Surviving in a World Without TV
I quit watching TV in May or maybe June. It was an experiment. I blogged about it even. I spent a week on vacation not watching TV and ended up no worse for wear. In fact, I enjoyed the not watching so much that I decided to see if I could survive an entire month. I figured after the month was up - if I even made it a whole month - I'd run right back to TV. After all, a habit is a habit. Plus it's TV. You can't not watch TV, can you?
I'm here to tell you that you can. You actually can not watch TV. Because by and large, TV is crap. When my month was up - simply out of boredom and old habit - I scrolled through the guide on a couple occasions. And by "scrolled through the guide" I mean I spent forty-five minutes of my life trying to find something decent to watch. Yes, one night I bumped into a Lifetime Movie Network movie that was pretty good, but that was an aberration. I have just shy of a zillion channels and there's still nothing worth watching, in my opinion. I don't do reality TV - no Kardashians, no fixer-uppers, no pawn shops, no ice highways. That leaves old movies, Bonanza re-runs, documentaries about aliens and Adolf Hitler, and political commentary. None of it - and I seriously mean NONE OF IT - adds value to my life.
Ok, I'll come clean. Sports. I watch sports. The end of the World Cup, a variety of tennis tournaments, including Wimbledon and the US Open, a little golf, baseball, and now football. I'll click on ESPN or CBSSports to catch scores and news, but if/when it gets ranty I shut it down. I can't do all the negativity and yatching. No one is ever happy and everyone has to criticize (That's why I skip "news" programming also).
Look, I want my world to be upbeat and positive. TV simply doesn't provide much of that. At all. So the truth is I don't miss it. And I really thought I would. My entire life at various points in my life was dictated by the TV Guide. Seriously. This was before DVRs and the like, so if I had a show, I had to be home. Had. To. Be. It was ridiculous. I was ridiculous. It's how I filled my evenings. It's how I filled my life.
Meh. That time has passed, at least for now. I fully expect when the new prime-time season gets into full swing, I'll record and watch a few shows. A few. Let's get that lined out right now. I like Homeland (even though last season was a bit predictable and too 'ripped from the headlines'), Grey's Anatomy (even though last season did get preachy at times. I don't watch to be lectured about social issues. I want hot doctors making inappropriate sexual choices while curing diseases I've never heard of), and Law & Order SVU (with twenty-plus seasons of original content, I don't expect to be disappointed). Three hours a week, less once I fast-forward through the commercials.
So, what do I do with my time if I'm not mindlessly watching TV? Are you sitting down? Both feet on the floor? It's a shocker. You know I'm a long-standing non-reader, right? Like I really, really, really dislike reading? Like I begrudgingly only read for research or education purposes? Yes, I know I'm a writer and we're supposed to LOVE to read. Blah, blah, blah. Well, I don't. I used to, but somewhere along the line I ended up not liking it very well. I like the idea of books - I own quite a few - but reading.... Oy, it gives me the shakes. Sorry, I digress...
What have I been filling my time with? I've been reading. For real. Reading.
Since quitting TV, I've read probably a dozen books. In a little over three months. That's like one a week, a near unheard of occurrence in my life. At least my recent life. What have I read? I read mostly drivel (I think the authors would take exception to that characterization, but I'm certainly not powering through the Classics) - period-piece murder mysteries, a couple fluff romances (I'm a romance writer so...), a book on photography, the book by Deena Kastor I've been quoting left and right in blogs, a Karl-Ove Knausgard (that I haven't finished yet). Thank God for the public library. Well, and a friend who's introducing me to her collection of lesbian fiction. It's interesting to say the least. Thus far, either the writing is absolute crap but the story is good or a story that could be good gets lost amid the virulent sexual escapades of its characters (These women, who are all HOT by the way, work and f***. That's it. How they have energy to work after all that......is beyond me. We'll see how the rest of her collection goes). Because I absolutely cannot focus on one book for very long, I'm currently reading four (Well, five if you count my constant re-reading of the Kastor 'bible') - a period piece murder mystery (Deanna Raybourn has some decent books if you're not looking for literary prize winners), a tawdry crime-drama-lez-sex-fest, Better Bouldering, and an autobiography of one of my childhood heroes, Amelia Earhart. Switching it up often makes them all more palatable and keeps me reading. Which keeps me away from mindlessly scrolling through social media posts, Googling random crap, and buying stuff on Amazon on my phone all evening long.
Who would have thought? I went from watching TV to reading. Lordy. Trust me, it's more about the crappy TV than my enjoyment of reading. If I could find consistently good programming and not have to channel surf through a bunch of bullshit to find it, I'd honestly read less and watch more. That's the truth of it. Sadly, I don't see that happening. TV is going to stay crap and I'm going to have to fill my downtime with something. Reading. I'm going to fill my downtime with reading. Oy.
