Choosing Not To Choose
by Kylie Ardill

The covers tattered and torn, the quality dismal, my siblings and I would spend the afternoon stuck in front of the TV watching -- or at least trying make out images in the fuzz -- our latest finds.

That's it -- that was TV, that was our entire viewing pleasure. One country town commercial television station, one non commercial station and fuzzy videos. And we did this other thing, called playing outside, for most of the day.

In Australia, where I live, we've recently been introduced to the pleasure of cable TV. That is, everyone except us. Where we live there aren't any cables so we had to wait until they decided that us folk of non-city dwellings could have a cancer dome instead (read : satellite dish on the roof) in order to be awakened to the delights of cable.

We got our dish last Thursday, and along with it 30 channels on the Australian cable network called Foxtel. I know to you folks in the U.S. 30 channels probably isn't much but to me, this country girl who's viewing pleasure has only barely risen from her days as a child -- me oh my! THIRTY channels, it was a channel flick fest!

We've had our cable TV now for a week and three times already there's been nothing on. I tell you, thirty channels and three times I couldn't find a darn thing to watch. If my mother were here she would send me outside and tell me to play.

Of course I could always have switched back over to the commercial stations, but there's a certain guilt and rebellion involved in that. I'm not paying $56 a month to have 30 channels and then watch something else! Uh-uh not his mamma!

I was so excited to find out that along with our cable came Nickelodeon, the kids channel that my U.S friends have told me so much about. I envisaged a life of sitting on the lounge with my hair in rollers, fluffy slippers firmly in place, eating bon-bons while my two year old son sat blissfully contented in front of a constant string of children's programming.

It so turns out that he's not all that interested, which blew my plans for a life of bon-bon eating out of the water. So instead we've been playing outside, colouring, painting and doing children's craft activities -- my mother would be proud.

Then there's the other problem I have -- with 30 channels I spend most of my time trying to work out what to watch. There's too many options and the channel guide sits atop my entertainment unit looming like a copy of 'War and Peace'. I have trouble just finding today's date in it let alone actually sifting through the entire days programming trying to find something to watch.

Never fear, in this world of hi-tech there are more options -- you have additional means of determining what to watch -- there's the little information button on the remote control that you can click and it tells you what's on now and what's on next on all the channels. There's also the menu button, which brings all that up in full screen version and of course, you can log on to the Internet and search there.

By the time I've located something for my viewing pleasure it's already over and I have to start the routine again. I could spend an entire day just looking for something to watch and never actually watching a thing.

And so for $56 a month I've got thirty channels which on average offer up nothing decent to watch at least three times a week, and a 24 hour a day kids channel that my son's not even remotely interested in despite my encouragement. I refuse to check the commercial stations because the tight-wad in me won't allow it and the same goes for turning on the radio. And I've got way too many options, making this many choices in a day was something I left behind when I left the workforce, and they paid me back then, I'M paying the monthly fee for this pleasure.

Today, while contemplating returning the dish on the roof to where it came from something happened -- I noticed a button on the 200 button remote that came with the little black box which apparently causes the cable channels to function. It was a little musical symbol and when I pressed it lo and behold, I was presented with 14 pre-set music stations.

No commercials, just non stop music -- my solution! I frantically searched hoping that I'd find the kind of music I'd want to listen to all day long and then I found it -- The Top 100, 24 hours a day! No choices, only one station I'm interested in.

My husband finds this amusing, that I would pay $56 a month to listen to the radio, no images, no flashy graphics even.

Me? I'm simply choosing not to choose, it's just way too much for this mamma to handle in an average bon-bon eating day!

Kylie Ardill is owner and editor of online parenting magazine Spilt Milk.net http://www.spiltmilk.net  and co-owner of Australian home and family lifestyle site Box Planet http://www.boxplanet.com.au  She lives at Umina Beach in Australia and spends her days working on her sites, writing and raising two year old terror, Sam.

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