A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to Cutting Cable

I am not a big fan of commercials.

No matter if its for food, car insurance, or an upcoming television show, I cannot stand all that noise and blabber. The mute button and I have become best buds.

I also find myself watching less and less regular TV.

It all happened when we cut our satellite dish out of our lives.

Our Internet bill was getting out of control. Through the roof. Wads of wampum. We found our bills inching near $300 a month. And for what? Out of 100 or 200 or 500 channels, how many did we really watch?

How many channels did we really need?

So we took the plunge. We bought an inexpensive outside antenna that picks up 50-ish local channels, cancelled our satellite dish, and hooked up with our telephone provider for the internet. We bought an Amazon FireStick (although friends have bought Roku sticks too), ONE extra monthly service (we bought Disney+, but you could pick up anything from HBO to Showtime to dozens of other services) and saved over $100 a month while still riding the internet.

So what does that have to do with hating commercials?

I used to watch a handful of TV programs religiously — if I couldn’t watch it I’d record it, accumulating a big pile of sitcoms and dramas for future perusal. But now that I can’t record said TV programs, I find I don’t miss them as much as I thought I would. That I don’t miss crimes and sitcoms and variety shows and TV relationships as much as I thought I would.

If I really need a sitcom fix there’s plenty of shows available. I can dip back onto regular TV with my antenna any time I want, and everyone from the Golden Girls to Leverage to NYPD Blue are just waiting for me to binge watch on my streaming service.

I’ve also found that now that I’ve gone through the “popular” movies on said channels, I’m going back to watching movies on DVDs. We had a decent collection before satellite dishes and cable took over the world, and most of those I’ve collected are worth a second watch. Or tenth watch. Goodwill and five-dollar bins at retail stores fill in the gaps that come from missing first-time releases five years ago.

I also have found I could care less about the newest series and stupidity and fake laughter tracks that haunt the networks. Instead I am exploring the world of Chinese and Japanese ancient dynasties and the History of Rome and the Universe and what life was like in 1800s England. All on my own time, any time.

If you’re thinking of “cutting the cable”, do it.

You might find you have a lot more time to do the things you really want to do in life. Watch just what you want to watch when you want to.

And you don’t have to listen to blasting, obnoxious commercials.