How Mounting a Television on my Wall Turned into a Failure

I recently purchased a television — a little bit impulsively. It was on clearance.

I bought it online, sight unseen. I don’t feel particularly bad about it. I mean, it’s a 49-inch, name brand, web-enabled flat screen, with Chromecast built in, for $249. Two days later, it was sitting in my bedroom.

I also bought a wall mount for said TV, which ended up being $12 or $14 not particularly well spent. On Saturday afternoon — armed with a drill, a marker, an electric screwdriver and a large bag of hardware that came with the television — I set about hanging this beautiful, 50-pound monstrosity on my bedroom wall. Alone.

You probably see where this is going. While I managed, all by myself, to get it mounted to the wall, no one looking at the fruits of my labor would mistake it for being done well. Part of the problem is the plaster-covered adobe walls in my 100-year-old home. It’s almost as though they weren’t designed to support the weight of my new purchase, even when anchored with six-inch screws.

I set out to mount a 49” television on my wall. No one would mistake it for a success.

I am prepared to take some responsibility, however; that is, I’m sure there is a way to successfully mount that TV on that bedroom wall. But the way I did it could only be described as an abject failure. (Not an unmitigated disaster. That would have been the proper term if my brand-new television was smashed into smithereens in a pile on my bedroom floor.)

In the end, I took the television off my wall and set it atop a chest of drawers, which proved to be a perfectly suitable second choice. I’m not sure that’s where it will stay forever, but I’m fine with it being there until I can muster the confidence to take another stab at Operation Wall-Mount.

That being said, I woke up Sunday morning surprisingly sore. (It wasn’t until much later that I realized that television fiasco might be to blame.) But let’s just say that I was happy to have an enormous, new TV in my bedroom and subscriptions to Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, Hulu and Mubi.

What resulted may go down in history as the laziest Sunday in the history of October — which, in my opinion, is one of the best months for lazy days. There is something about the cooler days, diminishing sunlight and changing leaves that makes staying inside with a bowl of soup, a grilled cheese sandwich and a good book just about perfect.

Except, in my case, holding up the book proved to be very uncomfortable. So, I watched two or three movies and documentaries on Mubi, before turning my attention to crime documentaries on Amazon Prime Video.

All told, I probably spent about 19 hours in bed, without regret.

I think that sometimes it’s good to slow down and recharge, and to enjoy a day of self-prescribed bed rest. And a nice fall weekend is just about perfect for it.

— Originally Published in the Las Cruces Sun-News, 10/25/18