The switch from analog to digital television happens in February for most of us.  You are ready, aren’t you?  Just in case, here’s a quick video to explain how simple it really is:

I love the line about Jack Benny.

Yes, while it is still technically October, this is the first day of November sweeps.  Those of you who know me well enough are already aware that the idea of beginning something with the name November sweeps before November has actually even arrived is just the kind of thing that would typically annoy me to no end.

But I’m fine with it.  Actually, I’m practically delighted about it.

Sweeps extends for four weeks, beginning on a Thursday and ending on a Wednesday.  For the first time in about five years, this year’s November sweeps starts before Halloween, which means that it will end on the day before Thanksgiving.  The past few years has had the year’s final ratings measurement period beginning on the first Thursday of November and ending on the Wednesday after Thanksgiving, which meant that we’d have to be back at work, putting in our 150% on the Friday after Turkey Day, while still miserable in our tryptophan-induced walking coma.

This year, on the other hand, (and as it always should be), I’ll be able to sit back and relax on that Friday.  Or recover.

Bring on the bird!

Last month, I mentioned that my apartment complex entered into an agreement with Comcast, my local cable provider, to get basic cable service for all of its residents.  In exchange, Comast lowered the monthy fees to $40, down from a total of roughly $56 or so (which includes taxes and fees), and we now pay that $40 as part of our rent.

In the end, it’s saves us all money if we already had Comcast service.  I’m all for that.

The only missing ingredient for this to actually work, of course, is Comcast adjusting our bills so that we don’t get charged the old rate.  And that isn’t happening.

This new billing procedure went into effect on October 1st, which means that when I paid rent this month, I paid $40 more, and I no longer owed Comcast a cent.  But I got a bill from Comcast saying that I owed them $58 for service.  I called them and was told I would have to get my apartment complex to call.  I did.  In fact, I was there when she called to get everything straightened out.  They assured her that the bill I got in October would be corrected so that I wouldn’t owe them anything.

Oh, yeah.  You know exactly where this is going.

Yep.

I got my Comcast bill yesterday.  Not only did they not correct last month’s billing error, but they charged me an additional month’s service, so I now have a total balance of $116.  I called them again and was given the standard, “Have your apartment office call our business office” line, and was told that they’d have this whole mess straightened out in time for November’s bill.  The problem, it seems, was that they didn’t get all of the information they needed to get the billing straightened out.  They did, however, get all of the information they asked for, which leads me to believe that it’s their screw-up.  It doesn’t help at all that their attitude of “have your people call my people” means it’ll be another full month before I get a bill that shows what I already know:  that I owe them nothing.

Is it too much to ask that a business you pay money to actually fixes a problem when it’s first pointed out?  No waiting around, no failure to act, no blaming someone else for not doing something they weren’t even asked to do.

Just fix it.  I don’t think that’s too much to ask at all.

A couple of weeks ago, just as the new television season was beginning, I made reference to a remark from the star of an NBC series who speculated that despite the long wait between the previous season’s finale and the new season’s first episode, fans were more fired up than ever, because, after all, absence makes the heart grow fonder.

Not true, I said:

“Waiting three months to see the next new episode of a show I like enough to make time to watch during the regular season doesn’t make me want that next episode more.  It makes me want to see what other shows are out there that have newer episodes available sooner.”

In April, I will have worked in television for 18 years.  And I haven’t spent all that time in this career without learning something!

Now, apparently, the networks are learning it the hard way, according to TV Squad:

“Across the board, those sophomore series that went on hiatus for more than six months are way down in the ratings. Apparently, absence doesn’t make the heart grow fonder when it comes to the television landscape. It makes the instant gratification generation forget you existed. And stop caring.”

If I’m going to make a point of scheduling time out of my week to watch a specific program, even if I’m going to watch it after it has aired via Tivo, one of the world’s greatest inventions, I expect that program to do its part and be there.  An occasional rerun is something I can live with.  A couple of months of reruns during summertime is something I will begrugingly tolerate because that’s the way it is.

But waiting six months or so is, to me, the same as seeing the show canceled.  By the time it’s back on again, I will have had to rewatch the previous season to remind myself of where we are in the various storylines.

And I haven’t seen a show, yet, that I’m willing to make that kind of investment in just because the networks can’t get scheduling straight.

How about you?  Are there any shows you’ve given up on because of long delays in new episodes?

I was able to catch a bit of The Late Show with David Letterman last night, when David Letterman was still talking about John McCain’s sudden decision to bow out of a scheduled appearance the night before.  McCain canceled his appearance at the last minute, so he could play superhero and “race” to Washington to save the country from an economy he told Letterman was “about to crater.”

In the clips below — from Wednesday’s show — Letterman, who made it clear that he regards McCain as a real hero for his war service, wasn’t particularly amused:

“So the economy is about to crater.  You’re a senator, a fourth-term senator from Arizona.  You go back to Washington.  You handle what you need to handle.  Don’t suspend your campaign.  You let your campaign go on, shouldered by your vice presidential nominee.  That’s what you do.  You don’t quit.  Or is that really a good thing to do?”

