Unplugging: preparing to ditch web & TV for awhile (in the house, anyway)

[indigoiis]

You might want a subscription to Backhome Magazine. Lots of great ideas in that rag!

www.backhomemagazine.com

Indy

[Brandi]

So will you be going online when you are at work? I hope you will check in every once in while and let us know how you are doing? A barn? Why? Sounds very cool to me!

[tulip]

I was TV-less for many years, and I don't think I missed much. I did read more. Now I have a TV and basic cable, and I enjoy watching a few shows a week. But I have to be careful, otherwise I'll end up spending six hours in rapt attention to all those Law and Order episodes that I missed the first time around.

I keep my TV (it's small) in the closet and drag it out for shows I want to watch. If it's out all the time, it's sometimes too easy to just turn it on. I didn't grow up with a TV, so I can't just have it as background like some folks can. If it's on, I can't do anything else.

There's plenty to keep you busy in the country. Will you have a garden? I can spend hours in my garden. If you have any garden questions, ask me here or in a PM, as I've been gardening for years. It's good exercise, especially when you incorporate lifting of things and building and turning compost.

[Zen]

I could easily go without TV as long as I had good radio reception. I do feel lost without my NPR.
If you get tired of reading and want to veg out you can always watch a DVD.
Like Spinnervals

[NoNo]

When I moved last September, I cut out the internet as a cost-saving measure. I don't miss it one bit. I sit at my desk all day long at work, I don't need to go home and sit at a desk some more. Occassionally it's a bit of an inconvenience, and it makes it hard to post pictures (such as this past Saturday when two Blackhawk helicopters landed in the ballpark across the street), but I've learned to live with it. Actually, if I really need to look something up, I can use my phone. The funny thing is, last week I got promoted. The first question everyone asked was "Are you going to get internet now?"

TV's another story (and I'm with you on the Law & Order addiction). But I'm a sports nut, and I need my ESPN. Even if the game's just on in the background while I do something else, I like the company. It's not like I can have a discussion with my cat.

[Zen]

OOOOOO, I just thought of something.
TdF in July

[OakLeaf]

Oh, man, I rarely watch TV, but internet? Fuhgeddaboudit. Up north we were on dialup until just a couple of years ago when we finally got DSL. (We tried a satellite setup, but our trees are in the wrong place .) When we needed to download a system update, we'd drag the computers to Starbuck's or a truck stop and sign on to their hotspot I don't know if dialup is even a possibility any more, with the amount of bandwidth everyone's putting into their sites. But I couldn't live without internet. Then again, I don't work, so if I gave it up at home, I wouldn't have it at all.

[BleeckerSt_Girl]

How about a mini-internet connection on an iphone? Can you do that without a standalone internet connection? (I don't have an iphone, so I don't know these things)

Other than that....reading, knitting, learn to make baskets, writing letters to friends (a lost art), making handmade books or poetry, making canned preserves and chutneys. Doing more outside in the daytime (hiking, gardening, birdwatching...)
I stopped watching TV altogether (as in completely) about 10 years ago. Gave me lots more time to live LIFE.
Getting Netflix so you can choose an occasional good film to watch is cool though, a treat, like going to the movies. We are slowly re-watching all the great films, one per week or so (Felini's 8 1/2, Seven Beauties, Taxi Driver, The Bicycle Thief, Last Picture Show, etc...).