I'm here to tell you that you can. You actually can not watch TV. Because by and large, TV is crap. When my month was up - simply out of boredom and old habit - I scrolled through the guide on a couple occasions. And by "scrolled through the guide" I mean I spent forty-five minutes of my life trying to find something decent to watch. Yes, one night I bumped into a Lifetime Movie Network movie that was pretty good, but that was an aberration. I have just shy of a zillion channels and there's still nothing worth watching, in my opinion. I don't do reality TV - no Kardashians, no fixer-uppers, no pawn shops, no ice highways. That leaves old movies, Bonanza re-runs, documentaries about aliens and Adolf Hitler, and political commentary. None of it - and I seriously mean NONE OF IT - adds value to my life.
Ok, I'll come clean. Sports. I watch sports. The end of the World Cup, a variety of tennis tournaments, including Wimbledon and the US Open, a little golf, baseball, and now football. I'll click on ESPN or CBSSports to catch scores and news, but if/when it gets ranty I shut it down. I can't do all the negativity and yatching. No one is ever happy and everyone has to criticize (That's why I skip "news" programming also).
Look, I want my world to be upbeat and positive. TV simply doesn't provide much of that. At all. So the truth is I don't miss it. And I really thought I would. My entire life at various points in my life was dictated by the TV Guide. Seriously. This was before DVRs and the like, so if I had a show, I had to be home. Had. To. Be. It was ridiculous. I was ridiculous. It's how I filled my evenings. It's how I filled my life.
Meh. That time has passed, at least for now. I fully expect when the new prime-time season gets into full swing, I'll record and watch a few shows. A few. Let's get that lined out right now. I like Homeland (even though last season was a bit predictable and too 'ripped from the headlines'), Grey's Anatomy (even though last season did get preachy at times. I don't watch to be lectured about social issues. I want hot doctors making inappropriate sexual choices while curing diseases I've never heard of), and Law & Order SVU (with twenty-plus seasons of original content, I don't expect to be disappointed). Three hours a week, less once I fast-forward through the commercials.
So, what do I do with my time if I'm not mindlessly watching TV? Are you sitting down? Both feet on the floor? It's a shocker. You know I'm a long-standing non-reader, right? Like I really, really, really dislike reading? Like I begrudgingly only read for research or education purposes? Yes, I know I'm a writer and we're supposed to LOVE to read. Blah, blah, blah. Well, I don't. I used to, but somewhere along the line I ended up not liking it very well. I like the idea of books - I own quite a few - but reading.... Oy, it gives me the shakes. Sorry, I digress...
What have I been filling my time with? I've been reading. For real. Reading.
Since quitting TV, I've read probably a dozen books. In a little over three months. That's like one a week, a near unheard of occurrence in my life. At least my recent life. What have I read? I read mostly drivel (I think the authors would take exception to that characterization, but I'm certainly not powering through the Classics) - period-piece murder mysteries, a couple fluff romances (I'm a romance writer so...), a book on photography, the book by Deena Kastor I've been quoting left and right in blogs, a Karl-Ove Knausgard (that I haven't finished yet). Thank God for the public library. Well, and a friend who's introducing me to her collection of lesbian fiction. It's interesting to say the least. Thus far, either the writing is absolute crap but the story is good or a story that could be good gets lost amid the virulent sexual escapades of its characters (These women, who are all HOT by the way, work and f***. That's it. How they have energy to work after all that......is beyond me. We'll see how the rest of her collection goes). Because I absolutely cannot focus on one book for very long, I'm currently reading four (Well, five if you count my constant re-reading of the Kastor 'bible') - a period piece murder mystery (Deanna Raybourn has some decent books if you're not looking for literary prize winners), a tawdry crime-drama-lez-sex-fest, Better Bouldering, and an autobiography of one of my childhood heroes, Amelia Earhart. Switching it up often makes them all more palatable and keeps me reading. Which keeps me away from mindlessly scrolling through social media posts, Googling random crap, and buying stuff on Amazon on my phone all evening long.
Who would have thought? I went from watching TV to reading. Lordy. Trust me, it's more about the crappy TV than my enjoyment of reading. If I could find consistently good programming and not have to channel surf through a bunch of bullshit to find it, I'd honestly read less and watch more. That's the truth of it. Sadly, I don't see that happening. TV is going to stay crap and I'm going to have to fill my downtime with something. Reading. I'm going to fill my downtime with reading. Oy.
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