Sometimes, Life Is Complicated.

There was nothing wrong with the original idea. The whole plan seemed innocent enough. Angel and I thought we'd introduce my grandpa to the  Sherlock tv series, because he likes mystery/crime dramas. We told him that it was just the kind of show he'd like, we told him we had it available for free on our Netflix account, that we could hook up a laptop to the tv and watch a couple episodes together.

The only problem was that we needed a cord of some sort to connect the computer to the television. Angel knew what the cord looked like, and Grandpa said, "No problem, I have a box of 100 different kinds of cables, there must be at least one of the kind you're looking for."

Famous last words.

(My grandpa, praying at my wedding. It's really hard to find pictures of that man.)

You've guessed it, there was no cable of the right kind in Grandpa's cable box. "Well, how much is the cable that I need?" he asked. Angel guessed about $10-$12. "Head out to Radio Shack and buy it!" Grandpa ordered.

By now he seemed pretty determined to watch his new show. Angel and Isaac, my brother, went out to the store, Grandpa and I expected them to be back in 20 minutes with a cord. They were back in 20 minutes, no cord.

At this point, I had given up all hope of watching Sherlock. Grandpa, however, had not. He asked Angel, "Is the only reason that you can't find the right cord because my television is too old? I got it as a birthday present ten years ago. Could a new television work with this "Netflix" you keep talking about?"

Angel and Isaac talked to him for a while, using strange vocabulary such as "HDMI" and "Smart TV."

Grandpa said, "Well, do either of you know enough about TVs that if I  went out and bought one right now, you could pick out a good one for me?"

Angel and Isaac immediately started backpedaling. No, they haven't been reading Consumer's Reports, no, they don't know the best tv models available at the moment. If Grandpa wants to buy a tv, he has to call our uncle, he'll know how to get a good deal on a good tv.

Grandpa is about to call our uncle and tell him it's time to go television shopping, when I have a great idea! "Hey, let's just call the video rental place and see if they have Sherlock."

I thought it seemed much more sensible to spent $5 renting two seasons of Sherlock than to go out and buy a several hundred dollar tv in order to watch Sherlock on Netflix for free. Angel found the phonebook, Grandpa found the number, Angel called, and nope, no Sherlock.

Since we were thwarted by the video rental store's poor stock decisions, Grandpa called my uncle and said he wanted to go on a tv shopping outing. This was when my uncle pointed out that it was already after 6 p.m. on a Sunday evening and all of the television stores would be closed.

Isaac suggested to Grandpa that maybe, if we all went into the basement, where it is quiet and dark, we could all watch Sherlock on the laptop screen. Yeah, it was small, and it wouldn't be as nice as watching it on tv, but at least this whole venture would not end in total disappointment. Grandpa agreed.

We all got settled downstairs, started the show...and quickly realized that the combination of British accents and the less-than-powerful speakers of my brother's laptop meant that we couldn't understand a word. "No problem!" my brother said, "I'll go get a set of speakers out of storage, it'll only take me two minutes!"

He got the speakers, brought them into the basement, started setting them up, and we were finally ready to begin!

Only...a key cord to connect the speakers to the laptop was missing. It hadn't been stored with the speakers, where it was supposed to be. Angel and Isaac went back to Grandpa's box of random cords and cables--the very place where this whole fiasco began, and found the cord.

Could this process have been any more complicated? Even after the show started, I felt like I was waiting for the internet to randomly disconnect, or for Netflix to claim that Angel's credit card had expired and they needed a new card for payment before we could proceed. But there were no further complications.

Sherlock better have been worth it. In my opinion, it was.

Have you watched this show that caused my Sunday afternoon to be so complicated? I hear a rumor the next season will be available on PBS in late January...I'm waiting impatiently...

P.S. The role I played in this persistent quest to watch this show may be made somewhat more apparent if you knew that I took a college class on Sherlock Holmes (perks of a liberal arts school)...and wrote an essay on the relationship between Holmes and Watson (found here)