how long does it take? - Page 2 - General running

Waapster

17/03/2004 at 15:24

No tv? That's kinda weird. Its like a kitchen with no microwave. Or an armchair without an electric footrest. Or going running without a GPS unit.

Ooooh - I feel icky just thinking about no tv. The best thing about a telly is falling asleep in front of it. There's nothing in life quite as grand as dozing through a football match.

Hildegard

17/03/2004 at 15:46

I used to have a housemate who was a bit evangelical about not watching tv. But he was from a fruity, Steiner school type family. (Just to generalise!)

He would sit in front of the tv, and start talking to us, in order to distract us from watching the programme. It was very annoying! I think he did it because otherwise he would have watched tv all the time. Or something like that.

I do miss having a video though, as there are loads of classic films I would like to see.

A Chimp Writes

17/03/2004 at 15:53

I think its kinda weird too, waapster.

I mean, how else are you supposed to keep kids quiet?

Dr Nic Twinks

17/03/2004 at 16:04

How people can not watch Footballers' Wives of a Wednesday, is beyond comprehension.

;-P

JFB

17/03/2004 at 16:34

I am another weirdo luddite - no TV, no mobe, no microwave etc (I can't be a**ed with a heart monitor, GPS or whatever either). I grew up without TV, as did my wife.
I have to say, I don't violently object to TV, it seems to have a fair few good things on it [eg Blue Planet, Jane Austen dramatisations], a lot of which ultimately get marketed as videos [Hildegard, next time you're around, come on over!]. We do have a video machine, which I guess is an expensive way of managing selective TV watching!
Trouble with TV for us is that it becomes the focal point of the main room in the house (and placed in front of the most comfortable chair), and it must require a lot of self-discipline when you're tired after work not to flop down and just goggle.
You do miss out on a fair bit not having TV - I often couldn't follow other kids' conversations at school, and I guess the same must be true for my kids. Also, I literally can't follow the speed with which the images change on some programmes.
I remember Camille Paglia saying that anyone who doesn't have a TV doesn't have the right to comment on contemporary life and culture - while that may be a bit extreme, I can see her point, you are removed from something that is the major cultural medium for the vast majority of people.
I cheat when the rugby is on and I haven't got tickets, find a pub or someone's house with a TV.

Hildegard

17/03/2004 at 17:31

Pssst, Dr Nic!... Footies' Wives is one of the programmes I miss the most. So bad, it's good. A friend of mine filled me in on recent events - can't believe what those writers think up!

Waapster

17/03/2004 at 17:34

Footballers Wives is fab! Surpassed only by the antics of real footballers.

If only I knew where to buy that furniture from...

A Chimp Writes

17/03/2004 at 18:41

That's not furniture.

That's Man United's defence.

mercury

17/03/2004 at 18:48

I was bought up with no TV , my dad got rid of it in the late 70's , he said it was rubbish , he had a point of course - there were only 3 channels and not even 24 teletext then . The only time it was a problem was when other kids took the micky for not knowing who Arfur Daly was

Now of course I watch it 24/7 but only Discovery channels

LongDistanceBadger

17/03/2004 at 19:26

Are you coming back soon then Hilde?
[opens paws in waiting embrace pose]
I'm wukking tonight, but have asked for Footballers' Wives to be videod on our new video player.
Cougie - it took me ages and ages to work out what a water-cooler conversation was!!!!

I had no TV til 12 and am glad - but am endlessly teased about my lack of cultural refs from the 70s. But I LOVE 'I love the 70s' type TV progs!' I may have seen things only once but they still mean a lot to me! We didn;t have one a few years ago for a couple of years... it was lovely after we got over the arms folded staring at each other 'so talk to me then' phase. Lovely for the cubs who drew and drew and looked at books. Now they get up in the mornings and the TV is something to fight over :(

Hilde you've missed nothing except a slurry-like gush of really rubbish celebrity(?) reality shows. (Except for the latest jusngle one which was ahem quite entertainig) Hurry back in time for the last Sex and the City though!

LongDistanceBadger

17/03/2004 at 19:28

Footballers wives was VERY RUDE two weeks ago - I was SHOCKED
[blushes at the memory]

Tanya and Conrad on the plane...well!!!!!

Hildegard

17/03/2004 at 19:29

LDB: in four weeks I shall be back on home turf!!!

Hildegard

17/03/2004 at 19:31

p.s. Sex and the City, bleurgh!!! Anyway, it was on every night last summer in Norway, when I was house-sitting a flat with a tv, so I have seen more than enough of that programme to last ten lifetime.

LongDistanceBadger

17/03/2004 at 19:33

Hilde - then surely you owe it to Carrie and the gals to see it thru to the bitter end....?
Actually i did see a critic suggest it should now be called 'and the' ;)

Have you made your contribution to the Norse literary canon now then?

Hildegard

17/03/2004 at 19:40

<<<whispers very quietly>>>

I'm still working on it. The thing of evil that continues to haunt me. And not helped by the now five month gap in supervision.

<<tip-toes away to do more work guiltily>>>

LongDistanceBadger

17/03/2004 at 19:43

Oh Hilde I;m sorry, look,forget I said anything - surely you are allowed a little cultural exchange with your chums back home to inspire you?

moomoo

17/03/2004 at 20:13

I would love to get rid of my TV, but Scotty wants to watch it. If we're watching something together, he is totally focussed on the screen, but as soon as I pick up a book he keeps distracting me. Then there is also the matter of remote control fascism...

Bionic Ironwolf pirate

pirate

17/03/2004 at 21:32

Actually Hildegard, the acculturation effect extends farther than just to TV progs. It's a whole culture thing of dress, language, in-jokes, well-known celebs, etc. And it's a fact that even when people ask you how things are 'over there' in whatever land you are living in, they don't really want to know. I've been living outside Britain for so long that I have trouble fitting in back home. The England I left is not the England that exists nowadays.

Dubai Dave pirate

pirate

18/03/2004 at 05:55

Ironwolf
Have to agree with you I too have been out of the UK for so long that I no longer fit in. As you say you no longer understand the in jokes, whose a celeb etc. Feel like a foreigner in my own country! Which is not a prob as I rarely go back. We do have a TV (42" !!!) but its only used for watching DVD's and sport, the rest of the TV here in Dubai is American and to be avoided at all costs. Strange that here in a area where Americans are derided constantly for imposing their culture on the world and everyone watches American TV, goes to Mcdonalds & KFC!

Blackers

18/03/2004 at 08:31

As I said on a thread about 2 months ago: TV is the evil techno-spawn of the devil [or something to that effect].

I guess thast every generation has it's media crap and its media luddites. I've been known to read a Grisham in the past and I doubt that it did me any good. And I do enjoy films.

But in particualr (and as a generalisation) people who are addicted to soaps are unable to assimilate emotional events and make balanced decisions in real life. Also, they have "emotions by proxy" not seekinh emotion in real life as it is fed to them via the screen.

Hence the verbal and sometimes physical attacks on actrs in the street (and I don't mean corrie there) because of the inability of the perpatrator to differentiate.

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