Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

They traffic in fear. it is their only currency. if we are fearful, they are winning.

This blog will pay for itself.

This country desperately needs a functioning Fourth Estate.

In my day, never was longer.

Meanwhile over at truth Social, the former president is busy confessing to crimes.

Proof that we need a blogger ethics panel.

When we show up, we win.

At some point, the ability to learn is a factor of character, not IQ.

Glad to see john eastman going through some things.

…and a burning sense of injustice to juice the soul.

In after Baud. Damn.

You don’t get rid of your umbrella while it’s still raining.

Let us savor the impending downfall of lawless scoundrels who richly deserve the trouble barreling their way.

If you’re pissed about Biden’s speech, he was talking about you.

When your entire life is steeped in white supremacy, equality feels like discrimination.

“In the future, this lab will be a museum. don’t touch it.”

Republican obstruction dressed up as bipartisanship. Again.

Good lord, these people are nuts.

So it was an October Surprise A Day, like an Advent calendar but for crime.

I was promised a recession.

Tide comes in. Tide goes out. You can’t explain that.

Despite his magical powers, I don’t think Trump is thinking this through, to be honest.

And we’re all out of bubblegum.

Republicans: “Abortion is murder but you can take a bus to get one.” Easy peasy.

You are here: Home / John Cole Presents "This Fucking Old House" / Free At Last

Free At Last

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I did something I had thought about a number of times before but never did- I cut the cables on my tv. I now just have internet and the various streaming networks I use.

It was just too expensive and I didn’t use it enough, on top of having to make do with substantially less income for the foreseeable future, and throwing close to hundred more a month for tv channels I don’t use just did not seem justifiable anymore. So that is gone. I have a lot of expenses coming up and less income coming in, so we making some changes. This one was a no-brainer.

The entire world is a tire fire so I am going to spend tonight playing video games. What are you all up to?

Reader Interactions

148Comments

  1. 1.

    JustRuss

    Gave up cable years ago,  Netflix and Prime have more than I can watch.  Spending the weekend with friends in a rental in Central Oregon,  feels almost like summer.  Supposed to rain Sunday.

  2. 2.

    mvr

    In answer to what are we doing: Doing a quick survey of the tire fires and not going too deep on the ones that gut me after a long couple of work days hosting a speaker.  Two good talks, a lot of discussion, taught some classes and put together some meals for groups with mixed dietary and other constraints. It went well.

  9. 9.

    frosty

    We cut the cable because we were tired of funding Fox. We have several streaming services, I’m not sure which, but I expect our expenses are close to what we were paying Comcast. Mind, none of the stuff on Prime or Netflix are on Comcast so we’d be paying that over and above anyway.

    Bottom line is that I don’t watch TV any more. I used to sit down for shows on HBO (Sunday night Veep, Game of Thrones, John Oliver) when they were on at a particular time and end up surfing and watching American Pickers, Bar Rescue, or a movie I’d seen before. Now?  There’s no particular schedule for when something is on. I don’t sit down in front of the TV unless there’s a particular stream I want to watch and … there aren’t any. Well, there are, but not enough to go through the effort of figuring out which streaming service and which remote I need to use.

    Oh, and sports? Forget it. Can’t watch the Orioles without MASN and you need to sign up for a $60 a month service that also pays Fox News. Ravens? Still over the air and we put up an antenna.

    TV sucks these days. That’s why I spend all my time on Balloon-Juice instead.

    ETA: What I’m doing? Road Trip to New River Gorge NP and the Virginia Creeper Rail Trail. And wondering why there’s a new leak in my camping trailer.

  10. 10.

    TaMara

    Funny, I did just the opposite a while ago – once streaming fractured, I picked up a cheap satellite subscription and then indulge in one streaming service a month, catch up on what’s new and rotate to the next one for a month.  Fits my viewing style best.

    And with most of my streaming, I go with the commercial versions because, well, I grew up with commercials, so no biggie. And except for a few things they are not that intrusive. Also, FreeVee and Roku have some good shows without subscription fees.

  11. 11.

    TaMara

    @TaMara: Oh, and what am I doing? What all business owners do when it’s time to leave town for a week, two weeks’ worth of work before I leave and getting the house ready for the petsitter.

  12. 12.

    mvr

    We have cable internet and phone but no TV.  I just don’t watch and it means I can have hobbies and hold a job.

    Well hold a job so far anyway . . .

    Mark

  13. 13.

    hells littlest angel

    I recently found out how much cable costs these days and was astonished. So many great ways to spend that kind of money in a month.

  14. 14.

    Mai Naem mobile

    I don’t have cable but do have satellite. I’ve been thinking of giving up satellite. Since COVID, I haven’t been watching a whole lot of TV. I know this sounds dumb but I honestly have a hard time with the TV and streaming. I hate dealing with the remote. I hate even setting up the remote with anything new but especially a TV.

  15. 15.

