JennetteFulda

  • Home
  • About
  • Blog
    • Blog
    • Archives
    • Travel and Adventure
    • Weight-Loss Blog Title Generator
  • Books
    • Books
    • Half-Assed: A Weight-loss Memoir
    • Chocolate & Vicodin: My Quest for Relief from the Headache that Wouldn’t Go Away
  • Timeline
  • Contact
    • Contact
    • Advertising

January 4, 2013 10 Comments

Reasons I’m Old: The things I used to do just to watch a TV show

VHS Tapes

Photo by Rob Pearce / by CC BY 2.0

If I want to watch an episode of The West Wing right now all I have to do is turn on my Playstation 3, connect to the Netflix app, and select an episode. That’s it! So simple! So easy! Alas, it was not always this way. Boys and girls, let me take you back in time to…

The Year 2000

By the fall of 2000 I had heard good things about this show called The West Wing which had already aired its first season. I tuned in for the season two premiere and was instantly drawn in by the fallout of an assassination attempt and the flashbacks to how the characters originally met. I wanted to watch season one so I could catch up and figure out why this Donna person was so devastated that Josh had been shot. Alas, in the year 2000 we did not have Netflix streaming. Nor did we have box sets of television shows available to purchase the year after they’d aired. We did have the Internet, but when I wasn’t at college all I had was dial-up. (Remember the SCRREEE-EEE-AAAATCH!! of the modem?) And even when I could use the fast internet at school, video compression techniques weren’t that great and YouTube didn’t even exist, so if you did manage to find a video online it was probably a blurry Real Player file. (Remember Real Player? No? Be grateful.)

So how was a girl supposed to catch up on a TV show? I went online and posted a request on a forum for the show. Then someone in California, my fairy godmother perhaps, sent me a box of VHS tapes of the first season. I was never charged for these tapes or even for the shipping, which was bizarre. I think the person who sent them wanted to be sure she couldn’t be sued for profiting off of the show, so she wouldn’t accept any payment. What she sent weren’t even the original tapes. I don’t think they were even copies of the originals, but copies of copies, and one episode had five minutes missing because of a severe thunderstorm warning in a state I didn’t live in. But I was so happy to have them! I was in procession of rare precious treasure! After I’d finished watching the tapes I paid it forward by giving them to a friend, who also felt special for acquiring such a rare commodity.

This must be how my parents feel when they tell stories about using record players.

Anyway, it is now ridiculously easy to catch up on TV shows, and most ways are even legal. There’s Netflix, Hulu, iTunes, Amazon, and more. I definitely prefer this world to the one where I had to post on forums and usenet and lurk in IRC channels while waiting in queue to download the banned season three finale of Buffy the Vampire Slayer from a bot. However, I do miss that feeling of accomplishment I got. I felt proud when I was able to locate a copy of something that was not easy to locate. I felt like I was in a special club of people who loved a show so much that they’d spend hours copying it from one VCR to another for a fellow fan. You don’t have to prove your love of a TV show that way anymore. You don’t have to cut through a briar patch to kiss Sleeping Beauty or climb up a tower to see Rapunzel. You can just turn on Netflix. You can watch it in widescreen too, which I find particularly impressive because it meant someone behind the scenes was planning way ahead. It’s better that way and I wouldn’t go back, but I like to look back and remember how it used to be and all the things I used to do to prove my love for a TV show.

  • Tweet
  • Email
  • More
  • Print
  • Share on Tumblr
  • Pocket

Leave a Comment (10) Read more about: irc, piracy, real player, reasons i'm old, tapes, the west wing, tv, usenet, vhs, video

Jennette Fulda is the author of:

Chocolate & Vicodin: My Quest for Relief from the Headache that Wouldn't Go Away

"Smart, unflinchingly honest, and laugh-out-loud funny."

- Lisa Genova, New York Times best-selling author of Still Alice

  • Amazon
  • Barnes & Noble
  • Powell's
  • Indiebound
You may also like:
  • What I don’t know about WWII could fit in a U-boat
  • Longtime blog reader Jacqui to be on Extreme Makeover: Weight Loss Edition on Sunday, June 10th
  • Funny cat video
  • Video: The Shopping Cart
Post navigation
Later: Timothy Geithner and Me
Earlier: Christmas miracle at the airport
Home: Main blog index

Comments

  1. Vickie says

    January 4, 2013 at 10:59 am

    I still have the VHS tape of the last episode of Voyager. Hanging on to it like some keep baby booties. Yes, I know there are DVD’s and Netflix, but it is the actual tape we watched when I was recording on VHS before life with DVR’s. I have not seen a commercial in years (maybe decades).

    Downstairs TV is hooked up with Wii and DVD player. Upstairs with Xbox and ROKU, TV in front of elliptical has a ROKU. We are big Netflix people too. Currently working thru MI-5.

    Reply
  2. Jeremy Logsdon says

    January 4, 2013 at 11:55 am

    I have to comment for no other reason than that I still have, buried on a hard drive somewhere, the RealPlayer video file of Graduation Day finale of Buffy, season 3. Thank goodness for the Canadians back then who DIDN’T have their Buffy finale banned for two months.

    Reply
  3. Michelle says

    January 4, 2013 at 1:57 pm

    Ahh yes I remember those days, I do still have one vhs tape around here. . .I think it’s the muppet show, the only place it can be watched is up at my mother in laws house.

