Are you big tv watchers? H and I cut the cord but we do like to watch a movie or a few episodes of certain shows at night. We also like to watch the Olympics and awards shows. But I wouldn’t say we have the tv on all the time. We never had any restrictions on how much tv our kids could watch, but we encouraged them to do other activities and not just be in front of the tv all day. They both had some friends who lived in households where the tv was always on and these kids really weren’t interested in anything but tv. I have one co worker whose 4 year old has a tv in his room and the kid has an iPad too.
I have my favorite shows, but I can go days without watching tv and be fine. My kids are the same. We just don’t feel the need to always be watching the tv or always having it on.
I used to have the weather channel or ESPN on in the mornings as background noise. In our old house, older S had a TV in his room because it was there before he was born. Only two rooms had a cable hook up and that was one. I don’t recall it being on all the time, and we moved when he was 8.
But at some point we stopped the morning noise, though I couldn’t tell you when. Maybe when we got Alexa and H listens to music or radio.
After work, we typically watch 1 hour a night. Maybe 2 if we are bored.
I do miss watching sports. Younger S was my sport watching buddy. H used to love watching sports, but over the years just stopped. He has a hard time watching even a football game. Boo… I do love it when younger S is home though!
I tend to watch the news daily - local, BBC, NBC, CBS (if I have time for them all - in that order). I tape them to watch them without commercials (BBC doesn’t have commercials) and fast forward parts I don’t give a hoot about.
Then we have over 100 hours of all sorts of shows taped (nature, science, “fun,” etc) and when we’re in the mood to watch something (usually with dinner) we’re rotate through who got to pick something. By having them taped, again, no commercials.
Otherwise our TV is off. When the kids were here we didn’t watch as much news either. We’ve only ever had one TV. Never a desire for more than one. Our kids were outside more than in, or reading, or playing with games/toys, etc. When they were really young there were a few kid shows they would watch (Reading Rainbow, etc).
We are total TV people. Because DH works out of town, I’m home alone a lot. I like having the TV on so the house doesn’t seem so quiet. We have 9 TVs just on the first floor of the house.
If the TV isn’t on, I’m usually listening to either a podcast or a book on tape.
I really don’t like too much silence.
I like political TV and baseball while I do needlepoint. My husband watches TV with the sound off while on his laptop. I like to binge series late at night on my tablet. Neither kid watches any TV but my daughter and son-in-law just got a used TV so they can cast streaming baseball to the bigger screen.
We never needed any TV rules when the kids were growing up because they weren’t interested but my own two TV rules are no TV in bedrooms and no TV during the daylight hours except for emergencies, like a tornado warning.
I spend more time online than I do watching TV. We cut the cord many years ago which reduced the amount of TV viewing. I watch the news (local and network news), but I don’t have a favorite TV show. During the first year of the pandemic (2020) we bought Amazon Prime and thoroughly enjoyed Prime Video.
I haven’t had a tv in a long time and raised kids without. It just happened. We weren’t idealogues about it. Now that I live alone, I watch a lot of things online on Netflix.
My husband has to have his CNN and CNBC to accompany his breakfast. So we pay through the nose for Sling. Me… I’m happy with whatever local channels our “pancake” can get. That said, we splurged $80 for our annual Disney plus subscription. It is a great filler for those times when there is nothing good on the pancake.
I always think it’s important to note that a screen habit is a screen habit. Be it tv, computer, tablet or phone. I’ve known people who with pride say they watch no tv but yet they are on a screen working ungodly hours or scroll away for hours a day. Pick your poison!
In regards to tv specifically I work during the week so don’t “watch tv” or even turn it on until like 8pm - unless you count pre-work exercise YouTube videos.
Actually watching tv? About 1-1 1/2 hours in the evening. H on the other hand likes “his” tv on as background noise a lot of the day he is home . He’s retired but works a part time gig at home. Drives me nuts to come home from work and hear golf on with no one watching.
H and I actually only watch one show together. Been that way for years. Our tv tastes don’t jive much at all! No tv in bedrooms, never have. Not against it (except against it for young children) just not a desire.
I never have the TV on just to have noise. We got out of the habit of always having the TV on when we lived in the UK as expats. At the time, there was just nothing on their programming during the day that I had any interest in. Never picked the habit of just flipping it on once we moved back to the states. If we are watching TV, we are watching TV.
We have a few regular cable shows we like, and we watch things on Netflix and Prime. We also like college sports and watch a LOT of college football on Saturdays in the fall.