    Kayla Rudbek

    I’m knitting a throw and trying to figure out whether I keep it or give it to my godson. The throw is supposed to be 60” long and I am almost through a third of it and it appears to be short so far. I’m going to finish the pattern repeat to bring it up to the full 1/3 mark and then measure it out.

  16. 16.

    Odie Hugh Manatee

    We dropped cable back in 2014. A Roku with Netflix, Hulu, Prime and Disney+ does it for us.

  17. 17.

    PaulWartenberg

    I’m trying to get into the Magic the Gathering game, because of a new release of Doctor Who themed sets, but the place hosting games was packed tonight and I didn’t feel comfortable enough as a stranger to hang around.

    It’s hard to go out to new places.

  18. 18.

    BellyCat

    …having to make do with substantially less income for the foreseeable future.”

    May have lost the thread. Did you get canned or not by your Most Benevolent Employer ™?

  20. 20.

    Suzanne

    Mr. Suzanne is spending the weekend fishing with a friend, so he bought me “Super Mario Wonder”. Looking forward to playing it tomorrowwwww!

  21. 21.

    frosty

    @Mai Naem mobile: ​  I hate dealing with the remote. I hate even setting up the remote with anything new but especially a TV.

    I’m with you there. I have the TV remote, a Roku, and a Firestick. And another one to switch the TV source. Aarggh!!

  23. 23.

    Percysowner

     

    I went to drop my cable last month. They were so desperate to keep me that they basically gave me cable free. The price for Internet alone was only $4 less than cable plus Internet, so I said what the heck and went with it. It goes for a year and once they raise the price, I’ll dump cable, unless they give me it free again.

  25. 25.

    catclub

    OTA TV used to be good at the previous home. Not here. I would need to get a better outdoor antenna.
    We have never paid for TV. I have paid for internet. and make donations to PBS to get PBS streaming. Also amazon prime. I still think free shipping is great.

  26. 26.

    eclare

    I am eating a popsicle in front of my dog, who very much thinks it is rightfully hers.  I’ll eat about half then give her the rest.  I’m no monster.

  29. 29.

    zhena gogolia

    I had a successful outcome today to a process at work that has been going on since last March. I’m relieved but totally exhausted.

  30. 30.

    Kelly

    We dropped cable tv about 8 years ago. No over the air TV signal reaches into our scenic canyon. We stream one show a night. We have Amazon Prime because if you live out in the boondocks Amazon save a lot of driving to town. We’ve had Netflix forever. Mrs Kelly bought a Mac laptop which came with several months of Apple TV. Not a huge catalog but every time we we think about dropping it something good shows up. OPB, our local PBS streams.

    I’ve been staying with my ailing Mom the last 8 weeks. She has a $160 a month cable bill and other than sports it’s a wasteland.

  32. 32.

    Nukular Biskits

    Been streaming for over a year now. No regrets, although I am looking at setting up a video distribution system to the wifi-enabled TVs so we can watch local UHF.

    Got my COVID booster and flu shot today. I hope I don’t feel shitty tomorrow.

    Other than that, sipping Yuengling.

  34. 34.

    zhena gogolia

    I got rid of most of my cable in order to get rid of Fox News. The problem is you can’t get rid of Fox News and still have TCM. That was the only station I ever watched. So the TV is now just a dead black monolith in the other room, while we watch movies on my laptop in bed. I’m not even sure I can turn it on any more.

  35. 35.

    Just Some Fuckhead

    We did this years ago when cable got hundreds of dollars per month and now we’re paying roughly 50% more than that for the various streaming services and premium channels.

  36. 36.

    geg6

    I feel you, Cole.  I’m in a bit of a bad place myself.  I’m very unhappy at work (new supervisor, who is a former student, who is not ready for supervisory prime time is driving me closer to retirement every day) and I’m 100% sure my John has dementia.  Pretty depressed at the moment.  Not sure what to do with any of that yet.

    Thought your job was safe?  Did I miss something?

  39. 39.

    MobiusKlein

    Playing X-Com (modded), and cooped up in 1/4 of the house while the floor folks finish their work. Which was delayed a day while the first coat of polyurethane dries.
    The piano is in the kitchen, beds are in the downstairs office, and the garage is our new horde.
    Cats are very perturbed.

  40. 40.

    dr. luba

    I got rid of cable back in 2018;  realized I rarely watched the TV any more.  I stream, albeit not often.  And recently got rid of Netflix when my niblings could no longer access it.  When I first got it, it was the only game in town.  I rarely watched it any more, nor did they.

    I’m on the road with my 91 year old mother, visiting family and getting a task done.  Our fall tour was supposed to end with a visit to a friend in Vermont, but she’s come down with a nasty virus.  Good thing I paid extra to make those hotel reservations cancellable.  It seems I am fated to never visit Vermont…..

  43. 43.

    MomSense

    I’m getting my place ready to sell.  Painting all the rooms, packing everything up so it looks like a nasty neat person lives here.
    In the middle of all this chaos my hot water heater decided to crap out.  I’m too old for cold showers.

