(UPDATE: Evening of June 14 Comcast called and made me an offer I couldn't refuse. So rather than completely dropping my analogue TV and cablemodem service I am getting digital TV and cablemodem at a greatly discounted rate for the next 12-months. Life after cable!?!? P'shaw! Quick, make some popcorn. There's a movie on HBO starting in 5 minutes.)

Well, now I done gone and did it. June 13, 2006 I disconnected my Comcast service. The whole thing. TV and cablemodem. And I'm already paying for it. I'm depressed without my cablemodem, and my wife is pissed at me for the impending TV disconnect to come on June 15.

How did I get here? Quite simply, finances. It's been an up and down year. I ended up having to owe taxes this year, and in response I upped my witholding so I do not have the same situation next year. In addition, I started my 401K at work. Two hits against the paycheck right off the bat. In addition there have been a series of unexpected medical bills, rising gasoline prices, property taxes increasing my mortgage payments... And, well, something had to give. The $100/mo cable bill is a luxury I can live without.

So now what? Last night I logged into work over dialup for the first time in years... Oh my god... Oncall is going to be rough. Fortunately I'm a UNIX admin. Mostly text interfaces. Very few GUIs.

What's also rough is I think my wife is under the impression I'm going to turn right around and subscribe to satellite TV. I hate to break it to her, but that would pretty much defeat the purpose. All this crap costs the same. Subscribing to satellite and DSL for broadband would end me right back where I started. Sat+DSL only costs $10 less at best. That won't make much difference in home finances.

Ahwell. I feel we need the break anyway. I spent way too much time on my computers, and I felt my wife and daughter spent way too much time in front of the TV. Time for us to spend more time paying attention to more important things.

It would be nice to prove there is still life after cable...