Jacob recently discovered how to record stuff on the DVR with the click of the little red “record button.” How he didn’t discover this sooner, I have no idea, but now he’s gotten out of control with it. It was one thing when I’d go to my list and find dozens of Spongebob’s, iCarly’s, and other age-appropriate shows on the list, but the other night he took it to a whole different level. I was sitting at the computer working on some blog posts when I heard my mom (I live with her) call from the other room “Nik? What the heck is this?!?” This is a common question in our house, and usually involves some sort of creepy looking bug that made it’s way in, or some randomly placed object (like a cup of water filled with dead flowers on top of the lamp because “they needed sunlight!”) that she has discovered. This time, it was porn. I’m not talking the mildly erotic stuff that you find on late-night television either. I’m talking the hardcore stuff, I don’t even want to write the name because I don’t want it coming up in a keyword search, but let’s just say it involved unclothed women engaging in rather naughty activities and is definitely not something you want your six year old kid watching. Especially when you haven’t gotten around to the “birds and bees” talk yet.

Somehow, Jake was going through the channels, hitting various buttons, and ended up recording not just the naughty girls video, but also some sporting event and another movie, for a total of $44. Once I discovered it, I tried to at least set a pin number to stop it from happening again, but for some reason my DVR wouldn’t let me. It kept insisting I already had a pin, which obviously I didn’t or this wouldn’t have happened in the first place. My mom called the cable company, and at first they weren’t willing to remove the charges. Luckily, after half an hour on the phone and several times on hold, the finally agreed to remove them. They then spent another half hour on the phone fixing whatever went wrong and walking her through the process of setting up a new pin number. Thank goodness Blue Ridge Communications is reasonable, I’ve heard of other cable companies basically saying “sorry, you’re out of luck!”

I understand that this is  my fault because a) I don’t stare at my six year old 24 hours a day to ensure that he never, ever, ever gets into anything he’s not supposed to and b) I didn’t take the steps to password-protect the DVR in the past. Honestly, it just never occurred to me that they would make it so easy for a child to order anything, let alone X-Rated material. I’m so relieved that all he did was record it and didn’t actually watch it, and I’m grateful that they took the charges off. I know my kid isn’t the first to do this and wont be the last, so I wanted to share this as a cautionary tale. Parents, set up that pin number or block those channels now, just in case your cable company isn’t quite as understanding. At least Jake only managed to rack up $44 in charges, I’ve heard of much worse situations.