Televison Favs

As I plan my escape from the boob tube, I've become obsessed with television memories (blame She - she started it with a comment on the previous post). Here's some of my favorites from childhood and teen years. What are yours?

The Wonderful World of Disney –I love Tinkerbell to this day, even though my daughter has informed me that Tinkerbell is a bitch – after all, she tried to kill Wendy.

The Ed Sullivan Show – Remember the guy who spun plates? And well I remember Topo Gigo. I loved him! “Hey Eddie, kess-a-me goodnight.”

My Favorite Martian – Starring Ray Walston (who decades later showed up briefly on the show, Picket Fences) and Bill Bixby – before the Courtship of Eddie’s Father.

The Patty Duke Show – But they’re cousins, identical cousins. They laugh alike, they walk alike, sometimes they even talk alike – what a crazy pair!

Julia – A ground-breaking show starring Diahan Carrol (much later of Dynasty fame). Carrol is about 70 now, and still quite the dish.

The Rocky and Bullwinkle Show – political parody extraordinaire – but I didn’t know it back then.

The Soupy Sales Show – Soupy aired early in the morning. One of his gags was to look real close in the camera, and in a whisper, instruct children to enter their parents’ bedrooms very quietly, on tip-toe, and take all the money from their fathers’ wallets and send it to Soupy.

Laugh In – The Fickle Finger of Fate and Here Come de Judge – Nixon even made an appearance on the show – can you believe it?

The Smothers Brothers Show – God bless summer replacement shows – Mom always liked them best.

The Prisoner – “Who is number one?” “You are, number nine.” Or was it really, “You are number nine.” The comma makes all the difference.

It Takes a Thief – Pity that Robert Wagner had to grow old.

I Spy – starring a young Bill Cosby (who even back then had some sort of fetish for sweaters - though thankfully not yet of the Cliff Huxtable variety), flush with comic success and trying his hand (quite successfully) at acting. He and Robert Culp made quite the pair.

Star Trek – The FIRST ONE – which in my book, is the ONLY one. “I’m a doctor, Jim, not a knock-off!"

All My Children – I’m talking way back, kids. I watched the very first episode – with the original Phillip, Richard Hatch, who later appeared in The Streets of San Francisco – after Michael Douglas left the show and much later, in the first Battlestar Gallactica series.

Maverick – before Mel and Will ever got their hands on the role.

The Rockford Files – starring James Garner, of Maverick fame, as a PI, living at the beach in a trailer and driving that cool Firebird. Mike Post composed the theme song – which is certainly one of the best TV theme songs EVER.

The Mod Squad – with some of the worst writing, worst acting known to television; yes, with all that competition – Mod Squad can beat any other show in the “worst” category. We watched it all the same- thinking it was so cool. Peggy Lipton often looked morose.

Saturday Night Life – You know, the one that was actually funny!

Unplugging – sorta, kinda, a little bit.

Once upon a time, long ago, back in the day, before there was dirt, you only got about 5 channels on your television set. You didn’t pay anything for this – except the electricity to power the TV, and of course, the TV itself – and mind you, there was only one TV in the house. You didn’t have a remote control – so you had to get up and walk across the room from the easy chair to change the channel. If you were very lucky, you watched at best no more than two cartoon shows on Saturday morning (but not every Saturday – daylight’s burning – go out and play) before Dad took over to watch a football game. You watched maybe one hour of TV of an evening – but not EVERY evening. On Sunday evenings, you might get a little extra time – to watch the beginning of the Ed Sullivan Show after Disney. But only just a little, and only on special occasions. After all, that Ed would sometimes show some pretty racy stuff and besides – Sunday is a school night. It wouldn't work any way to stay up too late watching TV: the networks shut down every evening around midnight. Stations would play the national anthem, show a picture of the US flag, waving majestically in the wind, and then the screen would go grey and black and fuzzy until 6AM, when the local, early morning news shows would start up.

Yeah, for you youngsters – it must sound downright primitive, eh? Can you imagine?

These days, almost every household in America has at least one TV (even if you’re dirt-broke poor – you’ve got TV), and little over a third of us have more than one. The average American watches close to 4 hours of TV a day. We surf through these channels as we sit on our butts – you never have to get up to change the channel. And you can watch 24 hours a day if you like. And the number of networks and channels? There’s a gazillion now.

I have an expanded, basic cable plan and I receive about 100 channels (some folks get 500). But what am I watching? I channel surf amongst maybe 10 channels at best, watching mostly reruns, movies that are edited to death (to spare my innocent ears and eyes of foul language – but not of sex and violence), and stupid news/entertainment shows. Now why am I paying a bundle of dough for 100 channels of crap when I’m really only watching 10 channels of crap? And why am I watching this crap? Aren’t I worth more than that? Don’t I have better things to do with my time, my brain?

I decided to make a change. But I work slowly.

First, I researched what shows or clips of shows I can watch online. I love the Daily Show and the Cobert Report – but I can get that online. I like Countdown with Keith Olbermann, but again – I can get that online – for free.

For what’s new and fresh with pop culture- I can go to You Tube. Again, free.

Then I investigated the radio – wow! What a wealth of possibilities the radio offers. I listen to the radio anyway- time to expand my options. And I can listen to radio either on my computer or my stereo.

Being anal, I made a list of shows online and radio productions I’m interested in. The list is posted prominently in the middle of my refrigerator. Random pictures of my kids and friends have been pushed off to the side to make room for this ever-so-important list.

And then I signed up for Netflix. I can order Rome, The Sopranos, etc. I have 100 selections in my queue: documentaries, foreign films, and yeah – reruns (some of shows I’ve never seen): Rome, The Sopranos, 6 Feet Under. I have the cheap plan, so I only get three DVDs at a time. I’m trying to be moderate.

In the Bay Area, you can’t get regular channels (local, PBS, and the basic networks, ABC, CBS, and NBC) without either an antenna (always temperamental and ready to scorn you at will) or cable. I called the cable company – and discovered they will charge me to downgrade - cause a tech has to come out and block channels from entering my home. Yeah, these channels, they just willy-nilly enter homes at will.

Of course, the tech can’t come for several days, and at that, it is a WINDOW (you know this drill – he’ll arrive anywhere between Monday at 10 AM and Friday at noon – that’s what it feels like, right?).

I am scheduled to go bare bones on the televised media next week.

In the meantime, I am watching as much crap as I can!