Then there was this about McCain’s absent “second string quarterback:”

“You say, ‘I gotta get back to Washington to save this country.’  Good for you.  ‘And while I’m gone, campaigining in my stead will be my great running mate from the state of Alaska, Sarah Palin.  And she comes out and campaigns.  What happened there?  What’s the problem?  Where is she?  Why isn’t she doing that?”

Here’s a clip of nine minutes’ worth of Letterman’s remarks on McCain’s last-minute decision.  Enjoy.

Towards the end of the clip, Letterman points out that McCain had called him personally to tell him he was “racing back to Washington,” then pointed to a supposedly-live clip of McCain sitting down for an interview with Katie Couric.

Maybe his pit crew had to change a tire during the race to the airport and they just happened to stop right outside CBS News?

On last night’s show, Letterman pointed out that after all of that, McCain didn’t actually leave for Washington until Thursday morning, which would have given him time to make Letterman’s show with no problem.

This week, several prime time television shows make their season debuts, and in some cases, their big premieres.  Yesterday morning, while flipping through the morning news programs, I caught a clip of NBC’s Today featuring a guest from the show Heroes.

I’ve never seen an episode of Heroes, because long before it premiered, I realized that it was going to be one of those shows that you have to watch too carefully…the kind you have to drop everything else for so that you can sit glued to the set so you won’t miss any important clue about some dramatic revelation.

(It’s entirely possible, since I’ve never seen the show, that I was wrong about that little guess.  But by now, it’s too late to just pick up in the middle, so it doesn’t matter any more.)

Anyway, this actor made the comment that he thought the long wait during summer hiatus — and in the case of Heroes, the wait was apparently much longer than that — was a good thing because it makes the fans just want the show that much more.

Nope.

Sorry.

Wrong.

The television viewer in me doesn’t buy that ridiculous argument for a second.  Waiting three months to see the next new episode of a show I like enough to make time to watch during the regular season doesn’t make me want that next episode more.  It makes me want to see what other shows are out there that have newer episodes available sooner.

A couple of seasons ago, I liked a show on USA Network called The 4400.  It was a science fiction series about 4,400 people who disappeared over a period of decades, then reappeared all at once from outer space with an agenda to dramatically change the world.  Some of the returning people seemed to have good motives, but all did not.

USA scheduled the show to air against traditional television seasons, so the show would have its “season” premiere in June or so, then run through the summer and wrap up that “season” in August.  By the time the following June rolled around, despite a ridiculous number of reruns of the few episodes that had been produced, you still had to go back and re-watch everything so you’d remember all of the little plotlines you were about to see advance in the next season.

It didn’t make me want to see the show that much more; in fact, waiting almost a full year to see a new episode since the cliffhanger the previous summer was almost enough to make me forget the show had ever been there.  I almost managed to miss one of the show’s season premieres because it didn’t occur to me to even look for it.  I happened to see a promo for it and realized it was that time of year.

Of course, the fact that The 4400 was a cable program says a lot about the traditional networks’ stubborn refusal to have a 52-week television season.  By taking summers off — and filling the summer months with that ridiculous reality crap — the networks just invite viewers to go elsewhere for entertainment.

And they hope that every September, when it’s time for premiere week, that those loyal viewers remember to come back and see what’s new.  They could afford to do that back when there were only three or four channels to choose from. But as competitive as the business is these days, with umpteen million channels out there hoping for your attention any time you pick up the remote, that three-month “downtime” just isn’t a good idea.

In the old days, a season was more than 30 weekly episodes.  There are some shows nowadays that seem generous if they manage to pop out 18 new shows in a given season.  And I’m not talking about the klunkers that get canceled after a few weeks.

It’s time the networks do away with the end of the season and keep new shows on all year round.  If they have to force limited-run series like Biggest Loser and Survivor into the mix, that’s fine; just give one or two shows a breather now and then to make room for them.  That’s still better than putting all of your regular programs on rerun patrol.  Then I’d have no reason to hunt down new shows when my favorites have nothing new for me.

The only show I’m looking forward to seeing is CSI:, the original one, not the Miami or New York versions, to see what happens with Warrick’s apparent murder.  (I’m pretty sure the character is being killed off, because it looked like he had sustained injuries that would not lend themselves to a “miracle recovery” in the season finale.  The promo I saw the other day indicated that CSI: doesn’t return until the first week or so of October, so it’s that much longer I have to wait around to see what happens next.  And it’s that much longer that I have to stew about it.

How about you?  Any shows you’re eagerly awaiting this season?  How would you feel about the networks killing the “summer vacation” scheduling plan?  Would you be more likely to get into a show that would offer more new episodes year-round?

Every now and then, I’ll switch on closed captioning, just to see what displays.  I just watched an episode of The Andy Griffith Show, the one called “Citizen’s Arrest,” in which Gomer arrests Barney for making an illegal U-turn.  In one scene, Opie tells Gomer that Barney got angry and resigned as deputy.