  48. 48.

    geg6

    As for cutting the cable…I currently have satellite but am considering that.  I have to upgrade from my current internet, Verizon, which sucks donkey balls.  Am looking to get Comcast internet (the only other option here and, based on my experience with it from friends and family, is vastly superior).  After that, again based on experiences of family and friends, I’m probably going to get YouTube tv for all the local channels and many other things, plus keep my Netflix, Max and Prime.  Will also, at that point, get Paramount.  That should cover my most watched shows.  Two of my sisters have done this and have Disney and Peacock, which I don’t plan to get, and are paying half what I am currently.

  49. 49.

    WaterGirl

    @geg6: Cole’s position was not cut.

    But they are making huge cuts to the program and cutting the salaries of people who are still working there!

    Very sorry to hear about your John, that’s worrisome.

  50. 50.

    eclare

    @geg6:

    In my experience with Comcast, if you threaten to leave, they will offer you much better deals.  I hate it, I am not a haggler, but you do save money.

  51. 51.

    Martin

    Fair warning to folks navigating the content waters. The US entertainment industry (you know, the folks currently on strike) have operated on about $100/household/mo for a while. It’s probably higher now.

    If you want to have access to your favorite shows, that’s about the number you need to expect to pay. There’s no real productivity gains to be had in generating TV content that we don’t immediately throw overboard as unacceptable (replacing scripted TV for unscripted, single camera shows over 3 camera, cheap special effects, AI writing, etc.) Anyway, all entertainment packages that get you that wide range of content will always migrate toward that number, understanding that with ads, you don’t have to pay that much, some advertiser will pay it for you. So that’s your only real avenue toward discount.

    Cutting the cord for services will eventually land you back at that number. You might get a reprieve for a while. You might password share, or surf the monthly trials a bit, but in the end, that’s the number that keeps the industry from being on strike. Alternatively, you can give up on the content, or a decent bit of it.

    In the end, the equation will get balanced.

  52. 52.

    Sister Golden Bear

    I cut the cord a couple years ago and love it. I still get YouTube TV, but I’m planning on dropping it because it’s expensive I don’t really watch regular TV anymore. But I do want to be able get the local news when needed, as well as being able to watch the occasional live event, so I need to get a digital antenna.

    At the moment, I’m recovering from a nasty cold. I thought it might be the latest Covid, because it came on fast, and I felt like I’d been hit by a truck. But today I’m feeling much better, even if I’m not fully over it. So who knows.

  54. 54.

    mrmoshpotato

    @MomSense: In the middle of all this chaos my hot water heater decided to crap out. I’m too old for cold showers.

    Ugh.  Sorry to hear that.

  55. 55.

    Yarrow

    I just marvel at this sort of thing:
    @frosty:

    Road Trip to New River Gorge NP and the Virginia Creeper Rail Trail.

    @Suzanne:

    spending the weekend fishing with a friend,

    @JustRuss:’

    Spending the weekend with friends in a rental in Central Oregon,

    Weekends away? Friends? What is that? I can’t even remember.
    What am I doing? Recovering from being yelled at by a number of people today for supposedly not working hard enough to care for a family member, even though I’m working flat out and having to make all the decisions. I’m so tired I hardly know what day or time it is. So, weekends away? Time with friends? Hahahahahahahaha. Hilarious.

  56. 56.

    Sister Inspired Revolver of Freedom

    I cut the cord ages ago, & miss it not at all. Even with streaming services, I am still saving so much money I’m some times shocked 😲 at the difference. I have an OTA antenna I barely use & the number of free services and/or nearly free, just keep growing in number. I’m so spoilt for choice I some times can’t make up my mind what to watch. Lol!

  57. 57.

    Kayla Rudbek

    @Kayla Rudbek: officially 1/3 of the pattern repeats done and it’s measuring 18.5 inches long instead of 20 inches. I was correct, go me! Of course it will relax and grow once it’s off the needles and washed, but I am not going to count on gaining the missing 4.5 inches back.

  59. 59.

    Soprano2

    @Mai Naem mobile: You’d hate a new TV, then. I have YouTube TV, which I like, but I miss being able to turn the TV on and have the show just be there, rather than navigating to the app then telling it I’m the one watching before I can get to what I want to watch.

    I’m listening to people sing karaoke. It’s a busy night.

  60. 60.

    Yarrow

    @geg6:  Very sorry to hear about your John. There are new medications that can slow the progression of dementia. Getting him tested and seeing if he’s a candidate for one of those might give him many more good years. The sooner a person gets on the medication the better.

  61. 61.

    Just Some Fuckhead

    @frosty: We’ve biked the Creeper Trail yearly for years, until this year. We couldn’t swing it with all our other plans.

    Make sure you stop by the “general store” in Green Cove.

  65. 65.

