I was dying to talk politics with him, but he wanted to talk theatre, and since that’s why I was there, that’s what we did. But to do what he does, in a place like Montgomery….. there have to be some great stories.
MK
Don’t blame the hotels. Blame Lodgenet, the providers of connectivity and entertainment solutions for the hospitality industry. Although the argument could be made that the hotels accept the solutions (including the remote) so they share some of the blame.
On a different note, what channel does the American version of Top Gear come on? Yes, yes, I could and should use Google but what the heck.
mai naem
Have a friend who owns a major chain “inn” She has stories which make retail sound like a piece of cake. They’ve had light sconces ripped off from the rooms. Also ripped off are the normal stuff – pillows, sheets, towels, bedspreads, microwaves. Also too the money from the Coke machine after first killing the surveillance camera aimed at the Coke machine. They’ve also had attempted suicides, suicides and natural deaths.. Polygamous families stay at the place. There’s also the lawyer who let her 2 yr old kid run around in the breakfast room like a madman which resulted in the kid tripping on the tile floor which ofcourse meant that the hotel had to comp the room etc. after being threatened by the woman with a major lawsuit because OMG it’s somebody else’s responsibility to make sure your brat doesn’t run and trip. Oh, the remote – they get ripped off so they get cheap remotes.
arguingwithsignposts
@MK:
Fixed that for ya.
Cat Lady
@Jay in Oregon:
Thanks. This is a show I’m going to watch intently with disinterest, assuming it’s metaphorical. I like that it doesn’t use music to set the mood, and it’s filmed almost documentarily. I’m really curious to see where it wants to take me.
Jay in Oregon
@Cat Lady:
The writer of The Walking Dead referred to is as “The zombie movie that never ends.” :)
wasabi gasp
Rather than cheap remote control, think hi-tech anal plug. Someone before you probably has.
Just Some Fuckhead
I take my own remote on trips. Even so, I generally wind up watching my slingbox at home on my laptop. Hotels usually have a really shitty selection of channels arranged in the most non-intuitive fashion.
Mako
You are in Orlando? Hotel pillow? heh, I probably know someone who rubbed their crotch all over your pillow. Not that it’s personal. just what we do. Tip your maid first.
Rex
Sorry that your date didn’t go better.
catclub
@mai naem:
I think you explained why the radio is so crappy, also.
Which is much more of a pain to me than a crappy remote for the 13 channels available on the TV.
I was overjoyed at one place that had a quality radio with a CD player. It was in Massachusetts – see the Mass liberals thread.
Tom Betz
@wasabi gasp: FTW!
jimBOB
{geek} What gets me is when they lay out the cash for these widescreen hi-def LCD’s, and then pipe in noisy analog 4×3 signal. These screens are capable of showing really nice HD widescreen images, but instead we get stretched, snowy garbage SD. {/geek}
Whenever I have to deal with this (thankfully not often) it reminds me of why I hate cable companies so much. Lots of money for least-common-denominator content, the large majority of which you couldn’t pay me to watch. Netflix can’t kill these bastards off fast enough.
Cat Lady
@Jay in Oregon:
Heh.
I’ll take zombies over vampires every day. That’s just how I roll.
kommrade reproductive vigor
And then there are booby trap hotels. Where there’s all these nice snacks scattered about the room and a teeny tiny card that informs you how much you’ll get charged if you touch any of it.
@mai naem: That sounds like sheer hell. Seriously, anyone who works in a hotel and doesn’t go Norman Bates by day 2 deserves a medal.
Larkspur
Oh dear god, you are all completely insane and gross, and sweet jeebus I am one of you.
Teddy Salad
This morning I received my Pets of Balloon Juice Calendar: a soothing tonic for the Election Day mugging. That’s rescue cat Emma with the Tunch mug in February. My cat has been published! Great cause, John, and wonderful execution, Laura! Good looking beasts.
Aaron S. Veenstra
I wish hotels did more to install and promote refrigerators and microwaves. I have a flatscreen TV at home, and it’s bigger the one in any hotel room I’m likely stay in. Also, that hotel flatscreen cannot keep beverages cold or cook microwave popcorn.
Mako
@Just Some Fuckhead:
meh
Just Some Fuckhead
@Aaron S. Veenstra: You need to look at “extended stay” hotels. Same rates, or better, and all the amenities. Hilton’s Homewood Suites brand even has a small free dinner in the evening. In fact, now that I think about it, we stayed at the one in Lake Mary last time I was down in the Orlando area.
PaulW
Television remotes break easily and often in hotels. You’re probably using a ninth-generation replacement remote from Wal-Mart they bought in bulk three weeks ago. Stop griping about the tv and start griping about how short the bathtubs are!
Yutsano
Oh frabjous day! Dino may finally fucking be DONE!!
