A Bonified Couch Potato

Here's another one of those "totally scientific" tests I found to determine if you're a hopeless TV addict or not.

I have to admit the test is pretty easy, but it's still no surprise I scored a perfect Couch Potato.

Here are my results...

You scored 100 out of a possible 100 points.

How'd you do? Compare your score to the ranges below.
0-20: You prefer a good book.
40-60: TV temperate.
80-100: Couch potato!

Go take the test and see how you fare. The website also has some great family ideas for things to do instead of watching TV.

Why Does TV Suck?

Don't worry, I'm still not watching TV, but I'm also not doing much else either. I just haven't felt like blogging because I'm still in a mental funk. Until someone sends me some really good drugs, or until I snap out of it on my own, you'll just have to deal.

I was surfing around tonight and found these really good reasons why TV sucks and I figured someone else might enjoy them as much as I did:

1. It's totally passive. One of the biggest problems with T.V. is that it doesn't take much brainwork to operate it. You turn it on, sit down, and watch. And watch...and for millions of people, it takes up 2/3 of their lives. They come home from work, turn on the T.V., and just glaze over until bedtime. They sit their kids down in front of it and let it baby-sit for hours on end. Kids are subjected to all kinds of worthless programming just so their parents can take a break from parenting for a few hours every day.

2. It spoonfeeds useless garbage to the public. Brainless sitcoms, sleazy tabloid news shows, worthless talk shows, cheesy infomercials, biased & negative reporting, and advertisements that insult the intelligence of the average titmouse. But when the public is trained to love this stuff, how can it fail to please? When T.V. is your third parent while growing up, how can you be expected to turn it off after five hours?

3. It's increasingly anti-male. This is something I began to notice years ago. Do you ever notice how men are treated and portrayed in commercials and sitcoms? The average male on T.V. is a shallow, bumbling idiot with no common sense whatsoever. Now, before some of you women out there claim that this is reality, think about it. Do you think this is accurate because all the men you know are stupid, or is it because men are classically portrayed as idiots on T.V., the greatest influence on our culture ever? Commercials are the worst...usually the man is an overweight, balding guy with glasses who needs some help from his omnipotent wife. T.V. men are incompetent and helpless without their smirking, intellectually superior spouses. Once in a while I'll see a woman acting silly and superficial, but usually it's a man. (Radio is getting this way as well. I can't count the number of times I've driven to work and yelled at my radio all the way because of man-bashing ads. They're usually subtle, but sometimes they're just outright vicious.)

4. Too damn many car commercials. My God...why can't I sit through a half-hour show without having to suffer through 10,000 car and truck ads? I'm not saying that we need regulations against it or anything, but when will enough be enough? Whatever happened to looking in the Yellow Pages or reading the newspaper?

There are definitely a WHOLE lot more reasons than these why TV sucks, but I don't feel like coming up with any of my own right now.

:-)

Couch Potato Syndrome?

I finally figured out what ails me! Read this article about a study published by the Journal of the American Medical Association. Here's a short excerpt which is a real head slapper.

NBC 10 NEWS - Health - Study: Too Much TV Is Bad For Health: "People who spend a lot of time in front of the TV have this kind of couch potato syndrome,' said Dr. Frank Hu, of the Harvard School of Public Health. 'They eat more food, eat more calories and eat more junk food because of constant exposure to TV commercials. And they also exercise less."

As soon as CPS (Couch Potato Syndrome) is recognized as an official disorder, I can apply for assistance under the Americans With Disabilities Act and finally get some time off work. ;-)

If you're so inclined, you can pay for access to JAMA and read the entire study.

My Brain Won't Remember Anymore

I found a blog post by "Storypage" talking about his break from TV. He's been away from it about 30 days now too, but something he mentioned in his post caught my attention.

My Frugal Life: No TV: "I don't see TV pictures in my head. I see (as in notice) more things as I go through my day, live more mindfully, remember more."

I've been noticing that I can't seem to remember anything lately, and I have to wonder if it's somehow related to my long-standing TV addiction. My brain has been turned into complete mush from the hundreds of hours of TV I subjected it to, and now it's getting even.

When I do try to remember something, I can't seem to get the information to surface when I need it. It's like a wall up there blocking the details from getting to where they need to be. Then, hours later, when I no longer need the info, it pops into clear view! Maybe my brain is trying to heal itself and get all those synapses working again between the two hemispheres.

Hey I don't know what it's doing, but I certainly hope and pray it will get better the longer I'm away from the tube.

The Big 30 Day Milestone

Where has Dave been since July 3rd?? Good question...I'm not sure either.

For the past week, I've been totally in the dumps (mentally) for some reason. I haven't felt like doing anything. I'm not sure if it's because of the weather or because I'm depressed about our modular home. Or it could be because I discovered a bunch of water damage in the master bathroom of our existing home. I've just been laying around the house and doing a whole lot of nothing (it seems). I try to read or surf the net a bit, but nothing holds my attention.

