Even the built-in obsolescence is not working

I reckon Harvey Norman has a big bin at their front door, so that when you buy a new computer, as you leave the store you toss it in the bin and go back and buy the upgrade. Someone should add to Murphy's laws that stuff breaks down the day after the warranty expires. I bought a tv from the Warehouse about two years ago, and the last couple of days it first started clapping out in the picture department, and then gave off very nasty noises, to the point it's now effectively non-functional. I rang a cousin who used to fix tv's, and he told me what in my heart I knew, that it would cost more to fix than to go and buy another one. (He no longer fixes tv's for this reason - I think he's now got a part-time job repairing satellites, or somesuch.) Similarly, we had a DVD player (admittedly an el cheapo from DS), for which the remote controller stopped working. They told me it would cost more to repair than to buy a new one. Actually, it would have cost more to repair just the remote than to buy a complete new DVD player including remote. I did that - I guess in reality I was buying a remote with a free DVD player thrown in. But I don't always give in so easily. About six months ago, the volume control on my electric lawnmower (bought at a garage sale) gave off a nasty puff of blue smoke followed by silence. I took the controller off and trotted down to my local lawnmower shop with it. The guy didn't even bother to look at it. The advice (you guessed it) was that they didn't make those any more, so I'd have to buy a new mower. For once I got ornery. Back home, I drilled out the sealed screws (the kind for which there is no known tool in the universe), spent the next half hour on my hands and knees finding all the bits that sprang out, shortened the cable where it had burnt out, and reassembled with some bolts instead of screws. It works a treat.