I was given a code red after the 14th visit.  No, it wasn’t for visits to the  local hospital, nor for extrajudicial punishment in the Marine Corps – it was for extraordinary pixelation on my HD TV sets.

I am sure there were times when you pixelated too and as you probably know it’s a lot easier to defibrillate an abnormal heart rhythm to a normal one than to depixelate an HD TV back to a normal picture.

Oh, you should know pixelation is an effect caused by zooming in on a bitmap and so making pixels visible, or by enlarging individual pixel colors in rectangular shapes to the point it distorts the picture and sound.  They say it’s either noise, information or an improper signal that can’t be handled by the HD box.

It all began at the end of the NFL playoffs in February continued through the Super Bowl, the Olympics and the Academy Awards. It went on for two months and – we hope – culminated a few days ago after 16 visits.

Now during this period of time I learned more about cable TV than I ever wanted to know.

At the outset I suggested to the first technician that I thought the problem was outside the house.  My thoughts were not worthy of consideration, so they checked signals and problems inside the house first.

They changed splitters that were not up to date, put amps in and took them out, changed some wires that were not up to date, and the signals fluctuated between good and bad.  Checked outside signals coming into the house – they were variable.

Early on during these ongoing visitations I was told one of my HD boxes was not hooked up properly and I was not getting a high def picture, which meant I was paying for two and getting one for a year.  I have three other TV’s in the house but they were not hooked up to cable boxes and were fine.  One tech told me they were so simple, they could make them work with a coat hanger.

I was told that the line coming off the pole to the house had to be changed.  This tech couldn’t do it – that was another persons’ specialty.

If you deal with Comcast you should know there are Comcast employees and subcontractors in each area. For the most part the Comcast employees do the outside work, the subcontractors do the inside work.

At this point I was dealing with the subcontractors. I had to tell each one – only one was a repeat – what the last one did.  They don’t seem to talk to each other until you are given a code red.  If you have a problem with your cable, ask for a code red at the outset.

I will not bore you with the details of each visit until I got the code red.  I will give you an executive summary.  Splitters, amps, all internal wiring and external wiring coming to and inside the house was replaced along with two brand new HD boxes.  Each time this work was done I suggested that the problem might be outside not inside.  After all of this was completed by the subcontractors they turned  me over to the Comcast employees who told me the problem was outside the house.  Nothing more could be done inside.

During this period, I talked to locals and the home office twice the number of tech visits – it was the home office that finally gave me the code red.

Now they put a box out on the street so they could monitor the pixelation and isolate where it was on the line.  That didn’t seem to work too well because there were too many power surges which resulted in shutting the box off that was monitoring the pixelation.

Now you should know that there was noise on the cable line, information that the HD  boxes could not handle and leakage.

At one point a super duper supervisor arrived on the scene with a device that all the others had, but didn’t seem to use, that would detect leakage.  He even allowed me to experience the screaming noise caused by the leakage.  I suggested Depends might help.   The supervisor didn’t seem to be amused.

I excused myself, for I too was coming to the end of my patience.

I must say, assuming that my problem is resolved, Comcast did its best.  The people were great to deal with, they showed concern and didn’t stop without trying to resolve the problem.

Mike even gave me his cell phone number, and we now talk often.  He thinks the cause was a squirrel eating through the line. Yes, and the home office even took some charges off my bill for the inconvenience.

Pixelation is far more complicated than a heart arrhythmia, something Vice President Cheney has experienced often along with his 5 frequent flier heart attacks.

Perhaps the next time I get a code red because of pixelation, I will call 911.