Grappling with simple tasks -- and winning, sometimes

In the end, it came down to a contest of wits. I won. I think.

Let's back up for a moment. How many times have you been frustrated by something that should be simple but turns out to be the biggest challenge of the day?

I think I know the answer. And as we grow grayer at the roots of our hair, these challenges -- call them life's tests -- become more frequent. And more puzzling.

Just think: I used to be able to open a box of cereal with little fuss at all. Have I gotten so much weaker? Are the cereal makers using stronger glue? What is it about that interior bag of toasted grain that makes my life so difficult?

I say "my life" because I don't want to put you in the same category of helpless humans as myself. Maybe you don't have any problem with cereal packaging whatsoever. Good for you, by golly.

What about those triple-folded pieces of mail, mostly slick advertising, that are glued shut so tightly that they are not intended, in real life, ever to be opened? At least not without doing serious damage to the contents, which, nine times out of 10, wind up in the trash anyway.

One of my recent battles was with the slender remote that controls the device that allows me to stream movies and TV shows to my television set. It was installed just last month. Earlier this week the remote stopped working. Dead as a doornail.

Thanks to the Internet, it did a search for "Amazon Fire remote won't work." I instantly had access to dozens of websites offering advice. Some were videos, which comes in handy when you're frustrated beyond belief.

Nearly all of the helpful websites started this way: The Amazon Fire remote is a notorious battery eater.

Who knew? I mean, when was the last time you had to change the batteries in your TV remote? Those things seem to prove the ads featuring the cute little bunny.

So I looked at my Amazon remote to see where batteries would possibly fit in such a slender device. Would it take a special lithium battery? Would the remote lose all its programming when its batteries were removed?

Ah, the Internet.

Several helpful videos were devoted to opening the Amazon remote to get access to the batteries. I did what the pleasant folks in the video did. Their remotes opened right up. Mine did not.

Finally, I must have pushed the right place. The remote's back slid into my hand as easy as pie. The good news: The remote uses two AAA batteries, and I had a package of AAA batteries stowed away in the old shoe box that holds all kinds of batteries and related stuff.

I replaced the batteries. That's when I was confronted with another challenge: how to close the remote.

Another video showed me how to line up three tabs on one side and slide the case so the tabs of the other side would grab hold. I suppose if you were a brain surgeon you would be more adept at this, but it took me nearly 15 minutes to close the dang remote.

It worked.

Hallelujah!

Now we're down to the contest of wits I mentioned at the start.

Smug with satisfaction over the remote-that-needed-batteries-changed episode, my wife and I treated ourselves to a fast-food meal. In the end, we had a leftover we wanted to take home. We asked the nice fast-food employee if we could have a box for the leftover. He handed us what looked like an innocent, appropriately sized cardboard container that resembled a small pizza box.

Pizza boxes and leftover fast-food boxes share a certain kinship. For me, they are both difficult to close. Do you push the side flaps in first? What about that gizmo that "locks" to lid in place?

My wife will attest -- when she stops laughing -- that I devoted the better part of 15 minutes trying to properly close and secure the fast-food leftover box. I refused to leave the restaurant until I succeeded. For a while there it looked like we might spend the night.

As I said, in the end I won. I think. I mean I got to carry the box to the our car with a smug look on my face instead of that terror-stricken look some of us get when we are flummoxed by the simplest task.

Old people.

What can you do?

For one thing, keep them away from cereal boxes and TV remotes.

Please.

Joe Sullivan is the retired editor of the Southeast Missourian.