    Shalimar

    @zhena gogolia: If you have a library card, you can watch old movies for free at Kanopy.com

    Not quite TCM, but a lot of choices.  Criterion also has a streaming service.

  66. 66.

    Soprano2

    @geg6: Do you have a way to talk to a therapist? I started seeing one a few months ago because I was 100% sure of the same for my John. She has helped me talk through the things I need to do and how to approach them and him, and how to deal with the depression of it being necessary.

    Today I came home from work to find him trying to get in his vehicle. I asked him where he wanted to go (pretty sure it was to the store to get something sweet to eat). I told him he couldn’t get in his vehicle because I took the key off his keychain since the state says his license is revoked and he isn’t supposed to drive. He got mad; when I tried to talk to him in the house he yelled at me to shut up, which isn’t like him. So I went to exercise class and when I came back it was like it didn’t happen. *sigh* I’ll probably be having that conversation with him again.

  67. 67.

    Zelma

    I have thought about cutting the cord since I almost never watch TV.  Except for sports on occasion like tonight. And the Phillies are down one in the bottom of the 9th.  Tragic.

    And when I do watch sports, I turn the sound off.  I simply cannot stand the constant noise blabbing any more and the commercials drive me nuts.

    I haven’t cancelled yet mostly because of inertia.  Maybe Cole will inspire me.

    I

  69. 69.

    Lyrebird

    @schrodingers_cat: Thanks!

    @Soprano2: I am so glad you got support for yourself… hard to go on through the heartbreaking situation if you don’t have more supports holding you up.  If my wording is trite, please just take my good wishes.

     

    @geg6: good wishes for you, too.

  72. 72.

    Soprano2

    @Lyrebird: Thanks, I was going crazy worrying about what to do and how to handle it. She always asks me how I’m going to take care of myself this week. It reminds me that I can’t help him if I don’t take care of myself.

  74. 74.

    Soprano2

    @Yarrow: I’m sorry, that sucks. The ones who are most critical never volunteer to do it themselves. Hubby went through that with his dad.

  76. 76.

    Shalimar

    @Yarrow: I am right there with you.  I take care of my mom 24/7 basically in exchange for a room to live in and food to eat.  She insists she doesn’t need any help even though she couldn’t even remember to take her 25 pills a day without me, and my brother calls me a moocher constantly for not getting a job in addition to watching her.  They both get angry whenever you suggest they aren’t perfect,  so they are just a constant nightmare.

  79. 79.

    Yutsano

    What am I doing? I’m about to go make some shoyu noodles and playing games on my phone. Oh and trying to not think about whether I blew that interview I thought I did well on. You know, just the regular anxiety that comes before a job decision. Which I find the results of either on my birthday or Halloween.

    EDIT: small wording change.

  80. 80.

    BruceFromOhio

    Summer of 2019 I moved the furniture around in the room with the cable box. Unplugged everything and set it all back up, but was short a power strip. It being summer I wasn’t inclined to watch much, left it unplugged. After almost three months it was clear we didn’t miss it, so I canceled it. Upped the internet to the next tier for more bandwidth.

    This saved us $1,440 a year, which made me angry. Why didn’t I do this years ago? Streaming subscriptions now eat up about half that savings, so there’s tradeoffs. The content and mostly commercial free services are a much better quality for the price.

    Equipping for local digital broadcast and dvr was fun to set up. Works just like the old rabbit ears and a VCR, but in high definition. I love feeling like I’m ripping off Jerry Jones with free NFL games.

  82. 82.

    Yarrow

    @Soprano2:  That’s a nice sentiment but in my experience you can help others when you don’t take care of yourself because the care still has to happen and you have to do it. It sucks but so does life. For me, every single fucking time when I make an effort to do something for myself then crap happens and I don’t get to do the thing for myself anyway. So I’ve kind of given up doing it. There’s no point.

    @Soprano2:
    @Shalimar:
    Yep. Care falls on one person and everyone else yells at you about how you’re doing it wrong. They’ll never help, of course. But whatever you’re doing is the wrongest of wrong things and you should know better and why didn’t you/ haven’t you done this, that or these other things. Everyone knows you should have done this or that. You are a bad person for not doing it. You are greedy, lazy, ungrateful, dumb, etc., etc.

  83. 83.

    Soprano2

    @Yarrow: Yes you can, and I may end up there eventually. Some days it feels that way already, I collapse on the couch at 9:00 and I’m still not done. For now I want to stay in good health so I can help him do the same. The doctor told me the best thing for him is to get out and see people and eat well (which is quite a struggle). I wish you well, your situation sounds crazy making.

  84. 84.

    JoyceH

    Okay so today my phone’s Facebook app stopped working. I’ve tried all the simple stuff and am afraid I’ve got to update iOS. Why does that scare me? Should I be scared?

  85. 85.

