The good, the bad, and the ugly- about tv...

On Sunday, we canceled our satellite service. We're going to try to just make it with our HD antenna and streaming Netflix.

It was a tough decision for us. We had Directv for 8 years, and we'd pretty much become addicted to tivo. All of us. Even the girls. Once, I remember watching an amazing sunset with Big Sis when she realized she needed to go potty. She started squirming and jumping up & down, and then she turned to me and said, "Mom, can you pause it? I'll be right back."

And even Little Sis has been known to ask for something "adin, adin" after seeing a song she especially enjoys between shows on Noggin.

As for Hubby & I, our evening routine has come to consist of sitting down and watching whatever we are "the most behind on" according to how many episodes we have on the recorder. I've sometimes felt almost obligated to see all the shows we've missed- because they are there, waiting.

Well, not anymore. Which is good, because the television isn't telling us what to do anymore. We don't have to feel any sense of obligation to network shows from three weeks ago.

Only now we can't pause anything, so if we do want to watch something, we have to plan even more carefully and only get up during commercials and pray the girls go to bed before the show starts and... you get the point. We're still adjusting. The other bad part is that if there is something mildly interesting on, I feel compelled to stay up & watch it because we can't just record it and watch it again later.

Of course, we're getting used to the idea of catching up on hulu, and more importantly, just not worrying about it. The last few times my parents visited, we all wanted to watch something different on Thursday nights. So we tivoed the NBC lineup, watched CSI with them, and Grey's lost out. And you know what? I didn't care as much as I thought. I watched it online during naptime one day, or I didn't. And it life went on.

That's when I thought maybe cutting our dependence on Satellite would be a good idea. Hubby thought long and hard about it, and came to the same conclusion. He has other ways to watch his sports, but it will still be a bigger sacrifice for him than for me. I am proud of him.

Will it be inconvenient at times? Definitely. But I'm hoping that we'll make better use of our time. The other night he cleaned out the garage. It looks ah-mazing. And we'll be saving money each month that can be put to better use.

So we'll take the good, we'll take the bad. We'll take them both and then we'll have... sigh. Okay, giving up some of our tv will be harder than I thought...

But there is something else we are already learning. And I'm about to sound like an old lady, but here goes... because we always recorded our shows and watched them at our convenience, we never knew what came on when. I had no idea that How I Met Your Mother is on in the 8 o'clock time slot. Seriously? That show is ALL about sex. I don't usually consider myself a socially conservative person, but even I am wondering what is going to happen in a few years when Big Sister is staying up later. Homework & Dvds, I guess... Ain't no way a seven year old needs to be watching what's on these days. It is ugly. I even worry about the commercials during football games- especially after Big Sis showed lots of interest in a skanky Christina Aguillera one...

That's why I think this will be good. Mostly. Because we're showing our kids our priorities and our values with how we spend our money & our time. And I'm hoping we'll be spending less of both on tv these days.

But, there are still some incredible things on tv. Like this clip my Dad just told me about. How did I miss this? You know I'm a sucker for spontaneous mass choreography...




See TV? I don't hate you. I just need to have a healthier relationship with you. And I've got a feeling this is going to be good.

By the way, Nikki B at Life as We Know It has been writing about this same thing. Check it out!