Brain Blast! My life without cable

Before I start, let me just say that I'm sorry for not keeping up with this thing. Life can get crazy at times. Okay, now I'm going to start.

I was babysitting for my neighbor the other day. Her kids just didn't want to go to sleep. Finally, I was persuaded by the younger one to let her fall asleep in the living room while watching cartoons. It took me at least ten minutes to figure out how to change the channel (they have satalite). By the time I found some cartoons, I looked over to ask her if she liked what I had on, and she was sleeping. Just then, the older came down and asked if he could watch some cartoons. He looked pretty tired, and I figured he wouldn't last much longer than his sister did. I said sure. We ended up turning on one of the branches of Nick. A movie was on that combined two cartoons: Jimmy Neutron and Fairly Odd Parents. As predicted, the boy fell asleep like five minutes into the movie. I, however, seemed to be captivated by the animated world. I watched the entire movie, plus the movie after that. That's like three hours of my life wasted. I still had another two or so hours until I was done babysitting, so I read part of my book. How in the world did I spend three hours of my time watching a pointless TV cartoon movie?

Let's go back to about six months ago. My parents were upset at how much the TV was on in our house. "Down with cable TV" was the battle cry. At first, I was overwhelmed with the thought of losing my beloved Jimmy Neutron and Fairly Odd Parents (they seriously were my favorite shows). After thinking about however, I realized that no TV was probably a good thing. Well, we tried it. I'm not saying that I never watch TV anymore, but there are so few shows on the ten or so chanels that we have which I think are worth watching, that my TV time was dramaticly cut. I still wish that I had more time, but who doesn't? Without cable, I actually read. I never used to read before, but now, if I get a spare moment, I'll flip open a book and dig in. My siblings are doing more outside the home (well, maybe not Trevor...he really likes Saved By the Bell). It just seemed to be an all around good move. Kudos to my parents.

Three hours of a TV movie now seems like a lot. Six months ago though, three hours was probably what I watched on a Saturday (and that's not the Saturdays with movies on). Sure, I miss the childish comedy of Fairly Odd Parents and the catchy phrases like, "Brain Blast!" on Jimmy Neutron, but hey, that's what Trevor and Rachael are for. I guess the best thing about no cable is that I find myself with more time, and time is something priceless to me. I'm really happy here in my life without cable.