Why I hit my TiVo unit with a crowbar this evening...

Ah, the finals of the men's NCAA tournament. The culmination of a couple of weeks of stress, all leading to this evening's game. March madness indeed.

Unfortunately, I had to watch the kids while my wife got beat up at a soccer game. But it's OK - that's why I have TiVo, right? I watched the first half live, then set the machine to record the second half while I put the boys to bed. After everyone was snoring, I flipped it on, started at the second half, and prepared to beg for the possibility that Michigan State could come back.

They actually made progress, although I hear that they lost. Why don't I know for sure? Because some dumb-head setting the TiVo schedule decided that the game would be a 2:30 match, and my machine dutifully kicked out after two and a half hours. Sadly, there was still 4:27 left on the clock.

I've had this happen in the past for football games and other sporting events - and I just don't understand how they could make this mistake. Given that after the game is done we just have local news and other goop, how about we say the game might last 3 hours? How about 10 hours?

This is a case of a massively screwed up value system that places "sort of correct" ahead of "not stupid". To the idiot at TiVo Central that decided a championship basketball game couldn't go over 2:30, I say this:

There is one game like this every year. One game. There are about 40 evening news broadcasts in the Denver market every day. The David Letterman show has been on continuously since the dawn of time, and is shown every day. Next time you need to make a decision about what is likely to bother me, you can fucking assume that it won't be "Oh no, I didn't get to see the Channel 7 newscast this evening! What about that kittie that got caught in the tree!"

I want to see the game. The whole game. As it stands, I feel within my rights to state that TiVo simply doesn't work if you are a sports fan that needs to time-shift your viewing. Until these chuckleheads can figure out relative value among programs, they are simply going to be targets for the nearest piece of iron I can get my hands on.

Idiots.

[ddg]