No cable? Oh, no!

Last night, as I was trying to relax from a hectic day and just veg out, I sat down on the couch to watch some TV. The baby was sleeping and Jennifer was playing one of her computer games. So I finally settled on an episode of I Didn’t Know I Was Pregnant. (I blame Jennifer for getting me hooked on this show. Her aunt got her hooked and now she got ME hooked!) The problem was, I couldn’t really watch the whole show. It kept blacking out!

I thought it was a signal problem and thought it would go away. But today, when Jesse wanted to watch Dora the Explorer, it happened again! And it kept happening with other shows and other channels.

Not only this, but all the shows we had on DVR weren’t showing up. It said “42% full” but nothing was there. (Jennifer went into panic attack mode because this meant she couldn’t watch her beloved Dragon Ball Z Kai.)

Hmmm. Something was definitely NOT right here. But for the life of me, I could not figure it out.

So, we have to wait until my husband looks into it.

Meanwhile, we can’t watch any TV – not unless we don’t mind a show constantly going dark. (Ugh!)

The thing of it is, having no cable feels weird. Sure, the kids can watch a movie. (Jesse settled down with Toy Story 2.) But the movie thing does not happen very often. We want our stories!

I’m actually curious about our reaction to this. All this time, I have complained about all of us watching too much TV. (Though I hardly watch ANY TV, as it is! Maybe a show a day.) And I’ve always longed for the days when it was just me and Jennifer. When I couldn’t even afford to have basic cable. (BASIC!!!) We had NO TV. No cable. No movies, either. (I couldn’t afford a TV or DVD player.) Jen and I spent our days doing other things. Going for walks. Reading (a lot of) books. Playing games, doing crafts. And talking – a lot of talking!

I loved those days. We had such strong bonding moments. So much together time. So many memories and lots of laughs.

And we can have that now. So, what is the problem? Is this so terrible?

It seems we have gotten so used to zoning out in front of the TV, we don’t know what to do with ourselves when we don’t have TV. Sure, we still read books – just not as often or as many. We play games – once in a while. And of course we talk, especially at dinner. But it’s like those things just don’t add up as sufficient entertainment anymore.

Could it be an age thing? Jennifer has not outgrown crafts. She still loves them. She loves books, as I do. And we have fun playing board games. So maybe it’s not an age thing.

Maybe we just need to be more creative. After all, that’s what TV seems to sap away from us when we put too much time and attention into it. So maybe if we take our creativity up a notch, we’ll come up with other stuff to do while we wait for this cable craziness to be fixed. It could happen.