The Idiot vs. The Idiot Box

We have 5 televisions in the house.  That's now one more than people who live here full time.  Things should be great, right?  Not quite.

• The remote for the kitchen in the TV is broken.  It controls the TV volume and the cable box but refuses to cooperate when it comes to simply turning the TV on and off.  I think it's been a couple years since the remote worked correctly.  You have to do that manually.
• The remote for the TV in the basement works only some of the time.  There's no rhyme or reason to when it works, which is maddening.  The problem is that it won't allow you to change cable channels.  It seems like such a little thing but getting out of the chair to change the channel is a killer.  Some times, after the TV's been on for a while, it does start working.  That, of course, only lulls you into thinking that it's finally going to work for good.  We've actually had Verizon send 3 different remotes as we try to fix the problem but with no luck.
• The remote for the TV in the family room works fine.  That makes it the most popular TV in the house.
• There are also no problems (yet) with the TV in our bedroom.  Of course, it's not HD (which seems to only bother me).
• Now the TV in the sitting room is acting up on us.  This started about 2 weeks ago.  The problem seems to be the cable box, which just randomly turns itself on and off in the midst of viewing.

After settling in last night on the floor in the sitting room to watch some college football and having the box cycle off 4 times in 1 hour, I'm a broken man.  I'm going to call Verizon to try to get at least that problem resolved.  Wish me luck.