Satellite Television

Compact satellite TV dishes became available when I was in high school, and overnight half the kids I knew stopped watching cable TV and began talking about "satellite TV." They couldn't get any of the local news channels so they were woefully under informed on important topics like grass fires and loose livestock, but they did have the option of watching TV from any time zone feed in the country. One of my sadder friends would rush home every night to watch Jeopardy! on the West Coast feed, and then he'd sit down with his mother at dinner and nail every question. For her it must have seemed everything she'd been saying about her brilliant son all those years was finally coming true. I would have liked to have been there when she learned the truth.