I, over winter break, unshackled myself from Comcast’s monolithic grasp.

I will miss “Archer” and “Justified,” but there is no justification for a cable and Internet bill totaling near $100 a month. After all, Comcast’s last innovation was Video on Demand, not Smell-O-Vision.

I, however, am not cut totally off from the outside world. I live in Rochelle, which has municipal broadband. For $25 a month, I get wireless internet. For the cost of one month of Comcast, I transformed an outdated computer into my entertainment provider.

Streaming videos from YouTube, Hulu, Comedy Central and PBS is all the entertainment I need and want. The first few days of the switch were pretty weird: Who thought of sitting at a table to eat? When I had cable I did not watch television all the time, but I did have a viewing schedule. Albeit the DVR exists. I no longer feel compelled to watch at certain times, and that has translated into less television viewing, which is good.

My daughter has adjusted well, too. When cooking dinner I usually sat her in front of the good old babysitter, and I do now as well. The difference is instead of watching “Sponge Bob,” she watches an educational YouTube video singing off all the countries in the world.

Saving $75 a month feels great. I cannot wait to save for a year, get it all in singles and park my dump truck full of money outside their door and smile. Maybe if Comcast spent less money on lawyers (Comcast Corp. v. FCC, 2010) it could charge less to provide us with its network of wires. Of course, the same savings could be had if Comcast cut its advertising costs; why does Comcast need to advertise?

The one issue I have had with the switch is I cannot get “free” basic cable via any DTV antenna on the market. The one last antenna location to try is on the roof, and seeing that the closest broadcast tower is in Rockford, I doubt that will work. When the FCC promised, “improved picture and sound quality,” I thought they meant no more adjusting the antenna in a storm. Heck, I bet if I took the rabbit ears up to the roof I would have received improved picture and sound quality, too.

Since I want to watch the Super Bowl, I am headed up to an icy roof. If I slip and fall to my death, let my final written words be this from Henry David Thoreau: “A man is rich in proportion to the number of things which he can afford to let alone.”