Mini-Experiment: 1 Month Without TV

In all honesty, this experiment happened by accident! My husband and I had signed up for a great cable package when we moved in July 2012. One year later, the price of that package went up by $40/month! We decided we didn't watch enough television to pay that much per month, so we cancelled our cable, with the understanding that we would get an HD antenna for the TV. That way we could still watch our local channels, which is pretty much all we'd watched when we had cable anyway.

Days turned into weeks after we cancelled our cable; still no HD antenna. I was having a lot of trouble with fibromyalgia flare-ups, my teacher-husband's school year was starting, and we were just generally busy. About two weeks after we cancelled cable, I realized two things:

1. I missed my local ABC station team (WCPO) and the Good Morning America and ABC World News Tonight teams like crazy! I had gotten so used to starting every morning with them, that they'd become like a second family; not to mention the fact that I'd grown up watching Diane Sawyer and seeing her giant poster downtown for the seven years I lived in Louisville, KY. I had been tweeting with them almost every day and had actually developed Twitter relationships with some of the local anchors and reporters, as well as a few people at the national level at ABC. It felt like I was missing something without them in my day.
2. My anxiety level was nowhere near as high as it had been when I was watching the news every day. It's not like I didn't know what was going on; I read the ABC app headlines and stories every day, but did not watch one news video. No war in Syria videos with dead bodies, no anxiety-filled potential Korean attack videos, no celebrity gossip videos, none of it. And I was calmer and happier without all of that horrible footage inundating my home.

So, time went on. And then football season started. I am the biggest football fan ever, so that's when I drove my husband to Best Buy and we chose an HD antenna! I was so excited to see everyone at WCPO and ABC again! It felt like I was seeing friends I hadn't seen in a month! And my anxiety went through the roof.

This mini-experiment was an accident, but I learned so much about myself both during it and in the few weeks since it's been over. I grew up without television, not getting one in my house until I was 16. Since that time, I have loved TV, almost feeling like I'm making up for lost time! But at what cost?

"Be the change you wish to see in the world." --Gandhi

Media: Playing Up Terror Too Much?

Well, this week has been a doosie! And the media has been right there to help us through it. Well...maybe the media didn't exactly help us through it, but it was there.

The other day CNN made a huge "exclusive" announcement that there had been an arrest made in the Boston bombings. An hour later, they announced that the FBI had just released a statement saying that they would appreciate it if the media would vet their sources before releasing statements, because there had not been an arrest made. I was on Twitter and suddenly there was a flurry of activity of people trashing CNN's horrible reporting!

1. ChickOpinion ‏@ChickOpinion17 Apr

   So now, #CNN says possibly definitely not yes maybe there hasn't been an arrest or not. Ha. #breakingnews stories are irritating.

    Collapse
   

   •  Reply 
   •  Delete 
   •  Favorite 

   • 5RETWEETS
   • 2FAVORITES
   • 

   11:45 AM - 17 Apr 13 from Ohio, US · Details

1. 
   

   Andrew Kaczynski ‏@BuzzFeedAndrew17 Apr

   RT @intelwire: My sources are telling me the bomber definitely has skin.

    Retweeted by ChickOpinion

   Collapse
   

   •  Reply 
   •  Retweeted 
   •  Favorite 

   • 70RETWEETS
   • 11FAVORITES
   • 

   11:47 AM - 17 Apr 13 · Details

1. ChickOpinion ‏@ChickOpinion17 Apr

   I think #CNN should pluck daisy petals: "There has been an arrest, there has been an arrest not..." #broadcastnewsfail #CNNReporting

    Collapse
   

   •  Reply 
   •  Delete 
   •  Favorite 

   • 1RETWEET
   • 

   11:52 AM - 17 Apr 13 from Ohio, US · Details

1. 
   

   Scott Conroy ‏@RealClearScott17 Apr

   Where was Lennay Kekua on Monday afternoon?

    Retweeted by ChickOpinion

   Collapse
   

   •  Reply 
   •  Retweeted 
   •  Favorite 

   • 20RETWEETS
   • 12FAVORITES
   • 

   11:58 AM - 17 Apr 13 · Details

1. 
   

   Armchair Quarterback ‏@Armchair_QBs17 Apr

   #CNN reports the #Jets are Superbowl favorites.

    Retweeted by ChickOpinion

   Collapse
   

   •  Reply 
   •  Retweeted 
   •  Favorite 

   • 5RETWEETS
   • 

   12:27 PM - 17 Apr 13 · Details

I understand that reporting on a "breaking news" story is complicated because you're always getting new information. But, since the CNN fiasco on Wednesday, all reporters on all networks have been saying things like, "We don't want to give you false information, so we won't give you specifics until we check the facts again." Why didn't they do that in the first place?

Not only has the media been rushing information, they haven't exactly been comforting during this time of unsettlement. I know that it's not media's job to sugarcoat everything, but I don't like feeling like I've just gone into an action movie when I turn on the news. Here are some of the headlines that the usually laid-back ABC has used this week:

On Monday night, the title "Terror at the Boston Marathon" was said in one of those movie announcer voices. It was so unsettling! I felt like they were drawing a little bit of the wrong kind of feelings to the story. It was not a feeling of tragedy; it was like an action movie.