    If a Tree Falls

    @PaulWartenberg: If you’re looking to learn how to play, Magic the Gathering: Arena lets you play on your pc or phone against human players. Direct communication is limited to a few bland responses, which cuts out the jerk factor. It’s free to play, but their business model is pretty generous, seeing how they need lots of players to act as the game’s AI.

  88. 88.

    Juju

    @Shalimar: I take care of my mother too. It’s tiring. I get very little help from family, except for my sister, who comes to take care of things when she can hear the tension in my voice. Brothers either live way out of the area, are too busy to visit more than once a year, or I have no contact with, my choice. I am fortunate that my family does appreciate that I give them the option of not worrying because I take care of everything. I’m sorry your family doesn’t appreciate you and the good care you take of your mother. It must make a difficult situation worse. My mother forgets that she’s taken her pills and then gets mad that I have keep them away from her after she took three days worth in one day and still thought she hadn’t taken them. I just go on about what I was doing and she forgets that she’s mad at me.

  89. 89.

    Yarrow

    @Soprano2:  Thank you. I wish you well, too. Caring for someone with dementia is not for the faint of heart. Your doctor is right, but it all falls on you to do the care. It’s exhausting after awhile. But there’s no time for exhaustion because you have to keep going. If you don’t everything will collapse.

  90. 90.

    BruceFromOhio

    @Yutsano: Interviewed on Tuesday for four hours, four different team members in succession. Ignoring the silence from the hiring manager and continuing to look for a job. It fucking sucks.

    Recruiting pro I follow posted a picture of a job seeker dressed as a ghost – “prep for your next Zoom interview” – may as well cuz that’s what’s gonna happen anyway.

    May good fortune find you, or perhaps be found.

  91. 91.

    HumboldtBlue

    @Yarrow: ​ 

    I gotta say, our family was so fortunate to avoid any sort of that kind of drama. We knew what the plan would be as both parents aged and once mom passed and dad got older those plans slowly came into focus — not without some pain and discomfort — but once the transition was made, dad went, as planned, to live with my brother in Dago. He and his family looked after dad over the course of four years, with the help of nurses and at the end, hospice staff.

    There was nothing but offers of help — fly into town for a weekend to give my brother and sil a couple days off — and nothing but profound thanks for what they were doing. It wasn’t easy, it wasn’t comfortable, at least relatively speaking, and towards the end it was sad, but It says a lot about the people I call family, and while I’m not the brightest star among the clan, there are some real gems I call kin.

  94. 94.

    bt

    you’d be surprised what you can get from an antenna, many HD Channels.

    as long as you can get a good signal.

    there’s all the ads for geriatric drugs, personal injury lawyers, and so on to ignore, but it’s a small price to pay.

  95. 95.

    Juju

    @Yarrow: I know exactly how you feel. I tried a Friday to Sunday trip to visit a cousin who was going to do another two year foreign service stint. My sister stayed with my mother, which I thought would work because she’s used to my sister. My mother went from believing I was swindling her and leaving the country with her all her money, to worrying that I was missing and no one knew what happened. She apparently leaned more often to the first thought. She really went off her rocker and talking to me on the phone didn’t help. When I returned she was mad for about 20 minutes and then forgot everything. On occasion she asks me why I abandoned her and how lucky I was that my sister came by to take care of things, or she’s mad that my sister came by uninvited and it was unnecessary for me to arrange that, then she forgets again. It’s interesting what she’ll remember sometimes

     

    @Yarrow: the doctors tried a few different meds for my mother, but they all made her loopy. She heard little men telling her she was going to die in her sleep, or little men were tapping on her teeth to keep her awake and drive her crazy. The doctors said the drugs weren’t helping and were discontinued. Go figure. Your miles may vary.

  96. 96.

    moops

    Uh, you are one of the laid off?  I had heard there was a danger of it coming, but I hadn’t heard it had happened….

  97. 97.

    Soprano2

    @Yarrow: I’m lucky I’m not at that point. I have to make lists of phone calls I need to make so I can remember them.  I need to talk to the attorney about making changes in our trust, when am I going to do that? I’m over two months behind on one part of my job at work partly because I have to take more time off because I have to take hubby to all his appointments now. I’m lucky, they’re understanding. As soon as I get one thing done two more come up to take their place, but I still have it better than most people. I try to remember that.

    I did have one great experience today, though – because I got a new furnace the heat came on by itself this morning. I didn’t have to build a fire to have heat for the first time in 34 years! So, progress….

  98. 98.

    HumboldtBlue

    @Yarrow: ​ 

    This happened back in the 90s and I started dating a lady, and as we got to know one another she asked me where I hung out, who were my friends? I told her, I don’t have too many friends, only two dudes did I become close enough friends with in So Cal to intro to family, and that if she wanted to find me she need look no further than my brother’s house, my sister’s house or my parent’s house.

    I’ve met a lot of people who have nothing to do with their families — obviously, many of them for good reason — and I’m extraordinarily fortunate to be lucky with family.

  101. 101.

    Yarrow

    @Juju:  I’m sorry the meds didn’t work for your mom. Everyone is so different.