You Don't Say
A childhood friend had a bit part on The Office tonight! I haven’t seen her in 40 years but I’d recognize her anywhere.
West of the Cascades
Jon Stewart told me at his Rally that remote controls give you AIDS. Stop bitching and stand up and walk over and turn the channel.
Gian
was there a problem getting the program the brazillian lady wanted?
ricky
I am sure the Libertarians are developing a ground program to win you over with a remote solution as we speak.
Quicksand
@jimBOB:
Fuck yes. 4:3 content stretched to fit a 16:9 screen is like a hotel TV specialty, and it makes me want to break things.
Roger Moore
@John Cole:
Aren’t you supposed to be making discoveries about the hotel’s intimacy kit tonight, not about the remote control? Your loyal minions are wondering WTF the problem is.
meander
On the other hand, these new TVs are more likely to have an easily accessible video input line for your computer’s output, so conceivably you could send Netflix streaming or Hulu or whatever to the television. You’d need the right cable to make this happen, and if I was a frequent traveler I’d probably invest in one.
This assumes, of course, that you can switch the input source on the TV, a function that is almost certainly not going to be on the LodgeNet remote. But might it be on the TV itself? In the last hotel I stayed in (Four Points in Kearny Mesa, San Diego), the TV had a “source” button on the front next to the channel and volume buttons.
The failure to subscribe to HD channels is quite maddening, as @jimBOB and @Quicksand noted.
Basilisc
Related question: why do hotels spend $$$ on having one or more multifunction telephones in every room, then charge such an outrageous amount for outside calls that people just sit on the bed and use their cellphones? This has been the case for many, many years, of course, to the extent that no one even thinks about making an outside call from their room any more. But it bothers me.
DPirate
For the same reason they attach cables to them so you cannot use them remotely. People steal them, step on them, flush them down the toilet…
Mako
@meander:
dear god you sound lonelier than the John Cole dude
Mako
@Mako:
Note to self-
“On the other hand, these new TVs are more likely to have an easily accessible video input line for your computer’s output, so conceivably you could send Netflix streaming or Hulu or whatever to the television. You’d need the right cable to make this happen, and if I was a frequent traveler I’d probably invest in one.
This assumes, of course, that you can switch the input source on the TV, a function that is almost certainly not going to be on the LodgeNet remote. But might it be on the TV itself? In the last hotel I stayed in (Four Points in Kearny Mesa, San Diego), the TV had a “source” button on the front next to the channel and volume buttons.
The failure to subscribe to HD channels is quite maddening, as @jimBOB and @Quicksand noted”
tesslibrarian
@Bnut: Um, pretty sure evidence that middle-aged technophobes are idiots is not “they only know how to use the public library.”
First of all, THEY DON’T. Even the ones who bother to come in, do NOT know how to use Dewey. Our policy is to walk someone to the book they need, not just give them the call #, because those numbers mean zilch to them, and they may not be able to remember that 975.502 after 975.12.
Second, microfilm and microfiche now require computer competency to get a usable image, and many machines assume you’ll be creating digital ones only, not print-outs. Every time someone is looking for an obituary from 1872, I have to teach them how to use software.
And these are the GOOD ones! The people who are actually coming to the library to find things or learn, or at least read something!
eta: after/before–jeez. I need to finish my tea before typing…
CynDee
@John Cole:
1. When you bitch, there’s usually a good reason.
2. You’re cute when you’re bitching.
3. Certain bitching really needs doing.
4. Why shouldn’t you be able to bitch? Especially on your very own blog.
el_nino
I believe the companies that sell the hotels pay-per-view used to also give them the TVs for free, with the understanding that the hotels would include adult PPV options, which would easily earn back the cost of the TVs, and then generate a nice profit stream for the providers. The invisible hand of the market apparently keeps itself busy when staying alone in hotels.
JonBoy
This is just proof of the theory of evolution. Or a corollary or something. Let’s just call it the theory of hotel evolution.
It’s the same reason hotel artwork is so crappy and the towels are no good. It isn’t because that’s what the hotels started with; it’s just that all the good remotes, the soft towels, and the good artwork “evolved” into somebody’s living room.
Michael
That remote needs to be handled by everyone that rents that room including people who don’t stop to think that destroying hotel property, while immediately gratifying, raises room costs and frustrates the people that rent the room after them.
Of course, the odds of someone renting a room in America that can’t see past their own tiny little world is slim. A real white elephant, if you will.
Greg
The other thing about these stupid hotel remotes: they almost never have a “jump”/”back” button, one of the most basic and useful buttons on a remote. Drives me nuts…
ks
I’ll go one better & bitch about something even smaller–the hotel shampoo & conditioner bottles. I don’t care that they’re small, but that they are so hard to get anything out of. I doubt that they care if I steal it, because they only hold maybe 2-3 days worth. But I can only get about half of the stuff out of the bottle–what a waste!