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dispatches from the land of the near-dead #1

So here I am in Florida, headed towards The Villages in the Light truck. Two points of clarification: the Villages has nothing to do with "the village" from "The Prisoner", and my almost-inlaws are named Light; the truck is a big one.

So I hope it goes without saying that I'm joking about the near-dead. I wouldn't want hate mail telling me I'm being un-christmassy. However, The Villages is a HUGE retirement community. 40,000 senior citizens during the summer, and 80,000 during winter! It's independent living, not like a convalescent situation. But still, it's weird.

1) as you might expect, there are multiple cafeteria style restaurants (think Luby's or Old Country Kitchen)

2) everyone drives golf carts, sometimes covering miles in them. And they have them all pimped out!

3) There is an age-restricted pool but instead of "adult swim" meaning 18+, no one under THIRTY is allowed in the pool. So I can swim in a pool that my boyfriend can't!

Back to catching up with the inlaws...

what a time to get cable!

So we've been without cable TV for nearly 3 years now.  With our previous roommates we had a DirecTV system and more junk to clog our eyeballs than we could handle.  But with our move from a house to an apartment, we knew something like that would be tough to pull off (we live in a neighborhood with old houses that aren't very dish-friendly, and with neighbors that probably aren't very fond of how they look, either!).  So we looked into "regular" cable, but then we discovered that the adjective Comcastic is not a positive one, despite what the company would like you to think.  So we settled for Internet and "basic basic" cable (the practically free version that gives you the same stations as you'd get with an antenna)... and we only got the "basic basic" because they charge you MORE, if you don't get it.

So flash forward to now.  I've been wanting cable TV back since we moved into our new apartment in July.  Partly it's that we have more space so one of us can watch TV while the other one is out of earshot, but a lot of it is that I have missed being able to dip into different parts of the pop culture pool on occasion.  Sure, lots of stuff can be found on the Internet now, but there's something kinda nice about knowing you can fill your craving for an episode of The Price Is Right (or better, Sabado Gigante!) whenever you're in the mood.

So I spent a ridiculous amount of time over the last two weeks trying to get the best deal from Comcast.  But I couldn't find out ANY deals without talking to TWO online salespeople and TWO phone salespeople.  It seems that the online people know nothing about the phone offers, and furthermore, you cant even READ about the online offers anymore -- you have to go into a "chat room" with a customer service rep, so it's basically like being on the phone, except with more carpal tunnel syndrome.

Finally, thanks to a TV ad (thank goodness we had basic cable so I could research getting cable!) we learned that they have a $39.95 a month deal that gives you a whole bunch of stuff for a year, but ONLY if you are a complete Comcast virgin  If Comcast has ever touched your data pipe (You may giggle now.  I did as I typed that.), then you have to pay a premium.  OK, fine, so I'll pay a few bucks more.  I want it that much now.

At the end of the day, it ended up being over TWICE what a new subscriber would pay, and I don't even get all the features.  And yet the customer service rep happily told me what a good deal I was getting.  If Verizon had FIOS going here I would have so switched!

Anyway, after all is said and done, I am looking forward to having cable, except of course, now I'm also remembering we're in the middle of a freaking writers' strike.  So what do I have to look forward to, besides the aforementioned Price is Right and Sabado Gigante reruns?  Well, I guess I can enjoy the gradual crash-and-burn as Hollywood discovers writers actually ARE necessary to run their shows...