Downgrading

Well, we did it. We got rid of our Dish Network satellite. Friday, our phone company came and installed a digital programming through the phone lines or something like that. I'm not sure exactly what it is. I'm sure Preach understands it all. All I know is, we only have local channels plus a couple of Spanish channels, C-Span (who in the heck actually watches that channel????), and HSN. It's going to be $25 a month for 2 TV's.

The kids are having a meltdown. They are acting like their dog died or something. I've never seen such sad faces and "poor, pitiful me" sighs. They don't know it, but that only reinforces our knowledge that we did the right thing.

(sigh) It's hard on me, too. I am addicted to the TV, too! I *heart* reality TV! I'm not ashamed of it, either. ;) And "Top Chef" was JUST starting! UGH!

Why did we do this? Why did we give up 24/7 cartoons? Well, there are a few reasons:

1) We wanted to spend more time together as a family, doing something besides watching TV. We've been talking about this for a looooong time.

2) I don't know if you knew this or not, but Cartoon Network turns into "Adult Swim" at night. And "Adult Swim" is absolutely nasty. It's cartoons geared toward adults, I guess. To be honest, if you are watching this crap, you need to re-think it. My FIL told us that he heard that this crap was on Cartoon Network at night, so DH and I decided to check it out. We turned it on like at 10:00 PM one night. I can't remember the name of the show, but what we saw was disgusting. It as a cartoon about all the ways you can die. They showed bombs with realistic body parts going everywhere, gunshots, stabbings, hanging, and various kinds of torture. It was just death after death after death..... It was so disturbing. It was worse than any rated R movie I've seen. So be careful, if you have this channel, and your children are left unattended at night with the remote.

3) Recently, we were sitting at the kitchen table eating supper, with the TV blasting away downstairs. All of the sudden, Prince says, "That is so silly! You can't fall in love by just making a phone call!" Preach and I say, "What??" Prince says that he heard that commercial again. We go and check the TV, and it was turned to a CARTOON station! And they were having commercials about calling and finding your "true love". Obviously, the kids had seen it before. Isn't that just WRONG???

So that's why we have made this switch. It's not foolproof. I know there are still shows and commercials on local channels that are not what I want my kids to see. But at least there are less of them to monitor. One day, maybe we can come to the point where we can turn off the TV totally. But we're just taking it one step at a time. :)