“We can neutralize your brain/You’ll feel just fine”

By admin

I was sick last week – down with a flu for five days. An enforced stay-cation. Idleness without guilt. I spent most of my days on the couch watching TV and drinking tea. I watched a lot of TV – really, a lot. And so I feel I should take this opportunity to confess publicly: I love television.

And not just the good stuff on PBS or Discovery. Give me Tabatha’s Salon Takeover and RuPaul’s Drag Race. Launch My Line and So You Think You Can Dance. Fringe, Heroes and Doctor Who. Gray’s Anatomy, Private Practice and House. Bones, CSI and NCIS. I am addicted to Project Runway and Top Chef. I don’t give a fig for cars, but I can’t stop watching Top Gear. I love staying home to veg in front of the TV. It is with guilt and embarrassment that I reveal my weakness for the “Big Bright Green Pleasure Machine.”

But, why a confession? you might ask.

I am not supposed to like television. I am supposed to be far too sophisticated, too cultured, too busy to waste my time with the boob tube. I should find it boring, pointless, grating or cloying. I should be appalled by the poor quality, the ridiculous plotting, the vacuous people… but I’m not. (Well, there are some shows that fall below even my watchability threshold.) I am a disgrace to my upbringing – a failed culture snob.

I worship my DVR and I’m done trying to hide it.