Television Poisoning, Part I (A First-Hand Account of the Disease)

I'm lying in bed, soon to go to sleep. When I wake up tomorrow morning, I will begin my second Spring Term at W&L with Physics for the Non-Scientist at 12:20. With that and an English course on literature about the Islamic world from 1100-1600 comprising my academic load for the term, I should be busy, but not overly so. I'm also looking forward to playing a good bit of golf and otherwise enjoying the gorgeous time of year that has, at last, arrived in Virginia.

I'm looking forward, but I'm also looking back on my Spring Break. I had a nice, relaxing week at home. Aside from playing golf a few times and writing a couple articles for my father about golf courses, I was spectacularly unproductive.

I managed to watch the 18 released episodes of the latest season of the show "24." At about 43 minutes per episode, I have invested very nearly 13 hours in the show in the past 8 days instead of reading the Bill Bryson book on Australia that I recently acquired. In terms of television, it (along with "The Soup," occasionally) is one of my only guilty pleasures. Therefore, I write this somewhat bashfully, but there you go.

In the past week-plus, I have been so heavily inundated by espionage, double- and triple-crosses, and implausibly deep-running conspiracy plot lines in the show that I fear that the line between real life and Jack Bauer's America--an America full of villains with hilariously cliché flaws and good-guys who are just organized enough to mostly stave off catastrophe but too incompetent to quell threats altogether--begins to get fuzzy after prolonged exposure to "24."

Now, this doesn't mean I'm going to be taking things into my own hands and plodding off to try and save the world with my tactical brilliance and totally rad self-defense moves. However, I feel more vigilant--you never know when some normally-amiable soul has gone and gotten himself or herself infected by the disease of silly mischief. Furthermore, I find myself half-wishing I could have the earnest, foreboding music of "24" follow me around, subtly changing as the situation dictates, danger alternatively confronting and shrinking away from me. And if ever something happens, for those orange digital numbers to pop up and hold the world in suspense for between 180 and 300 seconds until my wanderings resume would be quite amusing. If someone could arrange this at a reasonable price, do contact me.

Cheers.

P.S. In Part II I aim to complain about how some commercials are ruining our youth. Stay tuned, dear readers, stay tuned.

The Wood Man Entertaineth

Most people who know me well know that I am an avid lover of Woody Allen films. He is responsible for "Annie Hall"--my favorite movie of all time--as well as some other cinematic gems such as "Radio Days," "Mighty Aphrodite," and "Manhattan."

Tonight I watched another intriguing film in the Allen canon, "Crimes and Misdemeanors." Despite a tangible preoccupation with such serious issues as death, general morality, and justice, the film is a comedy with a great many witty one-liners and absurd-yet-oddly-realistic events. And with such a capable cast--including Martin Landau, Alan Alda, Mia Farrow, Anjelica Huston, Jerry Orbach, Sam Waterston, and Allen himself--two parallel stories mesh very nicely instead of annoying and confusing the viewer, until everything kind of resolves in the end in the gracefully matter-of-fact, life-carries-on sort of denouement that endears Allen's movies to audiences. The film, while funny and silly at times, raises some intriguing questions about death and justice and faith without being preachy or pushy. I would recommend it to anyone willing to see a cerebral, amusing film that lacks the pretense and noise from which so many current efforts suffer.

Cheers.

(I know this is kind of a random post; I'll try to return to my more introspective kinds of commentaries forthwith.)

I'm Baaaaack!

The last month has been pretty hectic for me. I'm sorry I haven't blogged lately; three writing-heavy classes (Northern European Medieval Art, History of the English Language, and Native American Literature) have sapped much of my creative strength of late, so TVM has been sadly neglected for some weeks. Well no more, I say! I will find the time to blog regularly again this coming week (my Spring Break) and over the coming months, should you find it in your hearts and net-surfing schedules to make room for my random thoughts once again.

Cheers.

--Tim