Thursday, April 24, 2008

Yes, really. Just one TV.

Our cable company is switching to all digital programming shortly, and they've been inundating us with letters announcing the upcoming change. The problem is if you have an older television, you need to have a cable box attached to it or it will no longer work. Okay, no problem. Our TV is old, but we have a cable box so I keep throwing away the letters.

So, today I get a call from the cable company saying they haven't heard from us about the upcoming change and they wanted to make sure we understood that older televisions without a cable box will no longer work.

Her: How many televisions do you have in your house?

Me: One.

Her: Just one?

Me: Yes.

Her: Because you only have one cable box. Any televisions that aren't hooked up to a cable box won't work after the conversion.

Me: I understand. We just have one TV.

Her: Okay (with a tone of "are you nuts" in her voice). Well, you'll be fine for the conversion then.

Me: Thanks.

Is it so weird to only have one television? What would we do with more televisions? I guess we're lucky that for the most part, TK and I watch the same stuff. Fine, I can't handle all the Stargates and he can't stand One Tree Hill, but we just stick those on the DVR and watch when the other is doing something else. But generally, we have the same taste. He says something like, "did you hear there's a new show coming on about a guy who gets a computer downloaded into his head that stars the guy who played Jayne in Firefly?" and I say "Wow, that sounds awesome". Or I say, "Oh my gosh, there's a Terminator show on TV that stars the girl who played River on Firefly!" and he says, "When's it on?"

Yes, we pretty much revolve our television watching around actors who appeared on Firefly. Or other Joss Whedon shows. What can I say? We're both total geeks. And I guess that's why we only need one television.

So how many TVs do you have? Please tell me, is it really that odd to just have one television?

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

I'm embarrassed to respond to this post.

But I will be brave, and share my shame, but with a lot of backstory:

When we moved into the house we're in now, I confessed to DH that what I really wanted was a TV in the kitchen, because I find watching TV while I cook to be a great joy in life. (And, it turns out, that we keep it on nearly constantly now because we listen to commercial-free music on the TV all day long. There's a SHOWTUNES STATION!! How lucky am I?)

Anyway, so it was a major hurdle for me to become a two TV household, because I never thought of myself as that much of a TV watcher, and I certainly don't come from TV watchers.

AND THEN, we finished our basement & bought a new TV for our living room, which means - yes - we now have THREE TELEVISIONS.

And yet, with all that, my poor deprived daughter still isn't allowed to watch TV. :) And now she won't get to for ages longer. We had been going to wait till she was 2, but her little brother won't be allowed to watch till HE'S two, which means she's got to wait till she's more than 4. I'm sure she'll survive.

10 lbs of awesome in a 5 lb bag said...

We have three. One is in the basement, where we have a treadmill and some other exercise equipment. The second one, on which we watch most shows, is in our den/family room. The third one is in our bedroom, by my wife's demand. I really don't like having it in there, but I lost that battle. Her only concession to me was to make it so that we can't watch it from bed.

Anonymous said...

yes, my friend. the cable company dude (and his colleagues) are still talking about "the residents who only have one TV".

i hardly watch TV at all, neither does DH, but yet we somehow are the owners of three television sets. one in our LR, one in the loft/spare BR and one in our BR. we've never bought a TV as a couple, all of these are eons old and still work, so i guess we just held on to them!

Mary Ellen said...

We have just one -- and we keep it in the "cold room," which will soon become the "hot room," which means we don't watch it too much... And (shh!) we have free cable! When we moved into our house, it was just there! But we don't have a cable box, which means we might lose it when they do this fancy switchover. Aagh!

Anonymous said...

ONE TV for us too.
More out of poverty than anything else. But we have a nice stack of gift cards we've saved up from Xmas and Bdays to Best Buy so a new one is on it's way.....which will just replace our one which is over 10 years old...So still...will have only 1!
But once my mom moves up I'm CERTAIN we will then have 2.

pink cake box said...

That is funny, that happened to us when we moved to a new apartment and the cable guy could not believe we only have one TV. What is wrong with that anyway??? And so yeah we also have one TV and its not even ours....well it was given to us!
When Bri and I was still on an adventure (meaning..he wasnt done with school yet and I worked just to have fun! And of course pay bills) we didnt really have any money to replace our TV after it blew up from Conan O'Brien's joke...and I'm serious. It was like in a movie, he made a joke then the TV sparked and turned off and suddenly there was smoke coming out. Anyway so we lived for months without one and it was great! We spent more time reading and talking to each other and playing with game boards.
Then we moved near my parents and my mom could not grasp the idea of having no TV, so she got us one.
I really miss those days without TV. Now its almost like we stare at the TV when the Toddler goes to sleep...spaced out! So exhausted we get lost inside that box. Cant wait for that one to blow up. I should watch Conan more often!