"Mary liked to pour gravy on John's ____"

I’m ashamed of everything I watch on television. If anyone walks in while I’m watching my lowbrow shows, I say, “Oh, my god, can you believe this drivel is still on the air?” If Cablevision hadn’t retooled my “Family” level and deleted the Game Show Channel, I would be watching a 1969 version of The Match Game with Gene Rayburn, Charles Nelson Reilly and Rip Taylor while President Obama was addressing the nation. The Match Game questions could be folksy “Name a kind of muffin,” or risqué: “Mary liked to pour gravy on John’s ______. “

I miss re-runs of Deal or no Deal so much, I watched the Spanish version Vas O No Vas on Telemundo where the contestants are not as chubby as the English version where most weighed three hundred pounds. I have about eight Spanish stations and six selling channels and Cablevision never takes them away because of a bandwidth shortage. I’ve been known to watch HSN when nothing else is on especially when Wolfgang Puck is cooking and saying "Look at that." every other second. If you ever want to feel better about yourself listen to the testimonial calls from “happy” customers when HSN is selling plus sized jersey tunics with palazzo pants in fuchsia.

When I’m at someone else’s house and Wheel of Fortune comes on and they say: I don’t mind Jeopardy but I will not watch this,” I enter my alternate universe where I wear high heeled shoes and good undergarments and tap my well groomed nails on counter tops. I roll my eyes in agreement and make a face. In other words, I abandon myself at the first alarm. If I were a prisoner of war and asked to reveal all the war secrets or be water tortured I would squeal like Porky Pig in about three seconds.

There are shows I watch to be annoyed. As I said earlier in the week. I watch, Morning Joe to be annoyed by Mika. I watch The O’Reilley Show to be annoyed by the titles he gives his segments: “Between Barack and a hard place” “Week-end at Bernie’s” “At your Beck and call” I watch Greta Van Susteren because she can’t quite speak, I like Greta but she leaves off the ends of words and they sort of slur together into barely recognizable communication. These last two shows repeat all through the night, which is when I come upon them.

Sometimes I venture to TBS and watch the fortieth re-run of Legally Blonde or The Holiday. I did this last night. The scene where Elle Woods decides that the pool boy is gay (he tells her snidely that she’s wearing last year’s Prada shoes,)and therefore couldn’t possibly be having an affair with the wife of the murdered man, is a fave.

I haven’t even begun to scratch the surface of all I have to say about television, but I’ll leave the rest for another time.

Okay next blog will be on Lute Tablature. (Yes, there is such a thing.)