Television

I've never been a big television viewer - I always left it to those around me. Occasionally I'd get caught up in a show or two (24 and Hell's Kitchen come to mind), but the vast majority of the time I'd flip on the tube only to pass the time between various tasks, while waiting for food to cook, or perhaps while sipping a scotch before bed. I would venture to guess that my average television consumption was, at most 30 minutes a day.

Not anymore.

Over the past month I'd say my average has increased to about 2.5 hours a day. That's a 400% increase folks - and it's getting worse. I'm worried.

I've identified the reasons for this, but the problem is the solution. Yesterday I tried to tell myself that I would not turn on the television before 10pm. You know what happened? I broke down. And why? Why did I end up bowing to this dynamic pixelated god? Because I was bored. The sheer prospect of time floating in front of me did not goad me to do something useful with my life, but instead forced me into the semi-dream state of television from which one can emerge hours later and have no sense of the passage of time.

If you started reading this expecting some sort of conclusion or resolution, I'm sorry to dissapoint you. It's just something that was on my mind, and so I'd thought I'd share. My friend Rob has pointed out in recent blog posts that there is actually some quality programming on television, and of course it's football season, so my time in front of the tube is not all completely wasted time.

However, I'm not convinced that rationale can be stretched to 2.5 hours a day. Oh well.