Cable TV gone – journal entries from several months ago
Tuesday Feb 25th: Go to Cable office and drop cable TV. I want to see if I can save money. I figure I can get the public channels. Arrangements are made to have my Cable channels disconnected.
Friday Feb 28th: Keep expecting to lose my signal but no one comes. Guess I still get to watch cable over the weekend.
Enjoy cable TV over Saturday and Sunday. Still not much on TV but at least I have the opportunity to see shows that still don’t interest me. Surf around trying to find something good. Notice that the same cable channels are showing the same movies over and over again, only now the channels seem to be sharing those same shows.
Cable stays on through the day Monday. Are they coming? How long do I get to keep watching before they come and disconnect the signal?
Monday evening March 3rd: Signal goes out after 5 pm. Discover neither TV in the apartment will function without some sort of antenna. Hadn’t counted on that. This could be interesting. Watch video Hard Rain. Internet friend asks if I am already going through withdrawal. Miss a program I would have liked to watch.
Surf the Internet for antenna solutions. Find one listed on youtube but haven’t decided if I will try it or not. Might just see how long I can go without TV. But I’ll watch VHS and DVD movies… maybe one per day.
Day 1 (Tuesday): First full day of no TV. At least I don’t go and turn it on by force of habit. But I’m used to listening to the radio all day as I like music. I like to take a nap now and then in the living room with the TV on as I can either find a digital radio station with no commercials or find a TV program I can fall asleep to. But this is going to change, especially since I don’t even have a radio in the living room. Wonder if I’ll go in and take quiet naps now.
Looked for a program on the Internet I wanted to watch Monday night when I lost my signal. Watched it today on the Internet on my computer. No advertisements throughout program – nice! At 7pm I watched You’ve Got Mail on VHS. Video machine making an odd knocking noise. Wonder if it is the player or the video. The player is old, but so are all my videos. This could be an inopportune time for the machine to go out as I don’t want to spend money on an antenna or new player.
Day 2: Watched the Black Hole during the afternoon. Took a nap wishing there could have been TV or music in the background. Not bad though.
Day 3: Looked for an episode of a reality program I am following. It is embarrassing to admit I am following it but I am. I watched it on my computer. The commercials were annoying but I found ways to ignore them until the program came back on. Didn’t watch any movies, nor did I feel the urge to.
Day 4: Wanted to get away from the computer desk and relax but have no TV stations. Went into the living room early evening and watched Volcano. It made me think of checking out some ratings on Rotten Tomatoes. It’s a pain rewinding VHS tapes but at least I have them to watch.
Day 5: Saturday and I can’t even watch any NCAA basketball games. I want to relax for awhile in the living room but I like to have the TV turned on. I pop in an episode of Columbo and watch it in its entirety. I check my email, go back into the living room for a nap and then watch a second episode. Then it’s back to the computer room. But at least I did catch up on another reality show I’ve been following; watched it on the Internet.
Day 6: Daylight savings time wakes me up Sunday morning. After checking email I go into the living room. No TV so I might as well take a nap and catch up on the sleep I missed. It is Columbo night on TV but since I watched a couple episodes yesterday I decide to skip it. I decide not to watch any movies on TV today.
Day 7: One week without cable TV and I have not gone screaming out into the parking lot. Watched another reality program that was posted to the Internet. Also watched a movie on computer that was hailed by critics but was totally unsatisfying. 2nd day of not watching a movie on TV.
Day 8: Was so focused on not liking the movie Gravity that I watched Apollo 13 on my VHS. It was way better. And I liked resting in the living room watching the movie.
Day 9: I went for a drive and took lots of pictures. Came home tired and sore. It would be nice to be able to watch TV in the living room and rest on the sofa, especially with that reality program I’m following coming on later tonight. But I will catch it on the PC tomorrow.
Day 10: Watched another reality program on the PC. I think I’m starting to adjust to not having TV to just turn on any time I want. Besides, I’ve complained to myself many times how there isn’t much on TV worth watching. Laundry has me distracted. Was tempted to go in and watch a movie but I chose not to.
Day 11 (Friday): The NCAA tournament is gearing up. I might miss having TV just to watch some games in progress. But I can keep track on websites on the computer. Watched part of a movie, took a nap, watched the rest when I woke up.
Day 12: Saturday is a good day to veg out on the sofa watching TV. But with no TV I settled for a DVD. I napped, started the DVD all over and ended up napping again. Oh well, at least I got some ideas to include in a story.
Day 13: It would have been nice to have TV for “selection Sunday” for the NCAA tournament. But I ended up spending all my time in front of the computer sending emails. I did check on the bracket after it was made official. So I guess I lived without TV today after all!
Day 14: Napped with that same DVD in the background. I guess those musical scenes are soothing. Watched Gravity again, this time with English. It was even worse than listening to the Italian version. Spent much of the day on my computer.
Day 15: Watched a reality show on the computer. I moved my little box TV out of the computer room a few days ago and am getting used to being without it although my desk looks funny with it gone. I used to have it on in the background now and then. But mostly it is the radio now, either that or my CD’s.
Day 16: Watched a couple of Columbo DVD episodes. Thought I might fall asleep but I didn’t. I don’t know whether I miss sports more because of NCAA basketball or not.
Day 17: NCAA games are on TV but I cannot watch. Maybe I should get an antenna. Missing them is not that big a deal. Able to follow the scores on the sports website. Watched another episode of a reality show on the Internet.
Day 18: Too busy following scores on the computer to care about missing TV.
Day 19: Watched the commentary to a DVD (Into the Blue). Wanted to relax on the sofa with the TV on. Neighbors on the floor below just a bit too active for me to be able to take a nap.
Day 20: Listened to NCAA basketball games all day on the radio. Would have been nice to have them on TV, but I sit at the computer and listen more than I watch anyway so it was not that much of a loss.
Day 21: Bought some WWII documentary DVDs and watched a couple episodes.
Day 22: Went for a drive and watched more WWII episodes. I think I’m getting used to no TV.
Day 24: Been watching the WWII DVD’s over the past couple days. But basketball is back and I am forced to listen to the radio. I’m doing ok though… or at least I think I am.
Day 25: Bought 100 movies in two collections – Horror classics and Sci-fi classics. I’ve been watching the Horror classics ever since, sometimes 3-4 per day. I seem to be missing TV less and less each day.
Day 28: It is Monday, four weeks after losing TV. I watched Horror classics over the weekend. Now I’m getting back to writing and will have less time for watching TV. But I relaxed by watching two movies this afternoon. I have plenty of material to put in the DVD player or VHS player that I doubt I will miss TV much aside from the occasional live sports program which I can pick up on radio or a sports website.
Week 30+: Got bored filling out my journal so I quit. Over the past several months I moved into a smaller apartment. But I chose not to get cable TV in my new location as I don’t miss it other than a few sports of which I can catch scores on the Internet.
Talked to my insurance agent who said he and his family haven’t had cable for 3 months. Besides, they watch Netflix and the kids never knew the cable had been disconnected. It appears I’m not the only one foregoing cable TV these days. No more journal entries; this is boring…
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