Build a better mousetrap...

Turn Them Off. Turn Them All Off. The subversive joys of TV-B-Gone.:

Mitch's invention is called TV-B-Gone. He carries one on his keychain, as, God willing, you will someday carry one on yours. It fits snugly in the palm, a near-weightless lump of black plastic. Its shape vaguely suggests the Batman logo. A tiny diode rests on the very tip of Batman's head, between his pointy bat ears. Press a button and from this diode a beam of invisible light escapes that can turn off any television--any television--within a radius of 45 feet.

Yes, yes, yes: Imagine the possibilities. You sit in a doctor's waiting room, casting your mind forward to the grisly procedures he has in store for you (you can almost hear the snap of the rubber gloves) and hung high above you in a corner near the ceiling, well out of reach, Maury Povich is interviewing an adulteress, her daughter, and her daughter's transgendered lover, as the studio audience whoops and yelps and stomps its hairy feet. You reach in your pocket and withdraw your key chain. You tilt Batman's head toward the screen: TV-B-Gone! And it's gone!

Or the airline has delayed your flight, again, and all you want is to go home, and as you pace the soulless terminal from one end to the other the voice of Wolf Blitzer trails you like a police siren, roaring out from the CNN television monitors which have been spaced every 10 yards, so you're never out of earshot. The TSA guards may have taken your Swiss Army Knife, but they've left you with your lump of plastic. You point and press. Wolf-B-Gone!

Be still, my heart!