just realized...

that august first marked the one-year anniversary of us giving up the television in our home. i have to say, it feels like much longer. i mean this is in a good way. it's been a year since we've been eating dinner together at the table--and lucy has just begun to join us with her high chair tray removed and her seat pulled up to the table--like a real person. with standing in her seat, putting her feet on the table and slipping maizy bits of food aside, it really is an enjoyable time. i cannot believe that we used to sit in front of the television, balancing plates on our laps, while we ate our meal together. our couch is certainly cleaner for it, anyway. and i estimate we've saved around $720 over the course of one year in digital cable charges.

we still have a television (though we're down to 1 now, instead of 2) and we watch movies occasionally when lucy has gone to bed. i've also been known to put snaps on a diaper or two while watching grey's anatomy on dvd. but for the most part around here, the television is off. when it's too quiet at home, we turn on music or talk radio. we read more (6 books this summer for me!). i sew a lot. jeremy scours the internet for all things truck-related. we get our cooking recipes online, instead of from the food network cooking shows. i'm no longer addicted to any sort of reality programming. it's an advertisement-free zone (minus radio commercials, junk mail, magazine and internet ads... well, i guess you really can't escape advertising, even in your own home).

good stuff, all of it. an experiment turned way-of-life. one that i highly recommend!

a load of crap...

was taken to our city's free e-cycling event over the past weekend. this was our first time getting rid of e-waste via a sponsored drop-off, and it was as simple and as painless as it could have possibly been--we didn't even have to get out of the car. our smallish load consisted of a computer monitor, my busted hairdryer, some kind of waxing machine, and other random small electronics. our garage is looking a bit cleaner, and i'm feeling nice and environmentally responsible. the experience was good all around. 

i live in a pretty smallish suburban town. multiply all the crap you see here by all the towns across the country, and you can see why e-waste is such a problem. a huge downside to technology moving so fast--just take a look at those totally outdated big screens--is that things become obsolete in shorter amounts of time, generating massive amounts of waste. there were several televisions in the pile that were totally comparable to the one i've got sitting in my living room (which we're currently using only to watch movies on, as no-television august carries into yet another successful month). aside from not being all cute and flat, there's nothing wrong with our t.v. in my eyes--but i guess where technology is concerned, functionality is in the eye of the beholder. 

my broken laptop still isn't remedied. i've shoved it aside in a fit of mourning for the time being. thankfully i have a husband who doesn't mind sharing his own computer--which led to our painful discussion regarding "what if it cannot be fixed?" could we (gasp) get by with just one computer? save ourselves $1,000 and, at least for the time being, another computer from landfill?

less is more. less is more. 

even the valleygirl has a hard time with this mantra now and again. 

lucy swings...

for the second time. well, for the first time on camera. we spent a lovely no-tv evening watching jeremy play baseball, then took her for bit of a swing ride before heading home. as you can see, she digs it.

just realized...

that no-tv august means that we won't be watching any of the olympics at our house. kind of a bummer. but i'm sticking to my plan.

no-television august...

maybe i'll just start giving something up every month?

we had dinner outside tonight. it was warm and not windy, so the three of us headed out to the deck and ate alfresco. lucy laid on her back and stared up at the sky, kicking and smiling and cooing. it was wonderful.

jeremy and i have been eating in front of the t.v. for as long as i can recall. here and there we'll sit at the table, but the vast majority of the time we're plugged in. we've talked about changing this bad habit since lucy is here. the question was when to do it. and i suppose now is as good as ever.

we don't watch a ton of t.v., so i don't expect this to be too hard. but we'll see. i do love to watch the food network. i stopped watching channels like mtv & vh1 as soon as i brought lucy home. i don't want her to be exposed to all of that crap (that i really used to be addicted to... the hills... i love new york... rock of love...). we also took the television out of our bedroom, which felt kind of like a big deal and now i don't even miss it.

anyway. that's where we're at.


oh, and a disclaimer: movies don't count. as long as we don't watch them during dinnertime, that is. we don't watch very many movies but sometimes it is nice to kick back and veg out.