I see some system pictures with screens in them, some with screens elsewhere and some without a screen.
I gave my Panasonic TV away two years ago. I have only once forgotten that I didn’t have one when I wanted to watch an England rugby match. I went up to the club and watched there with forty other people.
I have no Sky, no Netfix, no subscriptions for any telly watching. I have some DVD’s, about thirty and I have a few films saved on my iMac. That is about it.
I watch a few channels on YouTube and I watch a couple of gamers on Twitch.
This post was triggered by someone saying, ‘if you like Squid Game, you’ll like this new programme.’ I’ve never seen Squid Game, or Game of Thrones, or Breaking Bad, or The Wire or any of the trendy series that are brought up in conversation. I don’t miss any of it.
I listen to music and read a lot. I make, paint and modify model trains and a few aircraft and tank kits. I paint a few Games Workshop figures for people and paint a few 15mm Wargames Figures from time to time.
Anyone else with no television?
Haven’t had a TV with cable in about 4 years now. We do have Youtube TV and Netflix available on our ipad and laptop. It’s kept around for the rare moment we sit down to watch. Honestly, probably a waste of money for us. We have the music going all day and the kids don’t know a difference. They get some screen time in the evenings occasionally but mostly it’s music.
We have a TV because my wife wants it. I don’t hate it, and sometimes I watch stuff with her, but if she didn’t want it I would happily get rid of it. I never owned one before we met.
Like you, I never run out of things to do and TV seems to suck you in and take you away from other, more rewarding ways of using your time.
TV for me is mostly for sport; football and Formula 1, and the occasional drama series I particularly like the look of. TV is rarely on before 9pm and even then it is mostly because the lady of the house wants it on. If she’s not around and there’s no football or motor racing on chances are I won’t bother with it and stick to music.
Unfortunately when her adult kids come home, they’re the types to just switch it on and either ignore it or flick through the channels to see if they can find anything they’re vaguely interested in, usually reality TV rubbish. Does my head in!
No TV for 12 years. When we want to watch anything we crawl into bed and watch it on the big iPad. Stand it on your chest and it’s practically Cinerama!
Same, did not have TV for 13 years and never once missed it, no subscriptions. Only got a TV as we had kids … Now I watch F1 but apart from that I cant think of any time I turn it on. I normally have a head in a book and listening to music.
None here. But I have radio.
No TV for many years .
We are both voracious readers , cryptic crossworders and listen to music and the radio.
We also occasionally talk to each other !
About 13+ years ago we went no telly for nearly two years. Then, when the second christmas came around, SWMBO requested it come down from the loft so we could watch christmas telly. Unfortunately it never went back to the loft. At our current house we have no external signal input (sky/aerial) and we’ve been only internet tv for about 10 months now. I don’t miss having an aerial.
I lived abroad for nearly 20 years without a tv. I missed it: the sport, comedy, thrillers, detective series, documentaries, nature series, etc. Now, I restrict my viewing to the evenings, except for rugby / cricket / skiing. I rely on the radio for news, or flick through the guardian and BBC web pages.
Recently, with the nights getting longer, I get a book out and listen to music for the first part of the evening.
Have you tried knitting ?
It’s getting colder now. You could make someone a nice hat, scarf and gloves.
I have a TV but haven’t had cable in 20 years. Where I live allows me to spend more time with my outdoor activities, riding motos, hiking, weight training, walking. I sit on my butt all day for work so when I’m not working I like to be moving. Which means less time for HiFi and very little time for watching TV.
When I lived alone many years ago, there was no TV in the living room, (instead I had a projector and hundreds of DVDs). My time was highly productive with hobbies and reading and only watched what I wanted from disc.
It’s a state a long to get back to but right now, with very young kids, the TV is on constantly and daddy’s exhaustion levels are so high, sitting in a semi vegetative state at the end of the day in front of to TV is all I can manage. Not so much enjoyable as a last ditch stand to say to myself I spent some me time today without kids in the room. Because the alternative to collapse exhausted and spend no me time at all.
Feel your pain, @feeling_zen : I’ve very much been there.
With an 18yo away at her first term at Uni and a 16yo, I’m currently drawing to a close on the intensive stage of parenting and I have to say that it’s bittersweet. Sure, I don’t miss the relentless exhaustion you refer to, and it’s wonderful to have a little more freedom in what I choose to do, but there are plenty of things I’ll miss about their younger years, even if a psychologist might diagnose it as Stockholm syndrome!
Hang in there: it gets better!
Mark
I lived without a TV for a couple of years in the 90s, mainly tbh as a cost saving exercise. But I missed the comedy, the news, sport, dramas in fact everything that makes good tv watchable, including its occasional use as wallpaper (and to drown the sound of a one-time girlfriend’s appalling eating habits, she didn’t last long). So I bought one again. It’s great, and then when I met my wife it came with us to the new home. Kids came along and it was a godsend for those times when they just need an alternate entertainment to us pair, and as they got older and kept begging for Sky Sports - they grew up loving football as much as I do - I succumbed so that they could enjoy the title run-in one season (2006? 7? Who knows). My core objection that I refused to contribute to Rooney’s weekly salary of £180,000 was pointless. He’s being paid that regardless of what I do and we’re missing out on decent football coverage as well as F1, cricket and occasional other stuff. Cost? Buttons out of the family income, and every couple of years a phone call to Sky maintains the decent discount that they give to anyone who asks for it. F1 in UHD is as enjoyable as that track someone on here flagged up the other day - Cosmic Hippo. Not my sort of music tbh but the sound was superb; TV can be the same - not particularly enthralling but technically fantastic. Just like decent music through the stereo.
These days I wouldn’t be without a TV, for the same reasons as above except that Mrs H has very proper manners and is safe on that score. It’s not always on, but neither is R4, or R2, or music of my choice. Nor do we have an aversion to sitting in complete silence me with a book & her doing a load of lesson prep or marking through the evening. And weekends away in the motorhome are an occasional break from it all.
Re the above, as soon as this thread appeared it struck me that it would be an opportunity for those who see not having a TV as a virtue, to let us know that.
TV is great, it’s a window on the world and via the BBC and the LF provides this country with one of if not the world’s best broadcaster.
No tv for me,could not live with myself thinking that i had put any money in the pockets of the over paid staff of the BBC, main culprits Gary Lineker and Zoe Ball grossly overpaid.
Having a large screen, it does seem to dominate the room and demanding to be watched all the time.
Like my music - it’s not always on. Some brief moments and some long immersive sessions.
With so much content it is very easy to waste an hour or so just seeing what’s on. It’s those times to just turn it off.
I just started this as a response to someone that recommended a television programme. It reminded me that I haven’t seen any of the popular series over the last ten years or so. I wondered if there were many others in the same situation.
It was not intended to be smug or point at people that watch tv.
Are people with expensive watches or valuable German sports cars smug?
One of the many reasons why I tend to dislike this site these days is due to the way it’s changed over the years, esp since the old forum became the new forum. One of the biggest changes is the level of smugness on here; I don’t differentiate between arbitrary groups of e.g. German car owners or expensive watch owners (I have a nice watch myself but choose not to inform anyone on here about it), but there is a definite sense of one-upmanship and humble-bragging on here that occasionally leaps out.
To latecomers, my original response included the S word, but luckily it was edited out on my behalf. Can’t be upsetting the natives here can we?
Atb