Media Withdrawl

Since moving out of my parent's comfortable suburban home and living in 3 different apartments in just as many years, I have dealt with my limited budget in many different ways. I borrow clothes, I borrow books or buy used, I eat cheaply, and I don't pay for anything I don't have to- much like any other modern day student.

However, this skint existence translates to a lack of media choices in my life.

I can't afford cable, much less satellite, digital cable, TiVo, or DVR. I don't subscribe to XM radio, I don't have HD radio, and my boom box from 1999 just broke. I didn't have internet in either of my places of residence for two years. I mooched off of family and friends- "Oh, do you mind if I check my email?" I didn't even have a TV antennae for the first couple months I lived at my second to last place. Just fuzz and whatever movies I had received Christmases past (and my Golden Girls boxed set).

So imagine my delight when I finally got a new job and the ability to order cable internet in my new apartment. Leaping all over the apartment like a rabbit on 'roids, I called Time Warner Cable to set it all up- only to find that it will take two weeks for them to finally get over to my place and install it. The world became a bleak and antennae driven place once again.

My media consumption is curtailed. But it's the lack of my residential grandeur that really makes me aware of what I'm missing. So when I'm adjusting my rabbit ears to settle for network TV and you're enjoying Sports Center- think of me in my barren, cable-less, internet-less existence and appreciate what you have. These days, you have to pay more than ever for the good stuff.