I used to have a boyfriend who said that I use TV the way some people chew gum … always mindlessly there. He wasn’t wrong. I like the background noise.
I enjoy watching some of the HGTV design shows in the afternoons as background. I typically tune it out while I’m writing and then focus on the “reveal.”
H and I do watch some shows in the evening after dinner. Currently watching Vikings (yes we are late to the game) and Outlander.
If I lived alone I would likely have one TV and it would not be in the bedroom. But I don’t live alone…
Several years ago, H was gone for 11 days combination visiting family/work. As soon as he walked into the house he turned on the TV and it occurred to me that the TV had not gone on while he was gone.
I just have little interest. I do spend time on line but I don’t watch You Tube or videos or anything like that. No interest. I do read a lot. I have time to read because I don’t watch TV.
I need noise due to continually hearing my pulse. I have a lengthy playlist on my phone or will use (no paid ads) radio when there isn’t sufficient nature noise. Songs work far better for me than any TV show would, and as I said before, I detest TV commercials. When we’re somewhere, like a hotel, without the ability to pause and fast forward, we never use TV except for news or weather headlines and we’ll use the mute button during commercials.
My favorite white noise is getting a condo by the ocean and hearing the waves in the background. Here at home birds work reasonably well in the summertime.
I used to have the TV on a lot while I worked around the house, but in the last few years, I’ve basically quit doing that. We don’t usually start watching TV until the evenings, but now with football and college basketball on hiatus, we watch even less.
We binged watched Only Murders In The House recently, but finished it. We need to find a new show to watch.
I got in the habit of putting the morning news on every morning while making my kids’ school lunches. Started this habit after 9/11, when I was home alone with a toddler and infant, and my mom called asking me if I had the tv on (I didn’t). So getting a morning fix of weather/news kind of became normal. Only have one kid home now and H makes her lunch, so I don’t turn the tv now. I usually check the headlines on my ipad.
Growing up, as a family we watched Walter Cronkite on the CBS Evening News every single night together. Now as an adult, H and I “tape” the national news and watch it together at some point after we eat dinner. Sometimes our youngest will watch with us. So that is usually the first time we turn on the tv all day.
Other than that, H has never been much of a tv viewer and goes to bed early so he never much got into tv series. Over the years before streaming, I had certain shows that I watched. Most of my “tv” viewing now tho is on my ipad via streaming like Prime. I don’t watch any network shows these days. Other than watching the evening news, during the week our tv is rarely on although I occasionally watch the noon news but then turn off the tv. We do like to watch 60Minutes on Sunday evenings also.
Sports though…H and my sons are huge sports fans so if there is something on tv they want to see, the tv is on. Like this morning, H was leaving for golf at 8am. I came down at 7:30am and thought it was odd the tv was on at that hour until I noticed it was tuned to a British soccer game (he’s a ManU fan).
I did not have hard and fast rules with my kids for tv except no tv in the bedrooms. My kids all played year round sports so most nights they were at practice and then had homework. When they had free time, they were always outside. They weren’t interested in video games. There really just wasn’t a need to limit it since they rarely watched it. With more free time now as adults, I know they do stream shows.
I’m an avid reader so that’s where I spend more of my time. I watch shows in spurts - I typically will binge a season of something, and then not watch anything else for a while as I’m absorbed in a book.
Nielsen would never want to put a box in our house!
We cut the cord when our son was two. He watched video tapes (Arthur, Thomas the Tank Engine, etc.), no TV.
We have one TV in the house (one in the casita for guests), and we use it to stream movies and selective programs but probably no more than 2-2.5 hours in the evening, some evenings none. Never a TV in the bedroom; we use that room for other things. Really not TV people. We don’t even watch the news.
My brother and SIL have a hard time when they visit us because they have a TV in almost every room of their house, at least one on all day. My SIL can’t stand silence, and I can’t stand the noise. Now when they visit, they stay with my mom who’s more TV tolerant.
I like TV (all forms, broadcast, cable, Netflix, etc). That said, when Covid days hit and we were “safer at home” I made a promise to myself that I wouldn’t turn it on until after 8 pm, because I could lose myself and just zone out in front of it. Now I find I hardly turn it on before 9, although my 3 workdays I do catch up with American Idol or This is Us, or some other show I’ve recorded, during my lunch break, because I’m working from home, and it feels silly to walk from the dining room (where I work) to the living room for a break - this gives me something to “do” during the break. I still like TV, and I’d say my favorite channel is definitely HGTV.
