Another semi-lost day

Woke up way earlier than I wanted to today ... haven't been sleeping well for the past three nights. Had to sleep a couple of hours in the afternoon. But I did get some good things done. I bought a coolant recharging kit and managed to get my car's AC partway recharged. Still need to get the car to a mechanic to bring it fully up to par -- it's only at about 50% of its full cooling power -- but at least now it's tolerable to drive in the heat of the day. That's an enormous relief.

Just in time, too, 'cause I was able to meet my son, N., at our electronics-computer superstore to snap up their deal du Fourth of July: a 250GB hard drive for $60 after rebates. It's a great time to be a storage hound.

While we were shopping and talking, N. made some reference to a running gag from Seinfeld that I'd never seen; I never watched it regularly. So N. told me about it in long and hilarious detail, which was great; he's a helluva funny young man. But as he was talking, I thought about all the TV that he and I have watched together (a lot), and how much fun we'd had watching shows and then later using them in conversation. When I was living in a different city and most of our relationship was by telephone, that was especially important ... it gave us a solid bond across those miles.

What will happen with that now? I haven't told anyone about my TV abstinence yet. (I mean no one. This blog is it.) I'm not sure how to tell people without sounding like an alcoholic who's just been born again. I've read some comments on other websites, from people who've also sworn off TV to various degrees, about how others find the idea of watching no TV at all difficult or impossible to understand. And how isolated it makes them feel in conversation. Is that going to happen to me? Already, in the short time since I've turned off the TV, I'm running into references to TV shows, events, and ads that I've missed. TV is the popular entertainment, even more than movies. It's the source of popular culture. How long will it be before I become a cultural Rip Van Winkle?

Actually I'm not worried about my kids. N. enjoys TV but it's nowhere near his whole life, and we have lots of other shared interests. My daughter watches even less. Same with the rest of my family. But ... how often will I find myself in this situation with other people I like? Or would like to know better? Just how out of touch will I feel?

Yeah, OK, I know. Be here now. One day at a time. Dammit.

As I started to write this post, I realized that I'm no longer counting my days of abstinence. I know it's been about a week and a half. Let's see ... OK, right, as of tonight it's 10 days. Anyway, I guess that means I've passed some important point where I no longer need to count the days to help me hang on by my fingernails.

Sometime during the day I found myself wondering if I was depriving my dogs too by having the TV completely off. I got a good laugh at myself over that. But then I realized that -- and I'm pretty sure this is for real -- the dogs have been different in the past 10 days. They're not as active, not chasing each other as much or playing with their toys. Maybe they're stimulated by the TV too; they're very sociable dogs, and maybe the non-stop chatter energizes them with the illusion of having lots of people around. (Hmmm, maybe I'll have to ... play with them. :o)

Dog TV addicts. Wow.

It can't possibly be a sign of mental health for someone to think about TV this much. If I didn't know I was a TV addict before, I sure do now.