Weather wise, it's been way too hot to feel good about doing anything. I haven't been out on my bike, or working in the yard much. And then to run the air conditioning inside, I'm always stewing about how much that is going to run our electric bill up. I'm hopeless!

As far as the modular home on the lake thing goes, nothing seems to be working out. We never did hear anything back on the counter-offer we made on that piece of property. I guess they didn't like the terms of the offer. Oh well... Now, Michele and I are arguing about whether or not to list it with a realtor and just try to get rid of it. She REALLY wants a place up on a lake in Michigan, and I just want to dump the place.

So anyway, the good news is I've made it to the big 30 day mark of my break from TV!!! I have to say the last week has made it a bit rough and I even had one minor back slide.

Yesterday, which was day 30, I watched one show on CNN called something like The Turnaround. It's where they take a struggling business and bring in a mentor to completely turn the business around and make it more successful. It was around lunch time, and Michele was already watching it. The people talking on the show caught my attention because I love to learn how businesses are able to turn things around and become successful, so I didn't see the harm in watching just while I ate my lunch. It was a very interesting and educational show, and I'm not going to beat myself up about watching it.

I'll get back to blogging on a regular basis again, mainly for me, because it helps keep me on track and focused on the reasons I stopped watching TV in the first place. I also need to figure out what to do to get out of this mental funk I'm in. Exercising would probably do the trick, but every time I think about doing that, some little voice in my head quickly talks me out of it. :-)

Finally - TV Addicts Anonymous :-)

I just found out one of my blog visitors, Chris S., has also been blogging about his TV addiction. I believe he's on day 9 of his TV abstinence. Way to go Chris!

The absolutely hilarious thing is that Chris and I have discovered we're going through very similar experiences during our liberation from the boob tube. Specifically, the withdrawal symptoms and our desire to start organizing everything!

So, I encourage you to visit Chris over at his blog, TV Addicts Anonymous, and show your support.

TV and Procrastination - A vicious Cycle

Check out Kat talking about her TV addiction and how it feeds her procrastination problem. Boy oh boy, can I relate to this blog post!

Here's a short excerpt I pulled out:

First and foremost, I am a complete and utter T.V. addict. If they had a T.V. addicts anonymous, I'd be at the front of the line. I turn on the T.V. when I wake up in the morning and as soon as I get in the front door after work. It's a habit I've nutured since my car accident and I'll be the first to admit that it's soaked up almost all of my writing time. And I've let it.

Read the entire post here at...THE SOAPBOX:

A link between TV watching and ADD

Alright now, I'm certainly no expert but I just knew there had to be a link between the television and ADD. Here's a quote from the article I found:

Studies show ADHD increased with the introduction of children’s television in the 1950s and then spiked higher in the mid 1980s when VCRs and home video became commonplace. Although the condition is known to be genetic, scientists have noted its rapid spread throughout every social class of children, and guessed that there could be an environmental cause. TV watching is a cause, this study shows.

Read the whole thing here...

The Long Awaited Before & After Office Pics

It's not perfect, but I'll take it! Here are the long awaited pictures of my office after the I-can't-watch-TV-so-maybe-I'll-organize-something bug bit me.




There's definitely more to do, but it's a great start. My bookshelves need some serious help. I plan on eBay'ing all the books and manuals I no longer use or want. The printer you see sitting on the floor should be up on eBay sometime this weekend too.

If you look at the right side of my desk (in the above pics) you can see a couple of stackable trays. Out of the entire mess that used to be on my desk and around the office, that's all I have left to process. Well, OK... I lied just a bit. There is one box left in my closet which contains the remains of all my sorting and purging. It's not stuff I really care about now, but it is stuff I need to file away for reference/archive purposes.

Here's a brief reminder of what my desk looked like just two days ago:


I vow, right here before God and all my Anti-TV peeps, I will continue to collect, process, and purge all my "stuff" until only the important "stuff" is left.

Now here's the biggie (for me anyway)... I'm also going to get my personal financial information back up-to-date in the computer, starting at January of this year.

Back in the day, I used to keep my info (bank, credit, and investment records) up to date in Quicken like it was a religion or something. It felt really good to be in total control and know exactly where we stood financially at a moments notice.

Today, I have a pretty good idea, but I'm not in control like I used to be. I miss that. It's also hypocritical of me to preach to others about matters of money when I myself have managed to get slightly off track recently. Hey, I blame it on the TV!

So this year, I've decided to dump Quicken and make the big switch to Microsoft Money 2005. I spent some time playing around with Money 2005 and it's a HUGE improvement over past versions. Where they were lacking in past versions, there are now several great reasons to switch.

I'm rambling about things you probably don't care about, so I think I'll sign off for the night and get some sleep.