I tried justifying a little ‘withdrawal’ by DVR’ing Carlson, Hannity, and Laura so I could selectively watch and zip through the commercials, but now they are unwatchable for me. So I just read a lot more, which is a good thing.
In early 2020, when this COVID crap started in the spring, I pretty much turned off the TV - didn’t even watch sports, like tennis, that I usually watch in the summer.
What I found out was that not having the TV i.e.cable on, after the first week or so, was a REALLY good thing. I started going to bed earlier, more or less fell into a Circadian rhythm, & in general, felt less stressed out.
What I got into was listening to podcasts. True Crime in particular, plus a couple of health related ones. I worked for a police department for a while, so the true crime is interesting to me & I’ve been on a 3 year journey to improve my health (lost 1/3 of my body weight & dodged the T2D bullet) so the health ones are also of interest. I can also take my phone outside & listen if I’m doing something really boring or that I dislike (weeding the garden is a biggy). I do some reading via Kindle.
I am not going back to TV/cable. Period. My dad has advanced heart failure, going on 98 yo & really cannot do much except watch TV. He was a FOX-a-holic before the election, but even he is very disgusted & I notice that for ‘news’, he’s more & more on News Max TV. He’s watching the Outdoor Channel & Smithsonian most of the time now - before the election, FOX was on most of the day. When he is no longer around any more, the cable will permanently go bye-bye.