    @Soprano2: My kitchen counter is nothing but sticky notes reminding me to do things. My problem is that tasks never, ever seem to get done to the point where I can toss a sticky note. People who are supposed to do things don’t. Balls get dropped. Part gets done, other parts do not. It’s up to me to keep it all in mind and supervise and manage everything because if I don’t, six months down the road I’ll discover something hasn’t been done. And not because I did anything wrong but because I believed and trusted that organizations or people who said they would do things, would do them. Ha ha. Nope. So the sticky notes pile up. And when one thing gets done it seems to create five new tasks for me to do. Just me because no one else can do them.

  102. 102.

    Jay

    @Yarrow:

    I am in that regard, lucky. I moved home to take care of my Mom,( newly divorced) and kept a full time job. When it was Dad’s turn, T and I bought his house and did the same. When each wound up in hospital and then hospice, I showed up 6 days a week, with treats from fresh baked sweets, through dinners (Mom and Dad) to haircuts and shaves, (Dad).

    The rest of the family never gave me any grief, they were just happy that I was carrying the load and they did not have to.

  105. 105.

    Fraud Guy

    I cut cable last year; went to wireless internet, free streaming channels (that I never watch anyway), and cut 160 dollars from my monthly bill not having to pay for “basic” cable.

  106. 106.

    mali muso

    I have spent the past week walking the last 114 kilometers of the Camino de Santiago in Spain. Amazing and grueling experience (walking between 8 and 15 miles each day) that I am really glad I had the chance to do. My feet definitely need a rest though.

  108. 108.

    Ruckus

    I watch Netflix and my moderate DVD collection. Maybe a couple hours a couple hours a day at most and not every day. Do not have cable, haven’t had it for years. I do get the internet and do spend some time on the web. Like here. When it’s not too hot I take walks, an hour or two a day. I do have to say that working for 6 decades was interesting, but I am getting into the groove of retirement. No alarm waking me up, if I’m not tired I stay up, if I am, I sleep. I’ve built a few pieces of furniture, nothing fancy but it works for me. I spent most of my working life designing/making high accuracy things out of metal. This is a hell of a lot more relaxing.

  109. 109.

    Ruckus

    @MomSense:

    In the middle of all this chaos my hot water heater decided to crap out.  I’m too old for cold showers.

    Everyone is too old for cold showers. I used to enjoy the navy, being out to sea and not having enough fresh water to take even cold showers. That BTW is sarcasm. Sleeping in a room (pardon me – compartment) with 80 unwashed men who do physical work all day and no ability to take even a 2 minute navy shower for days/weeks at a time – one of the most enjoyable parts of being in the navy. And just in case you don’t recognize that, IT WAS SNARK. TO THE ENDTH DEGREE.

  110. 110.

    Ruckus

    @HumboldtBlue:

    My only family left are cousins. I am the oldest left in the extended family and the closest lives about 150 miles away. All the aunts/uncles/parents/siblings are gone. The nearest cousin is 150 miles away all the rest are at least 2 states away, some over 3000 miles.

  111. 111.

    Splitting Image

    I’m playing the the city-building game Pharaoh, by Impressions. I bought it years ago in a collection with Zeus and Caesar 3 and got bogged down in the Old Kingdom campaign. I finally completed that campaign 20 years later and am now halfway through the whole game.

    As for cable, I cut the cord 20 years ago and never looked back. I did invest heavily in DVDs for quite awhile, and built up a pretty good library of movies and TV shows to watch. “No commercials and available when I want them” is a good selling point for me, so I never got into streaming or anything that seemed like an updated cable service. I do feel like an old fogey when people talk some of the more recent shows, though. There are a lot of shows tover the years (like Game of Thrones) which had millions of followers but which I never bothered with.

  113. 113.

    CaseyL

    I feel for all of you dealing with spouses and parents with dementia.

    My Dad took up a lousy and dangerous lifestyle after he and Mom divorced, such that over time he alienated everyone in the family.  He wound up having a psychotic break and losing all short term memory, a situation that ended with me being his legal guardian for about two and a half years.  One problem was that I live in Seattle, he lived in Florida, and I certainly wasn’t going to move to Florida.  So I’d fly out there a few times a year to try taking care of things.  There were additional problems that made it impossible for me to actually make any decisions on his behalf (he had no short term memory at all, but was perfectly lucid otherwise, and no doctor would declare him incompetent) . After two years of having responsibility but no authority I just couldn’t take it anymore and basically signed him over to professional guardians.

    The ironic thing is, he lived to age 82 – longer than any of his siblings, who lived normal middle-class lives.

  114. 114.

    Citizen Alan

    @dr. luba: I cut cable many years ago, but now I need to start cutting streaming services. Yesterday, I was shocked to realize I am still paying for Hulu, and I don’t remember the last thing I watched on it. If it weren’t for Doctor Who, Rick & Morty, various Marvel shows, and Bake-Off, I would probably never watch TV at all.

