Go ahead and eat the crackers shaped like fish, you deserve 'em

  I have seen a lot of television over the years, so I would never have predicted that I would be watching as little at this point in my life as I currently do. Then again, I never would have guessed that the greatest advantage of Internet access for me would be banking and bill-paying, but here we are. Oh, I enjoy perusing the oddities offered up by cretin and genius alike, and of course the constant blather of every political stripe and then some; but the writing of checks and checking my balance with a few keystrokes is what I value most. Television on the other hand, holds very little interest for me these days, which is confusing to say the least. The old shows I viewed sucked pretty hard, it's a bitter pill to swallow but reviewing those favorites makes that fact undeniable.

 There's my other quandary, how is it with the channels multiplying all the time that there is less quality programming than ever? Channels devoted to Golf and Travel I understand, but what's with the WE channel? Currently showing reruns of Dharma & Greg and Hope & Faith, making up the other 24 hours with Guthy Renker and Lifetime castoff material. Can Hope & Gloria be far behind? (Wait, I liked that show.) What else is on, so-called 'reality' shows that are all so far removed from real life that the death of irony isn't even being debated anymore? Who gets to date Flavor Flav? Who gets to work for Donald Trump? Aren't those both things you might pay to avoid? Rachel Ray and Martha Stewart have talk shows? There is obviously a dearth of good ideas and many, many hours to fill, but this can't be all there is. I've veered off-topic.


  Watching all that television over the years has taught me a few things, at least about what people that go into television writing think of the rest of us. You see, Marie Barone took the plastic slipcovers off of her furniture the other day, Monica's wedding china got broken last night, and to top it all off Bleeding Gums Murphy died this afternoon. All of this got me thinking about special things that we set aside for special occasions that never occur, although Murphy did indeed play his saxophone up until his death; giving it to Lisa the day before he died. But the other two, Marie Barone and her guest towels with the gold fringe that had never demoistened a single hand, and Monica Bing's fine wedding china that she really, really, had not wanted to debox and use - what's the use?

 My Grandmama has two china cabinets filled with knick-knacks, brica-brac, and whatnots, even a couple of chatchkes; but no never-to-be-used dishes. All of the things in there are actively doing what they do - taking up space and being ready to be stared at, should someone walk up and want to do so. On top of that, she has several sets of dishes of which one is considered special occasion worthy; but she uses them. Often enough that over the years new dishes take their place and all the other sets shift downward, at which point I get new dishes. Lol. I'm a single man, and I don't have any dishes that I consider deserving of disuse, it's pointless. I'm sure if some woman finds herself unlucky enough to crash my bachelor paradise, a 'good' set of dishes won't be far behind.

  Not to say that I don't know real people that do those tv things, my Grandmama's sister does have china locked behind glass, and towels that match everything that have never been wet outside of the washing machine. My sister has a separate 'living room' that is not for people that live there, but she and her husband are allowed in it when there are guests over - the children not so much. I went to high school with a guy whose Mom did the same thing down to a 'guest entrance', which is reasonable when you have a mansion; less so in a townhouse. Oh, my Aunt and Uncle used to keep name brand soda around for guests and store brand for the kids. Wow, that's cold-blooded.

  My point is, we should live in the now, not the yet-to-come. There is no way to justify plastic on your furniture, little soaps that can't be used, towels that hang unused until they collect dust across the top. If you have visitors that would balk at the thought of using the same hand towels that the inhabitants use on a daily basis then I wish you all the luck in the world, I wouldn't have them over for all the kickbacks in Cheney's Fortress of Solitude. Join me, won't you, in using the guest bathroom, sitting on the guest couch, eating the guest croutons? Open that bottle of wine, you know the one, the one you're saving for an occasion that just isn't going to happen, kick your feet up on the good couch and make that occasion today; the first day of the rest of your life.


Duty Freebie:  I haven't even been reading the blogs I regularly read, and I don't want to recommend watching babies fart on Youtube, so head on over to bloggyaward for concise reviews of some good to not so good weblogs.