The Slough of Corruption

It's official. I am Morally Corrupt.

I used to be pure. Unsullied. I didn't own a tv. Then my mom gave me an old black-and-white portable that used to be in my parents' bedroom. That was fine. Most of the time the "picture" was just a bunch of wavy lines, so I could watch I, Claudius and yet still feel untainted because I was really just listening. That tv melted in an apartment fire and shortly thereafter, I took my first step down the slippery slope. I accepted a small color tv (bizarrely, the giver was once again my mom, not usually one to play the Temptress in my life's story).

So, ok, tv. But free tv. I drew the line at paid tv, and when we married, Keith gave up his cable subscription. Time drifted on, however, as did technology, and eventually we found the only way to ensure that the free network channels would actually appear on the screen was to purchase a cable tv subscription. Basic cable, just the networks and a bunch of local and religious stations, but still, we were now paying--paying--for tv. Down the slope we slid.

I suppose I should note we had paid for tv before--when we lived in England. But that's different. That's paying for the BBC. The BBC is worth it. It's moral. Totally different.

Anyway, there we were back in the U.S., with Basic Cable, clinging to our moral sense, as the boys moaned and whined and sulked and pestered us. Evidently we were the only family left in America with Basic Cable. Evidently we were guilty of child abuse by depriving them of Nick-at-Nite and MTV. But we stood firm.

Until Keith read one of those mail advertisement things and discovered that for less than what we had been paying, we could get our wireless internet bundled in with our phone and satellite tv--with the regular package of tv channels. Well. A Really Good Deal trumped morality. We went from about 5 watchable channels to umm, 95? Not that all 95 are watchable, not at all, but the thing is, the regular package included BBCAmerica, which meant there was no going back. Not ever. Life without BBCAmerica is totally unthinkable. I am not sure how I survived so much of my adult life without it. I know for a fact that if I were deprived of the new Doctor Who, my adult life would not be worth living.

Still, I retained some shreds of moral decency--after all, we purchased only the regular package, not the fullbore, deluxe, HBO-Showtime extravaganza. "Oh, we don't have HBO," I could say gently, but loftily, when someone started raving on about The Wire or Mad Men or whatever. We are Good People. We wait for the series to come out on Netflix. We do not demand Immediate Gratification. We do not Spend Our Money on TV. Umm, not as much as we could, anyway.

Then I read about this new HBO series: Treme'. Set in post-Katrina New Orleans. it begins tonight. We live in south Louisiana. We lived thru Katrina. Keith works with the homeless--Katrina continues to shape his daily work life. And it continues to shape the world in which we live. We can't wait for Netflix. So, weve upgraded to HBO. We'll be watching the series premiere in just 15 minutes.

It's official. I'm morally corrupt. I gotta say, tho', this moral corruption stuff, it's really kinda fun. We just watched True Blood--without waiting for Netflix. And there are these cool movies. And that Tudor series is coming on. And Hugh is so very happy . . .