  115. 115.

    Citizen Alan

    @geg6: I’m very happy with my job and my present status in Fresno (except for air quality–my allergies are somehow worse here than in rural Mississippi!). And yet, I still feel this constant low level anxiety all the time. It’s maddening. I genuinely think it’s PTSD from politics.

  116. 116.

    Soprano2

    @Yarrow: I hate how you have to ride people constantly to get things done. Hubby had a problem with his Dexcom meter, the doctor’s office couldn’t download the data. It said no device detected. It took 3 phone calls with the Dexcom people asking the same crap, did you do this, did you do that,  plus submitting an online ticket, just to get it resolved. I almost yelled at the third person that I already answered all these questions, why was she asking me again? Do they have a lot of people lie to them regularly, or can they not read the file? Is there even a file they can read? It seems that no one does anything in a timely manner anymore, it makes me crazy! Why are you wasting my time?

  117. 117.

    eclare

    @Citizen Alan:

    At a few minutes after 2 am, there is some sort of system backup.  In the past, if I let the comment just sit there and process, it will eventually post.  It just takes a while.

  118. 118.

    Bruce K in ATH-GR

    I remember when my family moved from New Jersey, where we had DirecTV satellite because of a Cablevision dispute that blacked out the Yankee games, to an apartment in midtown New York. For lack of a place to put a satellite dish on the side of a 24-story building where we were renters, we had to discontinue the satellite TV, and DirecTV would. not. get. the. hint. I got designated as the person to deal with DirecTV, and it was like they refused to acknowledge that it wasn’t the money, it wasn’t the quality of service, it was that there was no bloody place to put the dish.

    When I moved to Athens, I essentially quit watching TV, aside from occasional streaming things. When I upgraded my internet connection a few years ago, the phone company threw in TV-over-IP as part of the package, but in the three or four years since they sent me their streaming box, I don’t think I’ve watched 24 hours … total

    Been playing some Starfield, amusing myself by trying to turn an ugly-but-useful ship into something a little more elegant.

  119. 119.

    sab

    My stepson got me a fancy tv for Christmas last year that was supposed to go into our new room that overlooks the backyard. I was very not thrilled, because I wanted the new room to remain tv free. I could sit out there and read and drink tea and look out at the backyard. So I dragged my heels a lot. It was about six months before he was able to drop the tv off at our house, and then a few more months before we scheduled a time for him to come over and set things up. And that was only because our cats were peeing on the tv box in their room.

    It has been great. The new tv is not connected to cable. It can talk to the internet and we got it a britbox subscription. So no cable news. We are working our way through britbox, and eventually we’ll get Acorn. I also donate to our local PBS/NPR/classical music conglomerate so I should be able to get passport to the PBS archives if I can get stepson to program that. So now we have these nightly tv watching sessions with programs I like, not just sports and American sitcoms with angry families or friends sniping at each other for laughs.

    We still have cable in the living room for sports. I never had cable at all until I got married 25 years ago. I had an old tv that I had bought at a yard sale and rarely turned on. The cable subscription was something he required as a condition for moving in with me.

    And I still have my little portable radio that follows me around in the house now that our classical music station has moved back into Cleveland so that I can pick it up.

    Books are easier.

  121. 121.

    m.j.

    There was this magic time. I think it was 1983 or so. I was living in a band-house. We had a satellite dish, one of those enormous metal-mesh things in the backyard. This was before they started to scramble the signal (porn was catching on). It was wonderful. You could watch anything.

    Part of the fun was having one guy watching the tube with another guy at the window shouting at the guy cranking the dish to focus on the right satellite.

  122. 122.

    sab

    @Bruce K in ATH-GR: When I was a kid in Florida not near a big city, my parents refused to pay for cable, so our tv signal came all the way from Orlando. We got the sound but the picture was murky. Our favorite show was Seahunt. Lloyd Bridges was swimming in clear water in California but we couldn’t see that. We thought he was swimming in murky waters just like our tidal estuary.

  123. 123.

    satby

    @zhena gogolia: Me, too. Haven’t even connected the new TV I bought to replace the old one, though I dumped the cable 6 years ago. I have Prime and Netflix and I just keep forgetting to dump Netflix because I haven’t watched that either. I added Britbox and PBS channels to my Prime and that’s enough since I can only manage to stay awake through 1-2 shows or one movie a night.

  124. 124.

    Andrew Abshier

    Good for you.  I gave up cable in 2011 when I realized I was watching less than 4 hours a week of TV, and I haven’t looked back.   I don’t stream, either.   I do watch things on YouTube, but a lot of it is foreign language material.  When I’m learning languages (current one is Brazilian Portuguese) it’s good ear training.

  125. 125.

    NotMax

    Let Roku be your new BFF. Best one time 25 buck (then*) purchase ever.

