How do you decorate your living room? Do you use potted plants, or beautiful sculptures? Do you have artwork on the walls and Tiffany lamps in the corners?
We use remotes. TV remotes, DVD remotes, satellite dish remotes, old VCR remotes. The ceiling fan’s remote control, the fireplace’s remote.
We place our remotes on every table and every chair in the room. Aren’t they beautiful, in their multi-colored splendor, in their polished black and shining silver and gold?
Yes, they are so beautiful, we arrange some of these remotes in elegant remote control holders. Who needs flowers in vases when you can have remotes?
Then there are the remote buttons. These are beautiful in themselves, but did you realize they also provide free acupuncture for your fingers? If you step on the remotes, they will also massage your feet. So we leave some remotes on the floor – this way, walking around the living room gives you a free foot massage.
You can also the plainer remotes as paper weights, or temporary book marks, or teething toys for your child or dog.
But with so many uses for remotes, doesn’t it seem completely unoriginal and unattractive to use them as mere controls for your gadgets? Would you use your art objects or paperweights to control your TV or DVD? Of course not.
I am sure the remotes themselves feel this way too. Perhaps they feel it is beneath them to work as mere controls any more. Which is perhaps why, despite the profusion of remotes in the room, we can never find a remote when we need it. No doubt they hide themselves away, under the seat cushions, or in the back of the remote caddy. Or perhaps they just know how to hide in plain sight.
Or is it that they feel the need to live up to their name – is that why they are in the most remote places?
Now we are wondering if we should buy another remote – a universal remote to control all other remotes, a battery-powered version of Tolkien’s One Ring. Nine remotes for mortal gadgets and one remote to rule them all. One remote that we can use as, well, a remote control.
What about the other remotes, then? Perhaps we will let them remain in their vases. We can then have our beautiful remotes and use them too.
Or perhaps you guys have better ideas?
Sujatha
nittin
shyam
Anonymous
lol, ultimately we are being remotely controlled by these remotes too
Same scene here, wait till you have the problem of staring at the Dish Network’s marketing channel coz – yes, you guessed it, coz we’ve lost the remote to change the channels.
I just have one word to say to you, just one word (and it’s not “plastics”): Harmony.
Ok, I am talking about the Harmony universal remote control. I have been using one (the 676 model) for almost 2 years now. All mother remotes are sitting in a back shelf, right next to the audio cassettes. Seems a bit pricey for a mere remote control, but pays for itself in lost aggravation costs in a matter of weeks.
http://www.amazon.com/Logitech-Harmony-670-Universal-Remote/dp/B000IMSK8Y/
On occasion we have also been known to attempt to use the cell phone as a remote control and vice versa.
And ‘hunt the remote’ used to be a favourite family pastime:)
rads: Good point – maybe our remotes do control us
But the marketing channel? Ouch! Why is your remote punishing you like this ? 
BPSK: This post was inspired by (and written during) R’s online search for good deals on a Harmony universal remote
dipali: Cellphone as remote? I can see how that would happen
I have been guilty of pointing the wrong remote at the wrong gadget too – more times than I can remember 
I am old enough to remember the days (years) before the advent of the remote. And I remember our first remote – you could bludgeon someone to death with it, if you were so inclined! Not a pretty sight, certainly not something to be displayed as a living room accessory.
Now, I’m glad I live a life remote from the remote. I’m hopelessly old-fashioned that way.
Kamini.
Funny
Harmony-shmarmony. I spent 10 bucks on a universal remote. No problems at all.
I loved the “Tolkien” take on the remote!! That was super-imaginative!!
hhaah…hilarious..but so true…esp as a teether..you never find it when you want it!..thats the universal truth behind!..and you know what kids know which one works and which doesn’t…so mine always ensure they take only the ones that work and play with them….they use it to hit each other!
Hmmm km kinda stole my thoughts about universal remotes – I don’t need one but have always wondered if they are any good?
Kamini: Oh yes, I remember those remotes too
As a kid I thought bigger remotes were better. I remember being somewhat disappointed the Sony TV had such a small remote
km: We have a $10 remote too..it’s lying in one of those remote vases
rajk: Thanks! I was also very amused when I thought of the comparison (I know, one is not supposed to laugh at one’s own jokes, but..)
Srivalli: Ah, hitting each other. Now that’s one more innovative use for remotes
Szerelem: I don’t know, really. But R likes toys
No doubt, once he buys it, he will leave mundane details like programming it to me 
Quoting Agent Smith from the Matrix, “You move to an area and you multiply…There is another organism on this planet that follows the same pattern. Do you know what it is? A virus. Remote Controllers are a disease, a cancer of this planet.”
I have always maintained that the remotes at your house have a secret union and are decidedly Communist. And when you don’t treat them well by dropping them on the floor or throwing them at your partner/roomie, they stop working to revolt, until you have to compromise, make baby noises, remove their batteries from their behinds, and rub them vigorously between your palms.