I Like to Watch

April 22, 2007 | I swear, just a few weeks ago, I marveled at how many great shows awaited me each time I turned on my TV, but now? Ugh! Nothing!

Of course there's "The Sopranos," but what else, damn it? What else?! I feel like a kid trapped in the house all summer with nothing to do and no one fun to hang out with -- bored, bored, bored! But now, when I throw myself over the nearest armchair like a damp rag and stare at the floor, groaning, rolling my eyes, picking at the carpet, my mom isn't there to hand me a broom or to tell me to shut up and go outside until dinner. There's just my husband, who's lying on the floor like a heap of dirty laundry -- you know, right next to that heap of dirty laundry.

"What do you want to do for dinner?" he groans. "There's nothing in the fridge!"

"I don't know. Do we have any chicken pot pies in the freezer?"

"No! I don't want to go to the store! What's on tonight?"

"Nothing! There's nothing on TV! Literally nothing! Not one thing!"

We whip each other into a state of panic over our lack of viable options, and spend the hour or so it would take to run to the store and make dinner listing tedious shows we don't want to watch and meals we don't feel like preparing and crappy restaurants we don't want to order takeout from. Eventually, in our desperation, we turn to the Lord, asking Him why He would forsake us like this, neglecting to provide us with the wildly exciting televised entertainments and delicious, easily prepared meals that we so richly deserve.

"Why do you test us like this, oh Lord?" we ask, our wild eyes full of pain. "Why, why, why, why, why?!!"

When our cries of helplessness and despair reach a fevered pitch, it wakes up the baby, who tells us to shut up and go outside until dinner. Then she vacuums, makes the beds, cleans the bathroom, and whips up some grilled salmon and a quinoa-eggplant salad. I swear, having a kid was the smartest thing we ever did!

It's all bad
But not all of you have an infant to bail you out of your lowest moments, and to you I ask, how do you do it? When you want the Lord to work it out, but instead He hangs up His feather boa and gives up on becoming the next Doll, what then? When there's only one rose left, and you know the Lord's totally digging the wall-eyed Barbie from Louisiana, what do you do? When there are two lovely young girlies standing before the Lord, but the Lord only has one photo in His hands, what next?

All that was once fresh and new now seems gray and dead. "The Tudors," which should delight us with its pretty costumes and hot, humpy transvestite/model king, does not. It bores us. "Andy Barker P.I." was canceled just as we were starting to warm up to its odd charms. "Shark" underwhelms. We don't even watch "Veronica Mars" anymore. Ditto "The Gilmore Girls." "Reno 911" is supposed to be great, so why doesn't it make us laugh that often, oh Lord?

Do we still care about Meredith on "Grey's Anatomy"? No, we do not. Can we remember what was happening on "Heroes" the last time it aired? Something about the world ending, the rest is hazy. What if someone on "Lost" dies? Please, Lord, please make it so, before I give up and lock myself in one of those Dharma Initiative hatches, hopefully one that's stocked with plenty of Dharma Initiative Mallo Cups.

No sooner had we pronounced this the Golden Age of Television than all of our favorites took a nose-dive or left the air or both: "Battlestar," "Lost," "24"... To think how the mighty have fallen, it brings tears to a little girl's eyes. That, and the fact that she has to vacuum the bedroom instead of relaxing and enjoying her first six months of life.

A hard "Raines" gonna fall
Yes, I know. Next week I'll go back to thinking there are untold treasures on the small screen, thanks to an influx of sugar or a hormonal sea change.

In the meantime, though, why is Jeff Goldblum still working? He isn't just phoning it in at this point -- he's dictating it to someone else, who's texting it to someone who then phones it in. Didn't anyone notice that he mumbled every single line in "Jurassic Park"? What made anyone think he'd do better as a half-crazy private eye with voices in his head? Yes, there are those who like "Raines" (8 p.m. Fridays on NBC), and say it's fascinating to watch Goldblum imagine the victims of the crimes he investigates. But personally, I hate the recycled premise and Goldblum's muttering really grates.

To young people, Goldblum must seem like one of those stars who did cameos on "The Love Boat." As kids, we knew that Carol Channing and Mickey Rooney and Zsa Zsa Gabor must've done something at some point, but to us, they were just cheesy, seemingly talentless old people who fell in love on a cruise ship, and slipped their old bones into "something more comfortable," all of which grossed us out and made us count the seconds until "Fantasy Island."

Next page: Where's the justice?