    Incidentally, Netflix raising prices effective immediately. And a reminder that many streaming services offer lower rates (sometimes dramatically lower) for Black Friday/Cyber Monday.

    *still not that much more to buy. Prices nearly always drop during Black Friday event.

  127. 127.

    sab

    It has been fun watching my Irish American husband adjust to British accents on tv. I keep telling him that most of those actors are Irish/whatever. English, Scottish.  He was determined to find them incomprehensible. After a big dose of Shetland he admits that we do speak the same language ( with major differences.)

  128. 128.

    sab

    @sab: Also too, Vera in Northumberland he finds harder to understand than the Shetland guys. Vera’s main actress is from Kent putting on a Geordie accent (not convincingly to this American) and all the other actors are a mix of North English and Scottish. Of course my husband is confused.

    I live in Ohio and we have at least five regional accents within the state.  Casting for accents isn’t easy, and doing a different regional accent is more difficult. I know that, having moved a lot as a child between different regions. Every school year was a new accent.

  129. 129.

    eclare

    @sab:

    When I lived in London I had a Scottish landlord.  I never understood a word he said.  Whenever he spoke to me my reply was always “the check will be on the windowsill.”

  130. 130.

    frosty

    @Ivan X: I don’t know what a Firestick does that a Roku doesn’t. It was the first streaming thingy Ms F bought. I use the Roku.

  131. 131.

    sab

    @eclare: Doug Henshal’s approach (Glasgow approach to the linguistic issues) has been to yell at you louder until you understand ( ALL CAPS ON THE INTERNET.) Henshal is Shetland star. He does tone down Glasgow accent completely when he is acting in Shetland.

  132. 132.

    sab

    @eclare: And he didn’t understand a word you said: “Americans from the South speak so slowly that I fall asleep halfway through the sentence.”

  133. 133.

    eclare

    @sab:

    So true.  And I sometimes think “you are talking too fast for my ears to hear.”  There is some reporter for MSNBC that I swear needs to be slowed down at least by half, she is exhausting to try to listen to.

  134. 134.

    NotMax

    @frosty

    Firestick sends every iota of data it can cull directly to Amazon. As an advocate for any modicum of increased privacy that’s troublesome. Roku, at least, is not as arduous in shooting so much data upstream.

  136. 136.

    HeartlandLiberal

    Cole, we did this more than 15 years ago. We moved six months ago into senior retirement community, and the rent includes Comcast TV with maybe a zillion channels. In the six months time, I have watched one thing, the Ohio State vs Indiana football game. I turned it off at half time, because of the commercials. My wife watched a show with an individual featured in a new book by a friend of ours in California. That is the sum total of watching TV in our household over six months. We subscribe to Netflix, MHZ Choice, and Amazon Prime, so we are EVER at a lost for anything to watch. Oh, and we just subscribed to our local PBS stations, TV and Radio, so now we get to watch everything on PBS website.

  138. 138.

    Raoul Paste

    @geg6: You might take Jean to a neurologist.  In our case, it took a few months to get an appointment, but the expertise made all the difference in getting the right diagnosis and the appropriate medicine.

  139. 139.

    VeniceRiley

    There is a Disney plus espn plus hulu package out there for cheap. And Plus has several series shows and channels. I’d go for that.

    I may do it anyway and vpn to a US server and use my us bank account.

  141. 141.

    taumaturgo

    What I’m up to? Working on this riddle:

    We are bamboozled by biases, fooled by fallacies, entrapped by errors, hoodwinked by heuristics, deluded by illusions.” Koen Smets

  142. 142.

    la caterina

    @Raoul Paste: Yes to a neurologist consult!  My mother in law had one of the few treatable conditions that lead to dementia type symptoms.  Years after the symptoms started, she finally got a cat scan and had surgery, but by then the damage was done.

  143. 143.

    mvr

    @Yarrow: Family care is exhausting. Family care is worse when other family give you crap about it. I’m sorry you are dealing with this.

  147. 147.

    Ruckus

    Got rid of cable long ago. I get Netflix and the internet. I have DVDs of shows I like. Some I haven’t watched for some time so I’m going through them – slowly. I spend most of my time on line or out for walks when it isn’t in the 90s. Actually about 85 is my limit. Then I walk a couple of miles. I can still do it fast but the old ticker really gets unhappy about that. So I’ve slowed down. It’s not like I don’t have time to waste on doing nothing…. After 60 yrs of working this retirement stuff is nice, other than getting used to not doing much of anything strenuous whatsoever.

  148. 148.

    Ruckus

    @HumboldtBlue:

    In some ways I’m glad I worked longer than most, no one thinks I’m as old as I am and I have built most of my furniture, one more piece to go. I am starting to think about selling my car while it still has some value, there is a decent service around here for city transit and I take the overhead electric train for far less than gas to get to the doc and dentist. The train takes time but then I have that and it costs 35 cents to travel all the way across LA county. Actually the train time is not much different than driving – sometimes even faster and far less stressful.

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