I was going to post this as a poll, but I had too many questions. Still, the title says most of it - how many working televisions do you have set up in your home? I was talking to a friend of mine at work and she said she has seven. My mom has five and occasionally has more than one on at a time. What about you?
Also, how many people generally watch the TV at the same time? Do you ever leave more than one on at the same time? And how often do you watch?
My answers are: one television; usually we’ll have two people watching, three if we’ve allowed our son some TV time; N/A to leaving more than one on; and we watch for maybe a half hour to an hour once a day (Daily Show and often the Colbert Report).
Just the one. It’s not on a lot, but usually there will be 2 or 3 people watching (either both parents, both kids, or kids + one parent). We don’t generally watch TV as a family-togetherness activity, I guess.
I have a flat-screen Panasonic in the living room. The old CRT Sony from 1992 went into the littlest bedroom. I haven’t watched it since I put it there, and I haven’t hooked up an antenna or the digital converter. It does have my old DVD player hooked up.
The other two are a 9" B&W Hitachi portable TV I got when I was a kid in the early-'70s, and a Sony Watchman. They’re in boxes somewhere.
Zero. The last time I had cable was 20 years ago and the last time I watched TV at home was about 8 years ago… BBC was the only English channel, but it only worked a few hours a day when we had electricity. I have no interest in TV at all.
We have three but two haven’t been turned on in more than a year. We have one TV we watch (it is on for about 2 hours a day, mostly as background noise for laundry/dishes/cleaning) and there are usually 2 of us watching it.
Just the one. Usually it’s tuned to PBS kids’ programming, which means that some number of my three children will either be watching in rapt attention (if something cool like WordGirl is on) or wandering past giving it the occasional look (if it’s something less cool, like Dinosaur Train).
Of course, as an enlightened parent, I would never let my children come within 20 yards of a working television set, so the above paragraph is hypothetical only.
I have 47 TVs, generally have at least 12 on at a time with one person watching at least 4 (we keep the 19 month old awake just so she can cover her 4 TVs).
I have five hooked up to cable and one more that gets the over-the-air stations. I also have a handheld portable, but I generally don’t use it except when traveling.
Usually two out of three of us will be actively watching, in different rooms.
ETA: That’s one each in the bedroom, kitchen, living room, computer room and basement, with the small one in the master bath. I like to watch the morning news wheile I’m taking my shower.
Zero at my house. Haven’t had cable TV in two years and a couple of days, since I moved. Installing it was too expensive for me at the time, even with the offers they had then.
Their “package price” has since doubled, and even though I have more money now, I decided to skip it.
The TV now is just collecting dust next to my laptop.
For the 7 years before that, though, yea, the TV was pretty much on…
Two. I’ve got a 32" LCD hooked up for HD and a little 10" TV/VCR combo that my girlfriend watches when I’m watching sports. We tend to watch DVD’s or Hulu/Netflix on the laptop more than TV though.
I have a TV that I use as a glorified computer monitor. However, I do not have cable television service, nor can I pick up any over-the-air channels of any kind. It is used entirely as a computer monitor.
One. It’s not on unless someone is actively watching it. It’s usually one or the other of us watching. I have a limited tolerance for Scooby Doo and I prefer not to share Breaking Bad with my 8-year-old.
We have one for our family of three. Before I was married I gave away my TV and went five years without one, but my wife “needed” to have a TV.
It’s mostly watched by our ten year old daughter. My wife watches it sometimes in the evening.
Lately, I’ve only watched Pawn Stars and American Pickers on Monday nights and Mythbusters on Wednesdays. (Aside from seeing my daughter’s Nick shows when I’m hanging out in the livingroom with her.)
I live by myself. I have two TVs – a 46" LCD and a 32" LCD. I nearly gave away the smaller TV when I bought the bigger one until I discovered I could get a decent amount of channels – including the broadcast networks in HD – for free just by having another cable routed to the right place. So now the small one is my bedroom* TV which I use primarily for watching the morning news while I get dressed for work. It works out pretty well.
*I live in a studio-esque space with no room dividers. “Bedroom” is a stretch.
We have three. The main HD one is in the family room, watched by 1 to 5, or up to four using the Wii. The old one it replaced is in the basement for the kids to use, so up to three watching or playing Gamecube. We also have one in our master bedroom for my wife and I. All have cable, and two have antennas as well. We often have two on, but three is rare.
I live alone and have 3. How much I watch really depends on the season. I’m nutty for baseball (go Yankees!) and during baseball season I try my best to arrange my work schedule to allow me to watch as many games as possible. The only shows that I watch religiously are on premium cable (True Blood, Big Love, United States of Tara, The Tudors, etc) and there are often LONG stretches of time between them.
I am not someone who has the TV on for background noise. If I’m not actively watching it, it’s off.
My question is probably a silly one but why the distinction of working TVs? Why would anyone have a non-working TV in their home?
My grandparents had a non-working TV in their house for years. It was a big old console television, and they used it as a TV stand for the new, smaller television that they bought to replace it.
I am not saying that this was a good idea, or something that people should consider as a viable furniture option. Just pointing out one potential reason.
If no one is watching it, it’s off. Usually either the kids are watching it (there are 4 of them) or my husband and I watch something together at night.
I can’t stand it when restaurants have TVs on for background noise. It just makes it hard to have a real conversation. I tend to avoid those places.
