I don't understand people who say they don't watch TV. I think they tend to be the kind of people that boast that they don't have a TV, but totally watch sleazy garbage shows on Youtube or something. I have no problem saying that I love television.
There was a time during undergrad and grad school when I would watch at least three episodes of Friends per day. Then it was Sex and the City. I was obsessed with these shows. I loved American Idol. I loved The Real World until the Las Vegas season, but I would still watch the challenges sometimes. Much of the kind of show I am into is a variation on the reality show theme, and there is generally also some sort of scripted show that I get into.
Right now, I have those shows I watch each season fall to spring: America's Next Top Model, Top Chef, and Project Runway. I also tend to watch a few of the other reality shows Bravo does. Beginning last year, I got really into Glee. I also love Chelsea Lately. So these are the shows I watch on the regular. Then something happened.
Last summer we went to visit our friends Kelley and Jason when they were living in Virginia. We spent much of the morning and early afternoon boozing up on this mountain. When we got home, we realized everyone got a little sunburned so everybody was a little sleepy. Somehow Kelley and Jason inherited or purchased this huge TV. At the time, I think, they didn't have cable so they were watching a lot of things on DVD. I get that--almost my entire grad school career was without cable, thus all the Friends and SATC that I watched. They asked us if we wanted to watch some Planet Earth. Neither of us had seen it, so we were down.
Oh, I just remembered that I think I caught some of it once during Thanksgiving down at my uncle's house--again, we are all kind of exhausted so nobody didn't want to not watch it, nobody cared. Well, in the case of last summer, we got really into it. I mean, the earth is majestic and mysterious. And I am astounded at how they captured all that life and death in the craziest places. It's all quite beautiful, and moving, and amazing when you watch it on a giant TV.
I think we've debated about buying Planet Earth every time we see it at Target. But I don't know if I'd ever want to watch it if I didn't just catch it on a one-off kind of thing. The same goes for the shows that come on NatGeo that catch me, that blindside me into watching them for an hour or two. I just watched this show all about the moon and was enraptured. I'm not someone who's into science, but geez, these shows get me! This is what is happening--I am getting into watching these science-y shows. Who am I?
Something like this happened last Sunday night. We were just flipping around, trying to find something to watch that was not an ABC drama or something that involved law, order, or the letters N, C, S or I. We came across Life, the new Planet Earth. It was the mammal episode, so it involved all kinds of cute animals and their babies. I got so into it at one point that when watching a mother polar bear and her kids scavenging for food and Oprah, whose voice I am convinced is the same one of the Lord, started talking about their likelihood for survival and whether or not they would make it, I got really torn up.
I just couldn't imagine these creatures just dying because some bastard male polar bear wouldn't let this little single mom family get in on some beached whale. It's hard to watch sometimes! So emotional! But I was just sitting in the living room, watching the latest episode of the Real Housewives of New York and looking for something else to watch, when I saw that Life was on again tonight. Clearly, we know what I am doing the rest of the night.
If you're not watching TV, you are missing out. Not just on the insanity and beauty that is Life, but also on things like RuPaul's Drag Race and the Barefoot Contessa. I'm not saying that you should go and get a TV, but I am saying that if you don't watch TV you can always just ask me to tell you about it.
I got you, child.
Jon
