My wife, daughter and I are moving next week. We live amidst boxes and chaos (OK, the chaos is a constant, but the boxes are new). This move will represent some changes in the way we’ve lived for the past two years.
You see, we’re moving from student housing at Princeton Theological Seminary (where my wife is a doctoral fellow) to a townhouse in Bucks County, PA. At the seminary, we get free cable TV (actually, its a minimalist satellite TV lineup, but we get ESPN, TNT, USA, CNN, etc.). But where we’re moving, cable costs $50 and up, and we’re joining the three other people in America who don’t have cable TV.
I wish I could say the decision is based 100% on philosophical grounds. Who needs MTV or Wolf Blitzer in your living room 24/7? What can you get on cable that you can’t get on the internet, the radio or at Blockbuster Video? And what is the value of a TV that I affectionately refer to as "mind-rot"?
But the truth is that Jessicah and I are eagerly watching our final few episodes of Law & Order reruns alternately on TNT and USA. We’re lamenting that we only have one more week to watch the wonderful new show, The Closer, on TNT. CNN and ESPN are on our TV more frequently now, perhaps so that I can soak up their sounds and market-driven content for one last week.
Yes, we’d get cable at our new home if it didn’t cost $50/mo. Not that we have the need to Shop at Home, Pimp Our Ride or live a vicarious life of Sex in the City, but $50/mo (and rising each year, it seems) is just too much to pay on our limited budget for a line-up of channels and shows that have more junk than jems. Yeah, we’ll miss watching some of the Law & Order reruns, ESPN highlight reels or Breaking (non) News events on CNN, but we’ll get over it.
Anyway, I think our new neighbors each have cable, just in case I find myself missing Wolf Blitzer’s semi-urgent monotone or Jerry Orbach’s wise-cracks on Law & Order reruns . . .
The Lutheran Zephyr 