Your Mom Dot Com

Getting rid of cable was the dumbest thing I’ve ever done, and I once put an electric thermometer in the microwave to “see how hot it would get.”

As I’ve mentioned before, we decided to cut the cable cord. Boy oh boy did we feel pretty darn terrific about ourselves when it happened. I had the honor of making the call to Comcast and giving them my toughest “You know what? We just want to cancel everything!” and “No, Comcast, you listen to me.” (I didn’t say that). I also had the honor of dropping off the cable box in person at the Comcast store, so I could show everyone who worked there that my life was very interesting because I no longer watch television and that they better hold onto their hats because this company was going DOWN. 

I think it’s the closest I’ve ever felt to being part of a revolution. Comcast was going to burn to the ground while we, the people, were going to catatonically watch Hulu on its ashes. It’s a really great time to be alive, folks. 

Within two hours, however, I realized that this was a horrible mistake. You see, there is very little joy when there are babies in your house. You need to take the mindless pleasures where you can get them. For me, those include: watching 10 episodes of Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives on a Friday night because nothing else is on, stumbling onto the opening scene of The Italian Job on TBS, and finding out there’s a toe fungus pill out there called “Jublia” (you can only imagine the emotional effect this has on a person named Julia). I once watched an episode of Famiy Feud where a guy’s immediate, lightning-fast response to “things you see on the side of the road” was “carnage.” He meant to say “carcass,” and was SO confident it was “carnage” that he just kept on going. 

These are precious, comforting moments for me, a person who associates “regular TV” with the end of the day. Can you recreate these moments exclusively using streaming? Sure. But why would I willfully select DDD on Netflix just to watch Guy Fieri dig his pinky into a big pot of marinara? That just seems excessive.

And then there’s the money. Cutting the cord ended up costing us more than our astronomical cable bill. In addition to fees for five different streaming services, my husband was shelling out for bar tabs every week just to watch a few games of his choosing. He’s an avid sports fan which, again, makes this whole decision to deprive ourselves all the more preposterous. 

Plus, “all that free time”as a result of no tv was a complete myth. Instead, we couldn’t figure out what to do and got caught blowing through two long seasons of “The Fall” on Netflix, which is about a serial killer who does unthinkable things to his female victims. And his wife is a NICU nurse (why?). And there’s a cat that I kept thinking was going to get sliced up. Aside from Gillian Anderson’s perfect skin and hair, the show scared me to death, and was a poignant reminder of what can happen when you remove Family Feud from the viewing rotation. 

So, a few months later, we came crawling, begging back to Comcast. I told them over the phone that we not only needed to reactivate the account, but add MORE channels. I apologized. I skipped out of the Comcast store when I picked up our new box.

The other night, I stayed up until midnight despite having an infant who wakes up every three hours and a toddler who starts the day at 6:30am. But it was ok because I was doing something more important than sleeping: watching Limitless on FX (with commercials) while debating whether or not it was the dumbest movie ever made with my husband.