Anomaly? C'est moi!

For those of you who may not know, we don't have cable TV. Or satellite TV. No rabbit ears, antennae or anything else that might bring channels into our house.  We physically own a TV which we use to watch old Stargate episodes and movies for date night.

There's a reason why we decided to cancel our cable service and not bring it back, but we'll get there in a minute.

At this point, though, I think the response that I get from people who can't fathom life without TV is reason enough to never go back. One coworker used to get so frustrated that she couldn't talk to me about TV shows that she stopped coming by my office for a week or two. That was the extreme.

Sometimes I get the eye rolling that comes from someone realizing that I have no clue what they're talking about halfway through their conversation.

Yesterday, however, was a classic example of why we should never go back to cable.

A coworker, B, made some reference to a TV show; it seemed to be for an older cartoon which I may have seen snippets of but clearly not enough to catch what he was saying. My coworker managed to work through his disbelief that I hadn't seen that particular show and suggested a more current show to watch in order to catch up.

This is where the fun begins, you see.

At this point I see J, the coworker who sits next to me, settling in for the fun. She's seen this happen a few times, and I think she enjoys it as much as I do.

So let's capture the stages of grief, shall we?


Stage 1: Shock
B: At least watch Looney Tunes.
T: (opens mouth to respond)
J: She doesn't have TV! (She loves ripping off that bandaid quickly, I see.)
B: (looks at me, mouth open, disbelieving.)

And this point, it apparently becomes incredibly important to at least nail down that we physically own a TV.

B: You don't have TV?
T: We own an actual TV, yes. But we don't have cable.
B: Satellite?
T: No.
B: Antenna?
T: Nope.
B: Rabbit ears?!? (The desperation starts to show here.)

Stage 2: Denial

J has leaned in at this point to make sure she's still part of the show.

J: Tell him why, Thelma.
B: Why what?
J: Why they don't have TV.
B: (Looks expectantly at me, hoping for something, anything to make sense of this madness.)
T: Well, at one point a few years back, we found that we were scheduling our lives around TV shows we liked. And then one night I almost told a friend who desperately needed to talk that I couldn't go for coffee because a show was on. That's when we knew it was time.

Stage 3: Anger

This stage is typically silent. This is usually the point where J is laughing and I'm smiling. B, however, is working through his own issues. Occasionally Stage 3 will take a few days; sometimes they'll come back to my office with reinforcements. Reinforcements are necessary for Stage 4.

Stage 4: Bargaining
B: You know you can get a DVR now, right? So you could record the shows you want, still go out with your friend and watch the shows without missing anything.
T: (shrugs) We've been without TV for five years now. I don't really feel like paying for it anymore. And a lot of shows are online now.
B: Yes, but you can't wait it live online!!
T: You wouldn't if you DVRed it either, though.
J: (nodding by this time... she's seen this before)
B: But what if you miss a week, and the episode isn't online anymore? What do you do then?
T: I don't watch it. (I will admit that for this one, I do try to make it glaringly obvious how much of a non-issue it is.)
B: (disgusted silence.)
J: Cut from a different cloth, isn't she?

Stage 4 can often last awhile. People will bargain for days. It's incredible, really, how important it is to them for me to see the importance of having TV.

Reaching the next stage is usually a grudging transition from thinking they can save me to writing me off completely.

Stage 5: Acceptance
B: Whatever. You're weird.

It's a hoot. Seriously, at this point, the entertainment value of everyone's shock that we don't have TV is far too high to give that up. And who doesn't love hearing that you're cut from a different cloth?!

If you're reading this for the first time and having to go through the five stages of TV grief, I'm truly sorry. If it makes you feel better, I do watch The Amazing Race online and haven't missed an episode yet. And 'my' doctors are going to win.

Hopefully that help. If not, call my coworker, J. She has bandaids. She's been through this before. She can probably help.