For many months now, during my usual digging into news of all types, one of the things that has stood out of late is that folks are just not taking enough breaks from reality. We all have to deal with reality all our lives and for those of us who are not taking some kind of drug, either prescription or non, to escape said reality, we sometimes can lose track of why we’re feeling so damned stressed!

We simply haven’t bothered to take that break.

I’m not talking about a vacation. Who has the time or the money for vacations these days? For the working class couples who don’t have an as yet, comfortable portfolio working for them or like the majority of Americans today, have none at all, vacations come at a substantial cost only to be taken once in every second century or the third blue moon in October—which ever comes first. So for the majority of us, we have to find a way to ease the daily stress of our lives so we don’t end up as raving maniacs and are seen in our local newspapers under a headline that might state:

Crazy Person Locks Himself In Bathroom Of Midi-Mart and Demands Salted Peanuts!

And so I am here to tell you of the winning formula that we use at home. Not all will agree of course, but then again…we’re all different now aren’t we.

Basically it boiled down to: Lose the Cable/Satellite and watch movies instead.

Huh?

Yup, That’s right! No more regular TV. Not a set top box to be found anywhere in the house. Our local cable company couldn’t believe it. They even kept lowering their sign up offers to the point they were almost paying us for the first 6 months of a new subscription. Some of their reps that came to our door toward the end were actually driven to the point of tears and we had to speak kindly to them and convince them that their life really hadn’t ended and that it was okay that someone really didn’t desire to be beaten to death with what passes for piped-in entertainment these days.

They finally stopped coming. Anyway…

My wife and I have quite a movie collection (hers actually) and occasionally we rent one when we want to make sure it’s worth adding to our collection. If it is, then we search around at Amazon and other such places and where we can usually pick them up for very low prices either new or slightly used. We’re the kind of people who like to watch our favorite movies more than once. And as I said previously, both of us had sworn off having cable or satellite ever again. In fact, both of us hadn’t had any sort of regular TV for about 7 years previous to when we first met. A match made in heaven if there ever was one.

So watching movies is our thing to ease the day’s BS. And the news and other such info we can get from the internet with out having to pay a lot of $$$ for the privilege of viewing Today’s Top Stories from some big city we don’t live in. Beats paying $75.00 or more we think, for the right to have 134 channels of “infomercials” and other such useless pastimes and hardly any other decent of content to chose from. If it ever comes to the point where you can pick and choose what channels you want and pay only for those channels, then we might think about it. Until then, when it’s time to just let our minds loosen up—It’s show time(!) and I don’t mean the movie channel!

Okay, we do do other things for relaxation but that is not what this post is all about.

And now we’re actually considering going to see a movie at our local theater which is something we don’t usually do either. Most movies these days simply don’t rate paying the price and they show up in DVD so quickly after their run is over it ends up much cheaper just to wait. Besides, you can’t put a theater on pause while you run to the bathroom can you? The last one we saw at the theaters was “Return of the King” (awesome!). This time, believe it or not, we’re thinking of seeing the third “Pirates” movie, “At Worlds End“. A pirates movie you say? Why not, I say.

To our way of thinking, we’re absolutely surrounded and very aware of the reality we live in on a day to day basis and occasionally, just for sanities sake we have to take a break from said reality and just go see a movie strictly for the entertainment value and basically, just for the fun of it. That’s why there are extravagant features like “The Matrix”, “Lord of the Rings”, “Star Wars” and the “Pirates of the Caribbean” series that just enable us to take a break from reality and let our minds unwind. That’s what fantasy is all about—pure enjoyment.

It used to be something special about going to the movies. Now, with new movies coming out every other day and disappearing just as fast (even the good ones), the home theater systems complete with some 5 foot, wide screen video monitor, 3000 watts of Dolby Surround Sound and all the microwave popcorn you can eat, it’s amazing folks go to the movies at all these days. Perhaps it’s an innate desire to walk on sticky floors and hold your water for 2-1/2 to 3 hours straight—beats me.

So there you have it. Lose the “box”, start your movie collection and make sure you have at least a DSL internet connection for your computer for all the other stuff and you’ll be a more relaxed, well adjusted person all around.

Works for us.

If anyone considers the above post complete hooey, please don’t hesitate to say so.

Technorati : cable tv, movies, stress relief