Boob Tube

It is a medium of entertainment which permits millions of people to listen to the same joke at the same time, and yet remain lonesome.T. S. Eliot

In my house, when I was growing up, TV was referred to as the "boob tube" not for any female anatomy reference but because it turns us into boobs, or idiots.

Years ago, when I worked in Corporate America, I used to record Jeopardy every week day.  When I got home from work, I'd watch it.  I never thought to cheat, either.  I mean, I could've paused the recording to think about the correct answer, er, question, that is. On weekends I would watch home improvement and gardening shows.

But there were a few prime time shows I liked.  I remember watching CSI: Crime Scene Investigations.  The first one.  I also remember watching Sisters.  Anyone remember that tear jerker?  It was a prime time soap opera, but it sucked me in.  I watched a lot of Nick-at-Nite 'cause I really liked some of those old shows, especially the Dick Van Dyke Show.  What a classic!  One of the very, very few shows I will watch over and over.

When my daughter and I moved in with my parents, I remember watching Dark Shadows (I had been too scared to watch it when I was a kid) and a show called PSI Factor: Chronicles of the Paranormal which was a Canadian show that ran from 1996 to 2000.  Sometimes I watched X-Files.  The early years were pretty good, but the show got too intense for me.  Oh, I have seen every episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

Buffy cast

Sometime after my dad passed away, I stopped watching TV, except when I was with my mom.  She liked all the old cop shows.

For several years I rarely turned on my TV when I was upstairs in my room.  My daughter would sometimes badger me to run on the Bears game.  Once in a while I would watch The Smoking Gun Presents: The World's Dumbest.  The video clips were hilarious.  At Christmas time I would watch a few Christmas movies.  But usually, when I went upstairs after being with my mom all day, I didn't watch TV.

Of course, mostly I would read.  I went on the computer (that was before Facebook).  I did Sudoku and Acrostics puzzles, too.

After my mom passed away last year, I felt compelled to watch the remaining episodes of Gunsmoke and Hawaii Five-O that were still on the Uverse dvr.  I'm not sure why, but I watched one a day until all the recordings were gone.  Weird.  I should have put that in my last post, I guess.

Anyway, for months after that, I rarely watched anything on television.  Even when I moved in February, getting cable was only urgent because I needed the internet hook-up and it was cheaper to get the TV & internet combo.  But it wasn't until I was sick in April that I started watching again.

I started slow.  Jeopardy, of course, was still a favorite.  I have a fairly basic package, but it has Discovery channel, Investigation Discovery and History channel.  So I would watch Dirty Jobs (love Mike Rowe!) and Unusual Suspects and stuff like that.  Reality TV without the idiots.  Well, except for the perps.

Then, my sister told me about The Big Bang Theory.  The first episode I watched was a rerun from a previous season, but I was hooked.  I love these guys!  Maybe because I can relate.  I was kind of a nerd in high school.  I guess I still am, sort of.

BBT cast

And a friend told me about Psych.  I enjoyed that show, at first.  But then Sean's wiseguy thing started to turn  me off.  There's new episodes coming in February.  I may check a few of them out, but otherwise, it's not a favorite any more.

But then it happened.  I remembered watching a couple of episodes of Criminal Minds way back when it was a new show.  So when I saw reruns on a couple of channels I started watching it again.  Then I started watching Law and Order: SVU which was another show I'd watched years before.  That led to Law and Order: Criminal Intent.  Not a good as SVU, but good enough.  Then the same friend mentioned NCIS, so I got curious.  Now I'm hooked!  I love how the techies on both Criminal Minds and NCIS are quirky.

Abby Sciuto - NCIS

Penelope Garcia - Criminal Minds

To balance out all the crime shows, I am also hooked on House.  I'd watched it--or tried to--once a couple of years ago, but my mom didn't like it.  Now, I avidly look for every rerun on any channel.

I'm not sure what TV is doing to my brain.  Am I turning into a boob?  An idiot?  I still read, although not nearly as much.  I'm on the computer more because I'm on Facebook and I'm selling on Ebay and Listia.  I don't want TV to worm it's way into my brain like some parasite.  Oh yeah.  I watch Monsters Inside Me, too.  And Haunted, when I remember.

Do I have to change the title of this blog?  Eh, not yet, anyway.  When I do read, I'm still fast.  I've worked my way through a few dozens books in the past few months, so I think I'm still good with the reading.  If I get too carried away with watching TV, somebody come slap me, okay?

It's Weird

Sometimes there are things I see or hear about or read about and I can't help but shake my head and wonder what's up with that?  I know, for some things, there are explanations for the item or phenomenon.  It still makes me wonder why.

Weather would be a perfect example.  Meteorologists can tell me about temperatures and wind and precipitation involved in "fronts" and "systems" but it's still weird to see:

• rain falling sideways
• the sun shining when it's raining (or raining when the sun is shining)
• fog
• hail during the summer

macaque

Then there are animals that make you wonder what God was thinking.  I've watched Discovery Channel and Animal Planet and they spout their theories of evolution and adaptation.  It's still weird to see:

• the platypus
• birds that can't fly
• mammals that can fly
• fish that walk on land
• deep sea creatures
• males who give birth

There are things that are within a person's control.  Decisions made, ideas not thought out, mistakes or just plain defiance of social norms.  It's weird to see (or hear):

• children named Number 16 Bush Shelter, Midnight Chardonnay, Fifi-Trixibelle , Moon Unit, Dweezil, Apple or Rumer.  The list goes on and on, but the little girl named Talula Does the Hula from Hawaii tops my list as the worst name.  Fortunately, a judge agreed and, at age 9, she legally changed her first name--against her parents wishes!
• the designs of roadways like "roundabouts"

• houses made of strange building materials

house made of plastic bottles

• houses painted...uniquely

• certain clothing choices

I know there's a whole lot more weird stuff in this world, but I'd need to write a book to put it all down.  Hmm, that's an idea...