I own all the seasons... COME AT ME BRO (if you'd like to borrow them)

how many VHS tapes

a lot... and I was enough of a nerd to want "high quality" recordings, so I was doing the "SP" setting so I could only fit two hours (two episodes) per tape. It was obscene. I think I got through about three seasons like that - and switched to LP which gave me four per tape? And then I couldn't afford cable for a while.... and the streak was broken... and then DVDs came out... and then I had kids... and then I was like "hell if I'm ever moving this box again" and then I got cable again... and then I filled up my DVR with them... and then I figured out that I could export the contents of my DVR to my Mac (via the handy firewire port on the back)... which I could import using some janky old Mac utility I dug out of some obscure forum online.... and then I started to convert those files into something I could burn to DVD... and then the Northern Exposure series was released on DVD and I bought the special collector edition of season 1 and 2 (complete with little down parkas) for $25 per season... and then a year later seasons 3,4,5,6 were in a multipack in a Target discount bin for I shit you not $10.

and this is the sad, sad world that I call my life.