I don't own a TV, haven't for years. No cable, no On Demand, no broadcast. I have had screens around for playing movies, for a while an ancient TV that got no reception except the DVD player and lately I've taken to watching DVDs on a laptop in bed.When I'm somewhere with a TV, a hotel room, staying with friends or family, I love to watch, and feel dirty afterwards. I am aggressively anti-TV in my own home because I fear watching it, enjoying it, losing parts of my life to being sucked into this thing that I'll hardly remember anything the next day about except the product placements.
It does keep me out of the loop. I smile and nod when conversation turns to some popular show, or even worse, some clever commercial. I've never seen the commercials people are talking about. I've tried to calculate how much an advertiser values my time and attention, dividing the cost of broadcasting a commercial by the number of people watching it, fudging for valuing certain demographics over others, etc. It comes out to an extremely low number, a few dollars per hour at most. They don't actually value my time very highly, though even a dollar an hour (what the television station is earning off my watching) is a good deal more expensive form of entertainment than reading a library book(occasional fines=many hours of reading). Cheaper than reading a magazine($5=2 hours). More expensive than taking a walk(what expenses?). Cheaper than driving around for fun, far cheaper(50 cents a mile, generously, 20 miles an hour=$10/hour). Cheaper than going out for coffee. Etc.
TV, that sense of mindless sitting and watching, the addictive "let's see what's on next" when it almost certainly no is better or memorable or satisfying than what I've just watched, has been creeping back into my life through Hulu. But I am saved, by my utter lack of free time. Thank you baby!
Yesterday's run destination: Montana Ave.
Yesterday's menu:
breakfast: frosted mini wheats
lunch: leftover pasta and sandwiches
dinner: potato leek soup, roast chicken
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