[Jeffhs]

I got a letter in my mail today from Time Warner Cable which was trying to pitch me an offer for 100+ channels, two standard-definition converter boxes, and a monthly rate of $29.99 for 12 months. I read the thing and put it in the trash. What gets me, however, is the sentence at the beginning of the letter: "Since you left Time Warner Cable..." I did not leave them. I still have basic service (broadcast channels only), which, as I mentioned in another post, is the only way I can get the broadcast TV channels here, and I am still paying something on the order of $15 a month for the service, which includes all seven Cleveland stations -- as well as at least two out-of-town stations I do not watch. Why are they thinking I "left" their cable service, simply because I downgraded from expanded-basic to basic? If I had had my cable service completely disconnected, I could understand the question, but not when I still have the service at my apartment. Does the cable operator somehow, for some reason, think that just because I am now receiving only local channels I no longer have cable? This is not so. As I said above, if not for Time Warner's basic cable service, I would have little or nothing to watch here on an indoor antenna -- the only station that comes in well enough to watch around here is channel 19, and that was analog. I would probably get few if any DTV stations in this area (30+ miles from all Cleveland TV stations, according to DTV.gov) with rabbit ears and a converter box, so I never bothered with it. Basic cable suits me to a T, as I can watch most programs I used to get on x-basic cable on DVD or VHS; there isn't that much, IMO, worth watching on the networks nowadays anyhow. Further, it's a lot less of a strain on my wallet each month.