30 days of truth: yeah, I'd get rid of that

Day 16: Someone or something you definitely could live without.

I looooove TV. Love it, love it, love it. I love the fact that we have a giant one in our living room. I love that I can record four shows at once and watch them whenever I feel like it. I watch sci-fi, drama, and a smidgen of comedy. I watch all sorts of dirty reality shows like The Real Housewives of _(insert city here)_, but some really great ones as well, such as Top Chef. I watch Glee. I will turn it on and put it on mute while I listen to music and do stuff on the computer.

Yeah, I love TV.

Growing up, I remember having something like 5 channels, including channels 52, 48, 15, etc. We got only the basic of basics. It wasn't until I was 14 or so that we got a dish service that didn't royally suck. It wasn't until I got my driver's license that we had something resembling cable. I didn't get my own TV in my room until I was 17.

But once out on my own, I became so addicted. And it got worse when I finally had a DVR, after I met my soon-to-be-hubby. I could actually pick and choose what I watched. Suddenly, TV became even more interesting than before. When my grading was done, I was glued to that thing (while surfing the Internet as well, of course). I watched a ton of TV while pregnant. Really, what else was I going to do?

Then G was born. At only a few months old, his eyes would wander toward our giant TV in the middle of the living room. How could he resist? Here was this black sliver of a machine that flickered bright and colorful images. What baby wouldn't like TV? But I was disturbed by the fact that later on, he would actually fuss if we didn't turn him toward it. Despite our efforts to keep him from watching it, he knew it was there and when it was on. Gimme TV, my kid would fuss at 3 months old.

Yeah, so not happening, child of mine.

While home by myself, I decided to turn it off one day. I was trying to play with G and his eyes kept wandering to the TV behind me. I turned it off and didn't turn it back on until later that evening. The house was quiet. I could hear G clearly when he talked to me. Babycake is a way vocal baby - check out a video I'm posting tomorrow morning for a bit of that cuteness. G didn't miss it when it was off... and strangely, I didn't either.

Since then, I've turned it on while G is asleep to watch a few shows I have recorded. I also keep it on right before the hubs comes home. We restrict what G watches to just a few minutes here and there a day, mostly by accident, except for football on Sundays when he can watch all he likes. He looooves watching football with all those pretty colors and the fast movement, and while it's certainly not going to enrich his development, I doubt it'll hurt him either. Sometimes if he's really fussy, especially at the end of the day, we'll watch a few short clips of Yo Gabba Gabba!

In short, I've rather grown to like my quieter days. Sometimes I'll go most of the day without turning it on. Sometimes I won't even turn it on during his naps. Today, I maybe had it on for two hours. That's a huge difference for me. This TV experiment has proven that I really could go without watching it at all. I'd get used to it eventually, like I have cutting back my hours.

And really, if I want to watch something that badly, I could always find it on the Internet. Oh, Internet, how I love thee. Let me count the ways...