I like TV

I like TV. I know there are a lot of people who think that TV is a wasteland and watching it is a shameful waste of time, but I'm not one of them. There are some excellent, well thought out, inspiring/mysterious/hilarious

/true-to-love/heart-pounding/character-driven shows out there that are certainly NOT a waste of my time at all. But I watch too much TV. It's too easy to turn it on when I get home and have it as background noise throughout the evening, to pass several Sunday afternoon hours watching back-to-back episodes of Flip This House or the Barefoot Contessa or America's Next Top Model and end the afternoon feeling like a slug because they have slowly sucked me in, from half-listening in the other room to plopped down on the couch, frantically flipping to something else during the commercials so I don't have to endure one TV-free minute.

So I decided this morning that I should start doing what people sometimes do to stop overeating: I'm going to go to the heart of the problem and address WHY I overeat (in this case, overwatch). Am I bored? Am I lonely? Am I tired? If the reason I watch is for something other than the intrinsic qualities of the show itself, then I am going to turn the TV off. Unless Brad is watching sports, because although that likely does mean I'm feeling bored, lonely, and tired, his sports commitment is out of my hands.

I don't want to be a TV-free minimalist, and I don't want to stop watching the shows I like. But I want to be sure that I'm watching them because they are good in some way, and worthwhile for me at that moment. Maybe instead of Flip That House I'll start tackling some of our house projects, or instead of The Barefoot Contessa I'll start cooking more, or instead of America's Next Top Model, I'll start modeling. Or reading and writing more. There are just too many days where the time flies by and I end them feeling unaccomplished and unsatisfied, and I want to see if paying more attention to what I watch helps me to live a little more and a little better.