I find it interesting that streams keep flowing even after weeks of deep cold. Apparently, the trickles and flows continue down low, and the water can go when covered with snow.

This hawk, sharp-shinned I believe, is not here after bird seed. The feeder was abandoned all afternoon.

And then, on the topic of television, I find it interesting that, even though we restarted our Direct TV account after its summer vacation, since mid-October we have only watched two partial college basketball games, the Packers-Dallas game, and two episodes of Downton. No hyper news, no breathless Wolf Blitzer, AND not a single ad (since we fast-forward through them).

It's been like getting out of jail. The world is a much sweeter place when you don't see it through a TV set.

We do keep up on the news. The morning ritual around here these days consists of the two of us spending an hour or more (coffee in hand) deep into the electronic version of the New York Times or Google News. But we get to choose which article (from a thousand sources around the world), and we get to read them, actually various version of them, without ads and without the screaming endemic to televison.

We will watch the State of the Union address, for sure, but perhaps streamed through the iPhone instead of off the dish.

What we watch is streamed. We get to choose what, we get to choose when, and we get to watch ad free. (I will not mention here that we are currently into season three of the Gilmore Girls.)

The era of cable cutting is here, and after next summer's TV vacation, the cable will be cut.

As Jackie Gleason used to say back on his CBS network 1950's show, "How sweet it is!"