Televison, or my undeclared love for Anthony Bourdain

I do not own a televsion.

When I tell this to people, there is ALWAYS a response of approval. I get high fives and head nods and "way to go!" 's and "good for you!"'s, pats on the back and various other methods of allowing another human being know that you like what he/she is doing.

No one ever asks, presumably because they really don't care, but I continue this little interchange with a list of things that I do instead:

I read
I listen to talk radio
Laundry-okay, this one is a joke
I play my records and cds
I cook (consistantly failing at baking)
I organize my shoes (if you know me at all, you know what a task this is, in my five years of living in Columbia I have amassed a wonderfully decadent collection of shoes)
I check (in no particular order)
-facebook
-slate
-the huffington post (that's a new one)
-wwtdd.com
-the sartorialist's blog
-the daily digress
-gmail
-craig's list (free stuff, bikes, furniture, and the missed connections and personals...trust me, they're a hoot)
-sometimes the guardian uk if I'm feeling particularly uninformed

All of these things happen in my quaint little duplex in Olympia.

Technically, my attempt at television-less productivity is a BIG FAT LIE.
See, I can't afford a televsion. Nor can I afford the cable plan that I would need to go along with it. Actually, I can afford a small, cheap televsion with basic access cable, but that's out of the question because I would need a egregious, hi def flat screen with one million channels. I heart tv.

If I weren't a girl just out of college almost going to grad school this whole no-televsion thing wouldn't be a question.
I would devote a considerable amount of time obtaining that device and then another chunk of considerable time watching it.

But I am so I just make up for the rest of the year at Thanksgiving time in my Mother's guest bedroom watching No Reservations with Anthony Bourdain. I'm not going to tell you about this show because I don't feel like it, but I will say: It is almost perfect. I want to BE Anthony Bourdain. Then I want to marry him and have his babies and spend every waking moment looking at him and admiring his AMAZINGNESS.
Then I switch the channel back to the "What Not to Wear" Marathon and ponder yet again, "why do they thing that 5,000 dollars is enough to revamp a wardrobe?" Because it's not. I could take that money and spend every cent only on shoes and in half and hour.
Then I switch to the guide and ponder whether or not Paris Hilton's best friend search is trashy and entertaining enough for me to focus on but I pick "Dangerous Hippies" instead only to discover that it's ACTUALLY "Dangerous Hippos" and I would have noticed that if I had been wearing my glasses.

I've been doing this ALL DAY. But don't worry, I am not a pathetic triptophan-induced slug. I have inherited, from my Mother, the facinating ability to read and watch tv at the same time. I didn't even realize that I could do it until a couple of summers ago when I was Au Pair-ing in Auburn and I was made aware that I could pay attention to Hannah Montana AND read some Micheal Chabon novel at the same time. All the while making sure these children didn't walk off a cliff or stick their head into an oven. Does anyone need a babysitter?

So yeah, I've been reading too. The new cookbooks my Mother bought me. "Eat Me", and "Larousse Gastronomique". Because she knows what I'll be doing when I get home.

Happy Thanksgiving!