Monday, January 10, 2022

TV

 I'm not watching TV.

That's not terribly surprising, I suppose.  Before Gloria and I got married, I didn't even *have* a TV.  Gloria had one, and the townhouse even had cable service (it came as part of the rent for decades) but the cable outlet was in a corner that wasn't convenient for where the TV was placed, and we never saw any particular need to connect the two.  Then one day some friends wouldn't come over unless they could watch some program on TV, so I went and got 50 feet of coaxial cable and connected them.

But we never really watched TV, or videos, until Ryan was almost three.  Then they were going to move back east, and Gloria thought Ryan would forget her, so I went and got a video camera and a VCR, and we extracted a promise from Number One Daughter to exchange video tapes, and then we needed a better TV, and then, since we had a VCR, I started to get some movies from the library, and so it goes.  We started watching the news (recorded on the new PVR that came when the cable system was upgraded), and, after the 2010 Olympics (and also because Devon was playing), Gloria got interested in hockey, and then became a Canucks fan.  For the past seven years, since the broken shoulder, we watched the (recorded) news with dinner, then a hockey game, if the Canucks were playing (sometimes also curling), then maybe Murdoch Mysteries, or Still Standing, or one of the British, Australian, or New Zealand series that we got to know through stuff I brought home from the library (if they were being replayed on PBS or Knowledge), and maybe a movie from the library.  At some point recently Gloria started watching a lot of quilting and stitching videos on YouTube, from channels of people whose newsletters she followed.  (Hmmmm.  Is watching a lot of YouTube videos a sign that the end is near?)

I still watch the news, recording it, and then racing through a lot of it, since I know what they are going to say about the high CoVID numbers or the amount of snow we had.  I've watched a few of the videos I've brought home from the library, but sometimes it feels like I chore that has to be done.  I don't even record the Canucks games any more.  I did enjoy watching them with Gloria, but I enjoyed her enjoyment of the games.  It's not as much fun without Gloria.

I'm plowing through some movies and DVDs (and it does, often, feel like a chore).  I'm using them to force myself to take a break sometimes, since, if I don't, I find that I just keep pushing and pushing at more tasks (and there certainly are no end of tasks).  I find that I am falling asleep, or at least dozing, with anything but action moves.  I wonder if this has to do with the sleep deprivation, or whether I really do need the breaks from work more than I think I do.

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