I know nothing about cable TV

I was recently asked by leadership at my church to help a couple with their finances. I called them and scheduled a time to stop by. I knew the couple well and had visited with them in their home many times before, though it had been a while since I'd last visited. They asked what they needed to have at the ready for our discussion and seemed willing and almost excited to get things on track. I've found that to be a good sign. When I'm asked by a third party to help someone with their finances they often are not as excited which leads to no real progress.

I arrived at the appointed hour. Since COVID-19 virus is still an issue and this couple had some risk factors I made sure I had my mask on before approaching the door. I knocked on the door and the husband greeted me and quickly ushered me back to where his wife was waiting. She is not as mobile and is usually positioned in front of the TV. 

The first thing she said was, "I got a new TV with Roku and now my cable TV doesn't always show up." This was not too unusual as when I visited with them before I would often help them with technical issues around the house. She showed me how the Roku internet TV channels worked fine but when she switched the TV to cable it showed "no signal." I examined the cables. They looked fine. There was an assortment of unfamiliar boxes: Tivo, cable box, internet router. The Tivo box had a red and orange light lit up. That seemed strange. I tried restarting it to no avail.  My diagnosis was that the Tivo box was dead. However, I noted that I didn’t know much about these kind of devices and had no idea what to do next. 

The couple responded with a bit of shock, and then came a knock at the door. The husband left and returned accompanied by the cable repair man. That’s when it dawned on me. With my mask on and them expecting the cable repair guy, they thought I was the cable repair guy. 

After the repairman fixed their issue I commented on the mistaken identity. We had a good laugh and then were able to put together a plan to get them on track with their finances.