Recommendations

Not mine. Others.

Althouse has a post up suggesting she's going to abandon her tradition of live blogging AI which has sent Trooper York on a rampage. (And, seriously, the guy can rant: My quote of the day is "There are no atheists in funholes.")

As I noted there, I skimmed past the AI entries because I don't watch the show. I've come close, especially last season, between Althouse's posts and the constant buzz on Sanjaya. But a lot about the show's concept is off-putting.

And then I realize, I don't generally take recommendations. A one-off has a shot, like a book or a movie. But series? I consider watching a TV series to be a commitment, and it's one I easily neglect. The last regular network series I watched was "Law and Order". That ended when they moved it from Wednesday night. I now watch exactly zero Big Three shows. On Fox, I catch "The Simpsons" occasionally.

It doesn't help that I hate commercials, but a big factor is that the nets constantly move shows around. In this millennium I've watched the complete "Mind of the Married Man", "Carnivale", "Deadwood", "Dead Like Me", "!huff", "John from Cincinnati", "Rome" and "Dexter". (Well, "Dexter" isn't over yet but I imagine I'll watch the third season, too, even with Doakes gone.)

I steel myself against commercials enough to put up with "Monk" and "psych!" on USA. (I think "Monk" should probably wrap up soon, though. Mystery series have some unique issues that I think tends to limit their longevity.)

What these shows all have in common is that they were (or are) always on at the same time (and it's a convenient time for me). I'm willing to give any given TV series a try but I'm not really willing to chase it around. I used to love Vincent D'Onofrio's scene chewing antics on "Law and Order: Criminal Intent" but I haven't recovered from it being moved to USA. I was trying to watch the latest incarnation of "Dr. Who" but BBC America screwed that up.

With the exception of "Monk", which I'm less dedicated as a viewer, all the shows mentioned are also short. I'm good for about 1-2 seasons of shows I really like. I watched the first season of "Seinfeld" and "Friends". (Sitcoms have a very short shelf life for me.)

(The PVR may change all that, I dunno.)

I don't think I'm all that rare in terms of lack-of-doggedness in the pursuit of TV. There are so, so many other things to do. (Unlike TV series, I do take book recommendations, just about any and all, so I've got a huge stack to get through.)

Kelly's about the 40th person to recommend "Battlestar Galactica" to me. But will I watch it? Who knows?

The "re-imagining" I, of course, mean. I saw the original series (and the feature movie they made out of the pilot) several times over. But that was a long time ago.