The New Hobbit Hole

[Overtaxed]

I don't use the TV for talking heads....it's mostly for sporting events and reruns. But "Fish TV" sounds soothing.

[Overtaxed]

I'm looking for a chart of total taxes as %GDP and even that wouldn't cover the cost of gubmint regulations built into the price of goods!

[ksen]

I turned my television into a VHS viewing(soon to be DVD viewing)/Playstation playing machine. The black screen is quite soothing, and it saves me $15 a month.

-Kevin

[ksen]

I'm looking for a chart of total taxes as %GDP and even that wouldn't cover the cost of gubmint regulations built into the price of goods!

Did you try looking at one the think tanks' websites, like Cato or Heritage?

-Kevin

[HairOfTheDog]

I pay three times that for digital cable... so my saving potential is even more attractive.

[Overtaxed]

I got that chart from Cato...couldn't find the one I wanted. I'll check out Heritage, though.

[ksen]

This looks like a site you may be interested in.

-Kevin

[ksen]

I pay three times that for digital cable... so my saving potential is even more attractive.

Well, there you go. Do it HOTD. Turn off the beast that is invading your home. ;^)

Let's see, $45/month X 12 months = $540.00/year. Just think what you could do with an extra $540.00 a year. Ex. ($7 movie ticket + $3.50 for popcorn + $2.50 for drink) = $13 per viewing of LOTR; $540.00/$13 = 41.54 extra viewings a year.

Besides, anything worth seeing is probably being broadcast on the web as well, and with your blazing system you could probably watch the shows just as well on your computer.

-Kevin

[JenB]

For the past year I have watched - literally - two one hour tv shows a week. Sometimes I watch Fox News. I don't pay for the cable since I only watch them at my parents' house. But... there is nothing that I miss not having seen. There's so much garbage on tv, I'd rather just watch movies if I have to see anything, anyway.

[HairOfTheDog]

Sounds good... OK - I have to make some phone calls.... :~D

[ksen]

I thought that I would get a lot of flak from my kids when I decided to shut the cable off. It's been 3 months now and not a peep. Can you believe that they actually read books and play boardgames instead? (To my chagrin I found out that my daughter is pretty good at Scrabble)

If something happens and I ever need to see one of the networks I have a set of rabbit ear antennaes in case of an emergency, like hurricane season.

-Kevin

[JenB]

Great plan! Good luck with the family - stick it out even if they start to complain, it'll really pay off. When I was about four, my mother said, "No more tv" and taught me to read instead. We have a collection of several thousand books, on every subject imaginable. I've read most of them. Now I find I'm socially uneducated because I've never seen MTV, don't know what "Friends" is, and don't really know one actor from another, unless they've been in something major.

At the same time, I do know that Pluto's orbit takes it inside that of Neptune every century; that "Wherefore art thou Romeo" is not Juliet asking about her beloved's current location; what a Hobbit is. Socially deprived? I don't think so!

[ksen]

Ahem.

Oops, sorry, didn't mean to disturb anyone.

-Kevin

[Overtaxed]

Gosh...with all the people on this list I thought you were going to start teaching a Gondor Polka class. :)

[JenB]

Brief posting as I'm about to go home... see you guys in a few hours!

[HairOfTheDog]

Do you want some attention ksen? In between trying to WORK, I have actually looked around and tried to find something to entertain you all with, but I am coming up empty. I guess I could go over to the Green Dragon and say something about Jackson's "Not quite the last temptation of Boromir" up on the pass... see what folk think of it.

[ksen]

Gosh...with all the people on this list I thought you were going to start teaching a Gondor Polka class. :)

It seems that the interest in Polka has faded in the realm of Gondor (we have turned into a society that follows fads in the past couple of centuries). We have now turned to Cross-Stitching.

Here's a little something I'm working on to send to Gandalf for all his help with our past unpleasantnessess:

Think he'll like it?

-Kevin

[ksen]

..."Not quite the last temptation of Boromir" up on the pass... see what folk think of it.

I was thinking about that the other day, believe it or not. In the movie, Boromir never touches the Ring. Even when he has it by the chain, he never actually touches it. He come REAL close to touching it when Aragorn tells him to give the Ring back to Frodo. Does that show a bit of Boromir's attempts to resist the temptation of the Ring, or does it show more of Aragorn's growing aura of authority?

Maybe this would be better posted over at the Green Dragon.

-Kevin

[Overtaxed]

I think Gandalf would like it although I don't know where he would hang it. You could get Arwen to teach the class!

[Penny1]

I got my letters yesterday! Then I saw on a message board that #246 was a good one to read (at least, I think I'm remembering that number correctly--it's a really, really long one that is responding to someone's question about Frodo's "failure." Wow! If you haven't read that one yet, read it! It's the one that talks all about Frodo and Sam and the differences between their characters, Frodo's "failure," him going over the Sea, Sam staying behind, why Bilbo had to go with Frodo, etc. It ends with a terrific comment about why everything would have been so much worse if Gandalf had had the ring than Sauron because of how Gandalf's use of the ring would have blurred the lines between good and evil.

It's very cool! I wish I'd had time to type some of it up last night for you'all, but maybe in a couple of days I can.