Natural Mom Loves Prada

We have had cable for most of our married years. The last time we didn’t was about 8 years ago…
I like tv. I would almost say I love tv. I don’t care that they write shows at a 4th grade level or that many of the story lines are predictable – I love it. I like juicy characters like Gregory House and living vicariously through the beautiful teenagers on 90210. My prada mom likes this escape. There was a time when every night, except Fridays, from 8pm till 11pm we had shows lined up. We are busy with 4 kids, so years ago we felt like a PVR was a good idea and it was, it allowed us to always make our family the priority without having to be resentful that we were missing “the best part” of the show. Technology…I love it. It was still too much and natural mom put her foot down and started cutting shows and recently got to a good balance only having one or two shows a night every couple of nights. The kids watch a bit of tv during the day but the only thing I watch during the day is Oprah. Anyway, enough about our cable history, I just wanted to make it clear that we don’t spend every waking minute watching tv…but even so, I love it.

We decided that a responsible decision would be to cut out cable to help with our tight financial situation right now. Most of the shows we watch are online, on the station’s website, so we were paying for something we could get for free…that just doesn’t make sense. So off hubs went to get an antenna. With the antenna we get a handful of local channels and 1 or 2 are in HD…but it’s not the same. Everytime I start to pout, I think about the $110 I am saving every month but even that doesn’t take away all the emptiness I feel. I miss the choices. I miss my cake shows. I miss my PVR that did a great job of making sure I never missed an Oprah. When we do watch the tv, I miss being able to fast forward the commercials – we haven’t sat through commercials in years.

It’s been about 2 weeks or so and I’m not getting over it. Our whole nighttime routine has changed and I am starting to miss hubs. Our shows were our “thing” and because we have to wait for the shows to be posted to the websites – the whole schedule has changed and we are not spending as much time together. I told him a week ago or so:

Me: In a few weeks, we will have been married 10 years – and we better get there…I have put in my time (imagine me with squinty eyes )
Him: what?
Me: Well, we barely see each other anymore without our shows and what do you think is going to happen to our relationship?
Him: you’re a weirdo
Me: I’m just saying…

Sigh. I’m going through drama withdrawal…give me a break.

I don’t think cable is coming back anytime soon. So this is my new reality, life without cable. I don’t like it.