By Amy Sullivan

Moving my brother into his University of Connecticut dorm room a few weeks ago, I witnessed something I had never thought possible after spending two years and a summer semester at Northeastern University. My brother carefully propped his new TV set on the top of a book shelf. He plugged it in. He screwed a cable cord that he pulled straight out of the box into the wall. He hit the power button and, just like that: cable.

I couldn’t help but recall my battle for cable my freshman year, and every year after that, for that matter. I was instantly jealous; my brother hadn’t even had to walk across campus to pick up a cable box.

Getting cable at Northeastern requires quite a bit of skill. First, a few days after lugging those heavy TV sets up to the dorms, you must locate a Comcast table. These little set-ups look helpful, until they explain that they can give you the box, but you must be home for several hours on a certain date so that someone, easily identified by his Comcast jumpsuit, can come plug the thing into the wall for you.

Then you wait. I think I would consider myself lucky if the guy showed up even within a few hours of my “scheduled” time. My freshman year, he came the next day (and that was after my roommate called — twice). My sophomore year, he came, he brought the box, he plugged it in and, nothing. Two weeks later, we finally had cable.

Earlier this week, my roommates and I were told that the work order that directed the cable man to our apartment (only two hours late and only missing a few pieces of essential equipment) called for just two boxes when we had ordered three. After a polite call from my roommate to the company’s service line, we were told they would happily come install the third box in another two days. And for our troubles, they wouldn’t charge us another service fee.

The service fee, by the way, is quickly dwarfed by the astronomical number that appears on the bill for the actual cable service. For “standard” cable, as they call it, students are only charged $47.25. And for the Sopranos fans out there, HBO is an additional $18.95 a month. Freshmen, be sure to set aside a good chunk of change for the cable bill. (Hopefully, the company will get your address right so you won’t receive the bill two weeks after it is due and be charged an additional late fee, as was the case my freshman year. And don’t bother to fill out the change of address on the back of the bill. It doesn’t work. Even if you fill it out every month.)

In my hometown, in just-about-the-middle-of-nowhere Connecticut, I pay $42.95 a month for digital cable. For about $4 less, I get hundreds of channels, HBO and Comcast On Demand. Now, you can’t tell me it costs more to send satellite cable to the bustling metropolis that is Boston than it does to get it into my living room in cow country. From space, I doubt the big old Comcast satellite would even have to tilt. Yet here, I pay $4 more for a heck of a lot less.

And don’t ask about digital cable at Northeastern. You can’t get it. What about other companies? Surely, since this is America, a country that prides itself on a free economy, there must be some other option. Nope. We get Comcast or nothing. Get ready to shell out $47.25 a month (plus $3.80 for the box rental) because at Northeastern, we are at the mercy of a Comcast Cable monopoly.

— Amy Sullivan is a middler journalism major and a member of The News staff