I haven’t been watching TV pretty much since I’ve moved in with the Elderly Relative almost a year ago. This is only the second time in my life that I have been television-free for a long stretch; the first time was in 1999 for a year when I was moving a lot and had a job that took up all of my brain and time.

Why this time? A bunch of things, I guess. The cable package to which we subscribe in the household is measly and boring; the internet seems to have lots of stuff to look at; the remote for the TV in my room needs batteries; my Elderly Relative blasts his set all day and all night and that irritates me.

My amount of time in front of a screen for a recreational reason has not lessened, I don’t think — Netflix Streaming, Hulu, podcasts, Facebook, surfing, blogging — I’ve just traded in the set for a laptop. Maybe my screen time’s quality has gone up a bit? Not witnessing commercials is pretty nice. The freedom to abandon something boring/stupid and moving on to something better is also nice. Not having to witness morons pretending to deliver “news” is also very nice.

Probably the biggest advantage is removing the threat of getting addicted to a show or series just because it’s on. I never again have to see fat people cry on the treadmill or novice chefs getting abused or shore trash being stupid.

I’ve always been annoyed at how sanctimonious TV-free people sound, who pipe up in a conversation about popular culture: “well, I don’t own a television, sorry.”

Now, here I am, one of those. I don’t mean to sound holier-than-thou, actually it’s a little embarrassing to kill a conversation about a show or commercial or whatever. And I still watch some television shows on Netflix and Hulu.

It’s the delivery device, basically, that has changed radically —  which I’m sure is true for a lot of people. Have you changed your recreational screen time habits?