In the meantime, the kids and I enjoyed a trip to my hometown in the U.P. - our first there in around 7 months - and reconnected with family there, as well as said goodbye to our Grandma Jean, whose year-long battle with lung cancer ended on July 10th.
I finished the purge and reorganization of over two years of photos, readying to create our Disney World memory book.
I haven't read a lot of comic books, actually; just finishing up History of the Marvel Universe and Excellence as it is released, but I have a growing stack to read. For whatever reason, I just haven't been in the mood most evenings, instead reading Pathfinder 2nd Edition game books.
Noah camped in the backyard.
We also opened and set up the Abomination Build-A-Figure set of Marvel Legends figures.
Hope spent a week (safely) at Geneva in the out-of-doors, with company of other young people, and growing spiritually. She always seems like a different, older person on our 30-minute drives and chats back from camp.
About 1/3 of my continuing education coursework on Autism Spectrum Disorder in Inclusive Classrooms is finished.
Oh, and we have bare spots on two of our media shelves where cable boxes used to be.
The prompt for this brief post was an emailed bill from Xfinity for $97. That's down from the $277 we were paying for far too long. That could be reduced even more by buying our own modem/router, but for now, haven't taken that step. We just have the "Blast" internet package.
We invested some of my birthday gift money in a Roku Premiere. When that worked very well, I put all the Target gift cards I was gifted for Christmas and Teacher Appreciation Week this past year by students and their families towards a Roku Ultra. The Ultra had some trouble with a few programs (Hamilton on Disney+ and Sabrina on Netflix) on our Black Friday special TV, but since swapping the Roku devices between TVs, there have been no problems.
We did subscribe to YouTube TV so we can enjoy local stations and (maybe?) Green Bay Packers games this fall, plus the sorts of things Hope likes to watch (animal-related shows) and Noah tunes into most weeks (wrestling). Almost immediately after we did so, the price increased from $50 per month to $65, but even with the one-time $130 in devices and the $50 for YouTube TV, just a single month in, we're at a break-even on what we were paying in cable, and the only thing we have truly missed is Last Week Tonight with John Oliver (the main segments of which can still be watched on YouTube).
In addition to continuing our Netflix, Amazon Prime (Video), Disney +, and WWE Network subscriptions and now easily streaming those on the Roku devices on the main floor and in our bedroom upstairs, and not just on the Xbox One in the basement, I discovered loads of other free Channels. Pluto TV has some great stuff, the 24/7 Mystery Science Theater 3000 channel (...on that Channel) seeing the most use by me so far. That's also available on Shout Factory TV - but with individual episodes ON DEMAND. Insane. Others I have added and dabbled in:
- HGTV Go, Good Network Go, and ID (Investigation Discovery, a.k.a. "Murder Shows") Go, and ESPN, the two former for Melanie and the latter two for me, all of which are available on YouTube TV but have some nice on demand content in their Channels
- PBS
- Roku Channel (of course)
- Vudu
- Stirr
- Tubi
- Xumo
- Crackle
- Fawesome
- Filmrise
- Popcornflix
- NewsON
- Skynews
- WeatherNation
- Pandora
- AccuRadio
There is enough available on all of these Channels that I think I could truly go without YouTube TV and still have plenty to enjoy in the rare times that I am in the moot to watch rather than read, create, or play a game.
Nobody in our home has once voiced regret that we no longer have cable TV.
Reliable wireless internet, a quality streaming device, and subscription services seem to be the things that made our transition painless. If any are interested in doing the same, I'm happy to talk more with you.
Nobody in our home has once voiced regret that we no longer have cable TV.
Reliable wireless internet, a quality streaming device, and subscription services seem to be the things that made our transition painless. If any are interested in doing the same, I'm happy to talk more with you.
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