My mother in law is like this. She has cable and she'll never, never get rid of it. She'll just browse for huge chuncks of time thru the long, long list of channels (including shipping, music, spanish, and many of which aren't even available or are pay per view). The act of browsing the crappy ui itself is soothing to her (fucking maddening to me but w\e).
I think she has fond memories of watching cable news and such as a family when she was a child. It's the only thing that makes sense because she's alwayscomplaining about the price but refuses to cut the cord. Nothing other than rose- colored glasses could account for her behavior that i can fathom.