I'm nearing Year Six here in Japan

[chronovore]

I've been gone long enough that some of the basic operations expenses of living in the USA have changed and I can't really visualize them. Can someone fill me in on the status of common monthly entertainment and communication expenditures? Whenever I think about what people are paying in the USA, I always picture some massive heap of bills being paid just for regular stuff.

Here's what I picture:

• Cable/Satellite TV reception
• Internet provider (may be bundled with Cable)
• Phone/VOIP/Cellphone
  
• Tivo monthly charge (may be bundled with Cable/Satellite, if set-top box is installed
• NetFlix / Blockbuster and/or GameFly
• Xbox Live
  
• MMORPG fees, such as World of Warcraft, Everquest, etc.
• Satellite radio, or Rhapsody / Launch
  

When I look at that, I see a couple hundred bucks, every month, going out into the ether. I can't fathom it. Some of it's unavoidable, but some of it appears redundant. Is it?

While I'm asking, is it common for people to have their home phone line served through their internet provider? Or are people switching to mainly cellphone service now?

My wife and I both have cellphones; if my cellphone wasn't paid for by my work (and therefore not really mine), I think we'd ditch the home land line and just go all-cellular.

FWIW: When I last was in the USA, the cable in my area was delivered over TWO separate coaxial cables, and required a manual A/B switchbox on top of the machine to access each discrete line. If you wanted to VHS record anything, you had to make sure that the switchbox was on the correct setting for that particular channel and program. The last time I visited the USA, my sister was playing music through radio stations delivered through her cable service, and played through their home theater setup; direct service radio is still commonly used in Japan, and costs people about 7000 yen a month. Yikes! I've been trying to get some people to switch to internet radio.

Comments

[hedr-goblin.livejournal.com]

yeah, you win... Custom Built house in Osaka pretty much sounds like a dream.

[chronovore.livejournal.com]

You'll see!