24 No More

I find that Diane and I get hooked on a TV show and end up watching it, good or bad. When I look at the shows we watch regularly, they're all hour long dramas, aside from the few HGTV or Food Network programs. And I find it really annoying when someone tells me with great self satisfaction, "Oh, I never watch TV." Most of them are lying, the others are lying, too. (OK, there are a few that don't watch at all, but as a theater professor of mine said, "Go to the movies and watch TV or you won't understand the people around you. They're the keys to popular culture." And before I get off this aside, there is value in popular culture. A topic for another time: are the best writers of today writing genera fiction?).

Where was I? Ah. So, at the end of a day, typically around 9:30 p.m., we both like to settle down together and watch a little TV before heading to bed. And now we have TiVO and can easily watch an hour and a half to two hours of TV and be to bed by 11, cutting out all the commercials. Here's the list of what we've watched this last year:

• Law and Order: Criminal Intent
• Law and Order
• CSI Miami
• CSI
• Without A Trace
• The West Wing
• 24

We really enjoyed watching 24, but as the season progressed, more and more things began to annoy us. Most of the women in the show are evil or stupid. The blonde ones are without fail stupid. As the minutes tick away (which is a great device for the show) the plots become more and more unbelievable. By last night's massively disappointing anticlimax and then pointless assassination of the President, I declared myself done. If it comes back next year, I don't feel compelled to watch.

We were the same way with ER. We watched for years, then last season they killed off Dr. Greene. We'd grown sick of the soap opera and all the horrible things that happened in the characters lives. So we declared the show over and stopped watching. And many of the list above I don't feel I have to watch if I don't have the time (love the two Law and Orders - never watched the SVU edition, though).

And since I'm detailing TV watching, here's my additional list:

• Monk - starting again in June - lots of fun and great character.
• The Dead Zone - also a guilty pleasure
• Enterprise - my youngest daughter and I watch this latest part of the Star Trek saga. I've now been watching Star Trek in its various incarnations since 1967!
• Smallville - the girls watch this when they can and I've sat in with them - it's actually pretty good - a retelling of the Superman story with some interesting takes on the "mythology"
• The Simpsons - almost forgot that one - in a class by itself - rarely catch new episodes first run - always in syndication/rerun
• $40 a Day - a fun show on Food Network hosted by Rachel Ray, who I must admit I have a little crush on.
• Good Eats - Alton Brown is a hoot - and a great teacher in the kitchen
• Tyler's Ultimate - great modern cooking and travel show
• House Hunters - a favorite of Diane's, along with If Walls Could Talk