Roy was in Sam's Club a while back and the young man selling satellite service asked him who provided his TV service. When Roy told him that we had over-the-air TV service and it was free, the sales guy was puzzled. His manager had never told him about that and he couldn't compete with free TV. We had a good laugh about that. Imagine not knowing you can actually watch TV for free. Amazing!
Growing up in the country outside a very small town in PA, I never had the luxury of having cable TV or satellite for that matter. In those days, the satellite was huge and confusing - and cable never made it to our road. Not enough people to make it worth it. I loved going to my friend's homes because they had MTV, HBO, and all these other really cool stations. Roy was one of those kids. He grew up on military bases and his dad is a TV watcher. Every room in the house had a TV (the way Roy tells it) and they were on a lot so cable was a basic need.
When I had my first apartment, I got basic cable but when I moved to the studio apartment on Kings Hwy, I got an antenna and put it in the window. I was able to pick up about 6 channels and I didn't miss cable. When there wasn't something to watch, I would turn on the radio. And it made me more active, I would go do things instead of sitting in front of the TV.
When I moved out to the country, they were installing cable TV lines. Roy signed us up. It was expensive and there wasn't much more to watch than what was on the regular channels. We switched to satellite. I think it was Direct TV. It was over $50 a month, which I think is a lot for TV, and I was trying to pay off debt and make major improvements to our home. Every penny counted. And when you can sit and keep flipping through the channels hoping to find something to watch, you are usually successful and with that projects go undone.
So, one day I called and cut off our service. Roy knew I was going to do it. I'm not sure he was very happy with that decision but he went with it. We had an antenna (a really big one) that wasn't being used. We hooked it up and we had TV. Now I am not going to tell you it was heaven. We only had 6 channels to pick from and I had to listen to a lot of complaining from dear sweet husband.
We were glad that digital conversion brought us more options. Now we have about 15 channels to pick from and one of them is a dedicated South Texas weather channel. Another is Qubo and they play cartoons 24 hours a day. PBS now has three channels and that is what we watch the most. Roy enjoys their news programs and Sy and I enjoy the travel and nature shows.
Walmart has a DVR that you can buy and hook up to your TV. I, like most people, thought you couldn't get DVR unless you had TV service. When we finally break down and go to a flat screen TV (I know we are dinosaurs over here), we will probably also buy that so we can record some of the shows we enjoy and watch when it's convenient for us.
The investment is in an antenna, cable and a splitter, if you have more than one TV. http://www.antennatv.tv/ will tell you what stations you can get at your address and recommend an antenna for your needs. If you have a flat screen TV, you don't need a converter box. The 7 inch flat screen TV Roy put in the greenhouse gets a beautiful picture using a small antenna.
I know it's a big step to cut off TV service, but it's nice not to be free of that payment every month and always wondering what's on to watch. So instead of surfing the channels, go out and throw a frisbee with your kids and use the monthly TV service payment to go for dinner or better yet, add it to your vacation fund and build even more memories with your family.
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