    I had a similar experience yesterday. I was cleaning out the basement and ran across a set of dolls I had that were in pretty sad shape. A check of ebay turned up new ones (still in their boxes) for $15. So I bought them and they came, the boxes were in pretty bad shape so we lived it up and took them out of their funny cellophane wrappers with real price stickers (Originally $3.35, marked down to $2.99) but the thing that struck me was there was no barcode on the box. . .my 14 year old was amazed.

    Reply
  4. JenFul says

    January 4, 2013 at 2:17 pm

    @Jeremy Logsdon – Yes! I also got the “Earshot” episode from the same IRC channel, although I think banning that one was a good decision. I still think it was ridiculous that they banned the finale.

    Reply
  5. Leigh says

    January 4, 2013 at 7:00 pm

    I clicked on your browser history regarding the 20 year old albums. I had never heard of about 80 percent of those artists. Now that’s old! 🙂

    Reply
  6. Missy says

    January 4, 2013 at 8:07 pm

    Back in about 1991, in a copy of Countryside Magazine, was a request for vhs tapes of the British show “Good Neighbors”. I responded and sent copies. Thus started a treasured friendship that has continued. It’s funny how things work out.

    Reply
  7. Amy says

    January 5, 2013 at 9:23 pm

    I still have all of Babylon 5 on VHS. When I first started on the internet, the first “video” I saw was an animated gif that someone emailed to me. It took me and a friend of mine ten minutes to save it on the server, download it to the desktop and open it.

    Reply
  8. Sue B says

    January 6, 2013 at 5:07 am

    In May of 2001 my husband and I were joking about how our first baby was just bound to be born on the Finale night of Voyager. And yes on Wednesday evening of the 23 I was in the hospital. We watched the first hour then things got… noisy and painful. Any way, the one thing we did before we left for the dr’s appointment was to make sure the VCR was set and had a fresh tape. I had to ask the hubs if Belana had a boy or girl. I think I finally got to watch it the next week. With my own brand new baby girl.

    Reply
  9. Paula Saardchit says

    January 8, 2013 at 9:14 pm

    How interesting that I ran across this article today. Just yesterday, I was cleaning out my old entertainment center because I got a new flat-screen TV (a gift from my kids since they couldn’t stand the thought of me watching my old-school TV anymore) to make room for my new entertainment center because the new TV is shaped differently and doesn’t fit anymore. Anyway I was cleaning out the drawers underneath and ran across about 20 VHS movie tapes that I had completely forgotten about! I haven’t owned a VHS player in years. Why on earth did I still have those? LOL. It felt weird to just toss them but I’m sure there’s not a soul on earth who would want them as a donation. So in the trash they went. And time marches on. Change is good right? Thank you for your article. I had fun reading it. You’re a great writer 🙂

    Reply
  10. Nora says

    March 17, 2013 at 3:15 am

    I used to record Seinfeld episodes on VHS. If I couldn’t get home in time to record, I would have my younger brothers do it. I remember one night being pretty upset because one of them missed the first five minutes of an episode. I’m happy to report I now own all 9 seasons on DVD (which may sound antiquated soon enough).

    Reply

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

I wrote some books

Chocolate & Vicodin: My Quest for Relief from the Headache that Wouldn’t Go AwayHalf-Assed: A weight-loss memoir

Follow Me

Jennette Fulda on Facebook

Recent Posts

  • That billionaire brat made me feel bad that Twitter is imploding
  • No one grows old on DVD or CD-ROM
  • Losing more than 100 pounds…again: Part 3 – The Differences
  • Losing more than 100 pounds…again: Part 2 – Losing Weight
  • Losing more than 100 pounds…again: Part 1 – Regaining Weight
440

Travel and Adventure

Weight-Loss Blog Title Generator

Most Popular Posts

  • Two weeks of Blue Apron: Six recipes, one blogger, and not enough bowls.
  • Remind me never to go off my meds again
  • Like the back of my hand
  • The Big Move in Retrospect: Everything good and the bad about moving from Indianapolis to Chapel Hill
  • It’s hard to type when you break your arm
  • My health insurance denial letters. Past or future?
  • Punta Cana, Dominican Republic: Day 1, Getting there is half the fun!
  • Not a picture I’ll be bragging about

Blog Archives

Search

Know thyself, quiz Monday

Jennette Fulda tells stories to the Internet about her life as a smartass, writer, chronic headache sufferer, (former?) weight-loss inspiration, and seemingly nice person (who is silently judging you). You can contact her if you promise to be nice.

Disclaimer: I am not responsible for keyboards ruined by coffee spit-takes or forehead wrinkles caused by deep thought.

Follow Me

Blog Archives

Newsletter

One day I might actually e-mail something to my mailing list. If you want to be there for that moment, sign up below.

AS SEEN IN

  • The Washington Post
  • The Today Show
  • The New York Times
  • The Wall Street Journal
  • The Globe and Mail
  • Associated Press
  • Women's Health
  • Glamour
  • Shape Magazine
  • Runner's World
  • Health
  • The Early Show
  • MSNBC
Copyright © 2023 Jennette Fulda • All Rights Reserved • Privacy Policy • Site design by Makeworthy Media