The TV, The DVR, and Me

This is a story about a TV a DVR and me. Ten years ago we moved from a relatively decent size town, (if you call a decent sized town one with a flailing mall and seven grocery stores)to a one stop light town with no mail delivery and a cable TV network that catered to sports and kids. Goodbye Lifetime movies, goodbye anything geared toward women unless you enjoy home improvement shows and want to learn to cook. In time I discovered TLC and learned to enjoy shows such as Trading Spaces and What Not to Wear. Because hello, who doesn't want to go up to people they know and say "Oh girl did you get dressed in the dark this morning?" or "I'm sorry sir but what about the shorts, black socks and tennis shoes did you think was a good idea?" Personally I wouldn't do that but somehow when Stacy and Clinton do it, it amuses me. I also really enjoyed it when on Trading Spaces the people don't like what was done to their house. I always wondered if their friendships survived it.

Keep in mind I was home alone with a 3 yr old and a 2 yr old. Both of whom while I was in the restroom one day, took it upon themselves to take crayons and color big circles on my nice white walls. You can get a little punchy. So watching other people either getting their house messed up by their friends or getting cornered by their friends and told they dressed like a preschooler made my life seem a little simpler. So what if I have animal crackers ground in my carpet and the only thing I have time to put on is sweats, at least my friends aren't around putting me on national TV and telling me I dress like an idiot. It made me happier.

We lived with my days being filled with Blues Clues during the day even during nap time and my nights being filled with sporting events for six years. Then we upgraded to Dish. With Dish you get so many more sports channels and kid channels. Which was their motivation. My motivation was Lifetime television is awesome at Christmas time with the Fa la la la Lifetime movies and HBO. If I can't get to the movies at least if I wait long enough I can see them at home on HBO.

With the Dish we also got a DVR which eliminated the need for our VCR. Yes we were probably the last known humans still using it. But now that we have the DVR our lives are forever changed. I was very excited to get this gadget. I don't always get to see things when they are on and now that I have it I can barely stand to watch things while they are on because it's so fast to watch them on the DVR. It's so easy to skip the commercials. My problem is that now the children are 14 and 13 and 7 and they truly believe that this gadget belongs to them. We have at any given time no more than 2 hrs and 30 minutes left of recording time. They have every Disney and Nick show they watch being recorded. If a new movie on one of those stations is coming on, you better believe it's being recorded. At one time one of the stations we get was showing The Amanda Show, it isn't on anymore so of course we need those recorded and protected. Good Burger is protected. It's getting ridiculous! I have maybe six shows I want to record every week. I get to them when I can then delete them. They delete some but everything they watch is protected.

Finally I put my foot down. I have two episodes of Psych recorded that I refuse to delete. It's off the air till November and sometimes you just need to watch Shawn and Gus and laugh. I'm not sure how I lost control over the televisions in my own house. I have parental locks so they can't watch anything inappropriate, in fact they don't even try it. It would be nice to be able to record a movie now and again. But then I remember, all too soon they will be grown and gone and I'll have full control over my DVR. Then I don't mind so much that I have 2 hrs and 30 min. of recording time left. Too soon I will have all the time I will ever need. Perhaps I'll keep recording shows they loved just to reminisce on days gone by. Besides any movie I would want to record probably started out as a book, and the book is always better. If it didn't start out that way chances are it's not gonna hurt me to miss it.