I grew up in a house where the television was on every night, seven day a week, 51 weeks a year, from 7 PM to 11 PM. I was sent to bed very early, and was unable to sleep while it was still on. I still have trouble sleeping at night, even when the house is quiet.
When I married, my now-ex-husband watched television every night from the time he got home until he went to bed. He ate dinner in front of the television. He sometimes fell asleep in front of it, while I was in bed, trying to sleep, but unable due to the television noise.
I do not watch television. I mean it is in another room, on another floor in the house, and I do not turn it on at all. I was convinced to turn on CNN on 9/11, and it took me 20 minutes to figure out how to turn it on. I do have cable, though. I had it for my daughter, and in case anyone ever came over who wanted to see it.
Then I started dating a man I thought was special. I told him that I don’t watch television. He said he didn’t either. I said I had heard that before. He admitted watching a few selected programs. I said that was fine, but I found it rather annoying for people to turn on the television for no reason at all but to hear the noise and to watch anything that came on. He assured me he didn’t do that. But well, he did watch a certain sports team when they were on television. That made sense too. Of course, this all ended up meaning that he only watched television when he was awake, and he actually paid extra for sports channels. If a game was broadcast some place, he watched it.
I changed cable companies in the spring, and I almost missed the beginning of 6’ Under for the season premier tonight. I had to rush through 300 channels because I had no idea which one was HBO. At least this time I knew how to turn the thing on. That show is incredible. It’s the only thing I have ever seen where when it is over, I am sad because I want it to keep going. So I still don’t watch television, but I do watch 6’ Under. I can’t recommend it highly enough.
4 comments:
OK, I'll have to write an entry about television now. I love it when other people's journals inspire thoughts :)
Well after reading this I still can't tell if you're pro or con TV! I don't know how I avoided it, but I'm not a television addict. Our set doesn't even get turned on until the news @5:30. During the few shows I make it a point to watch, I'm so annoyed by commercials and interruptions that I almost would rather record & fast forward thru all the dull, mindless chatter.
I do feel there's worthwhile shows on & we watch a lot of History Channel, Discovery, TLC, PBS.. my guiltiest pleasures are 'Survivor' (which I'm becoming jaded on now) and 'Nip/Tuck'.. if you like Six-Feet Under, you simply must catch an espisode of it. But like you, we're both big movie fans and if nothing is on TV, we resort to our DVD collection. ¤Holly
We keep our television locked up in a cabinet. We do have cable, and we loveto watch movies on the DVD. But I can't stand the yammering it causes in my head and life, and I also need to monitor what influences are coming into my home. I lvoe Six Feet Under, too, but we don't have HBO. I just rent it from the video stores.
I have very few shows that I watch. However, other than one particular news channel, I could go for long strethes of time with no TV. When the kids are at school, the house is often silent all day with maybe the radio thrown in from time to time. With summer here, it's much harder to leave it off...they like to watch cartoons or play video games (which I despise because of the sound effects). Growing up, I couldn't figure out why my mother forbid the TV being turned on until my father came home from work. As an adult, I can clearly see his addiction to the tube and now understand why she hated it so much. ~Peachy
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