Yesterday morning and this morning the GMA headlines were also read like movie titles. It felt incredibly creepy. Yes, the headlines are accurate, but do they evoke the right kind of feelings that tragedies like these should evoke in people?

Both the President of the U.S. and the Governor of Massachusetts spoke yesterday about pulling together as a country and a community to get through this crisis (as well as, of course, the crisis in Texas). The media is not making me feel the same way the president and governor did yesterday. I do not feel reassured with "TERROR" in all-caps. Sure, it's accurate, but the media also has the opportunity and responsibility to decide how they are going to make the public feel. I don't like feeling on edge all the time, and I feel like that's where the media is taking us.

So, kudos to the reporters and anchors who have stayed strong through all of this. Thank you for being (mostly) reliable and working through the nights to keep us up to date on everything that's going on. To the public, I think we need to remember the people who were killed in the bombings and the officer who was killed last night in the shootout in Boston, as well as the people who were killed in Texas. We need to make sure that we keep this in perspective.

Stay safe. Stay strong.

"Be the change you wish to see in the world." --Gandhi

"Preachers' Daughters" Reality Show--What Could Go Wrong?

A new show is starting tonight on Lifetime: "Preachers' Daughters." It's about adolescent daughters of preachers, how they want "freedom," their daddies are super-strict on them, and then there is lots of lying, crying, arguing, and the girls showing off how nuts they are because they are "preachers' daughters." Sounds totally logical and not like a train-wreck at all, right?

I am not technically a PK (preacher's kid). I am, however, an MK (missionary's kid) whose dad preached occasionally. My parents have worked for the Presbyterian Church for 13 years. I lived overseas in a third-world country (Vanuatu) with them for five years and moved back to the States when I was 16, where I was put into a big-city public school. Nothing can go wrong there...ha!

I went through my rebellious phase while I struggled with anorexia and an abusive relationship--all in high school. In college, my first three years were just as hard. I had too many "relationships," struggled with taking things seriously, and tried on different identities to see where I could fit in.

So, did I go through all of this because my parents were missionaries? No. Can kids kind of go off the deep end when they feel like there are expectations that they cannot reach? Absolutely.

I absolutely cannot imagine having to do everything I went through with cameras and a million people watching my every move. This show has the potential to make the girls' lives a lot harder than it already is. Regardless of what everyone says about "reality" TV, we all know that we act differently when we know people are watching us. Teenage girls feel that pressure multiplied by 1000 because they usually assume that everyone is watching them all the time anyway!

If anyone feels like this show is a bad idea, please tell Lifetime. I am not against this show just because I think the premise is stupid--I think that it actually has potential to be dangerous for these young girls, as well as the PKs and MKs who will watch it. If Lifetime and these girls' parents won't take responsibility for their safety, the public should.

"Be the change you wish to see in the world." --Gandhi

TV Premiere Week!

This is one of my favorite and most hated weeks of the year! I love it because all my favorite shows and a few new ones start on TV. I hate it because I watch more TV and I'm not as productive as I'd like to be. Here are the shows that I'm looking forward to this season:

ABC

• Castle: Season 5. Monday 10pm (60min). Kate Beckett (Stana Katic) is a super-hot, super-brilliant NYPD detective who works with a mystery writer, Richard Castle (Nathan Fillion), to solve murder cases in the city. It's a fun show that is always entertaining and keeps you on your toes!
• Modern Family: Season 4. Wednesday 9pm (30min). This is an absolutely hysterical show! It's about a family (well, three subfamilies!) and all the crazy stuff they do together. It's so funny! It's not by any means an intellectual show, but it's great entertainment.

CBS

Sheldon (Jim Parsons)

• Partners: Pilot. Monday 8:30pm (30min). This is a new show that looks really funny!
• The Big Bang Theory: Season 6. Thursday 8pm (30min). Sheldon (Jim Parsons) is my favorite character! I love him! Leonard (Johnny Galecki) is also really great. Penny (Kaley Cuoco) needs to be a better actress, though. Season 5 ended really poorly, in my opinion, so I'm hoping this opener is really good!
• Elementary: Pilot. Thursday 10pm (60min). A modern day Sherlock Holmes series with Lucy Liu as Watson! I can't wait!

Other Shows to Watch

• Project Runway: Season 10. Lifetime Thursdays 9pm (90min). We're in the middle of a very high design competition! It's cutthroat and some really great designers have already gone home--down to the Final 6!
• The New Normal: Season 1. NBC Thursdays 9:30pm (30min). Episode 4 is this week. It's a very funny show about family life in modern day America. Still not completely sold on it, but willing to continue to give it a shot for the next couple episodes.
• Football! ESPN, ESPN2, ESPNU, CBS, FOX, ABC, NFL Network, NBC, any other channel that has it!

So, the moral of this list is if you don't have a DVR, you need to get one! :) 

"Be the change you wish to see in the world." --Gandhi