Here’s the exchange:

GOMER: You say Barney quit? He really quit?

OPIE: Yep.  He’s off Pa’s force.

But in the world of the hearing impaired, closed captioning turns Opie’s line into this:

Yep.  He’s off Paw’s force.

Paw?

I wonder if the captioners ever write things like “bear necessities” or “bale someone out of jail.”  Has a hearing impaired person been forced to endure reading of someone putting clothes in a “drier” instead of a dryer, or a man giving his fiancé a one-carrot ring.

It wouldn’t surprise me.  The hearing impaired deserve a copy editor, too.

Forgive a telephone-related pun, but it does double duty in this case.

Just when I couldn’t stall around any longer about heading to our newsroom to answer calls from angry viewers who wanted to watch their shows instead of severe weather coverage, I was told that news had it covered!  Sweet.

I had already had enough attitude just reading a few incoming emails.  I never cease to be amazed — although after 17+ years in television, I shouldn’t be surprised anymore — by the level of rudeness people display when they have something to say.

They’re quick to tell us what we do wrong, and even quicker to tell us what “idiots” we are.  (And that’s the kind of term the more polite ones say.)  And of course, they can’t seem to resist adding that they’re “never watching our station again.”

I’m not unsympathetic at all.  I appreciate the fact that they like something we have to offer enough that they’d get passionate about it.

But I also suspect that they wouldn’t stand still for someone talking to them that way for one second, and that if there was severe weather threatening their specific street and we weren’t on the air alerting them about it, they’d be raising hell about why we were “asleep at the switch.”  (Believe me, I’ve worked at other stations where we missed something and received exactly that kind of response.)

So I wonder what gives them the audacity to take that kind of attitude with someone else.  There is a right way and a wrong way to complain.  Some know how to do it effectively.  Most, unfortunately, don’t seem to get it.

There was a time when I’d have thought Saturday morning television would never be without The Bugs Bunny/Road Runner Show, and that the kids’ block of PBS would never be without Sesame Street or Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood.

If anyone runs Bugs and friends on Saturday morning, I guess I am watching some other channel at the time.  Fact is, I haven’t seen the rascally rabbit for a while now.

And now there’s news that while Sesame Street is still going — although virtually unrecognizable to those of us who grew up with it in the 1970s — Mr. Rogers is being sent packing from many PBS affiliates.

No new episodes shows have been produced for seven years.  Rogers passed away five years ago.  And officials at local PBS stations now say that the old tried and true program is showing its age, along with a decline in viewership that they have to act on.

Yes, ‘Neighborhood’ was a sometimes-hoaky production.  Yes, there were times when Rogers himself seemed far too “goody-goody” for anyone over the age of 12 to possibly be able to take seriously.  But for those who were younger than that, he was something special.  And for those of us who remember watching when we were those little kids he talked to, there was no one quite like him when it came to pointing out the fact that we’re all valuable in our own special ways.

Maybe there will be some new production with new characters that will communicate exactly the same message in a whole new way that is somehow just as effective.

But I doubt it.

Talk about coincidence!

Yesterday, I mentioned that I was considering dropping the bulk of my cable television service.  Now, I learn that my apartment complex has worked out some kind of deal with Comcast so that everyone in the complex will automatically get “basic service,” which translates to channels 2-99.

Unfortunately, that basic service is not free: instead of shelling out entirely too much money a month to Comcast, I’ll be shelling out an amount that’s supposedly somewhat less to my apartment complex as part of the rent.  Comcast says I should see a savings; my apartment complex seems oddly unsure of exactly what it will cost.  The letter I received in the mail isn’t the most clear piece of communication, either.

But I guess I’ll take paying less if I can’t find a way to not pay at all.

I’m seriously considering something that I can’t believe I’m considering at all:  cutting my cable television service.

My parents first got cable television some time around 1979.  Back in those days, there were only about 20 or 30 channels total, but that in itself was a great improvement over the four we’d had before that.  Back then, HBO wasn’t a 24-hour channel; they came on around 5:00pm and broadcast movies until 6:00am or so, then signed off for the day.

Ever since then, we’ve had cable.  I’ve never lived anywhere on my own without, and never considered trying to do without.  Until now.

For one thing, like my dad, I spend far too much time in front of the television.  Unlike my dad, I do not do this while complaining about how worthless television actually is.  I happen to enjoy television…when there’s something on worth enjoying.  My dad will sit through things he doesn’t like, then complain about how there’s nothing on.  (I’ve never quite understood that.)

But there is less and less worth watching on all of those cable channels.  My favorite channels — outside of the local ones — are TV Land, GSN and TruTV.

On TV Land, I like the classic shows, like The Andy Griffith Show, I Love Lucy, All in the Family and Sanford & Son.  Unfortunately, TV Land keeps adding a lot of reality crap and movies to their lineup, and I’ve just read that they’re planning more of the same.  If the channel is supposed to be all about nostalgia TV, then show me classic television shows!

On GSN, I like the classics there, too, especially the Gene Rayburn version of Match Game from the 1970s and the original What’s My Line? from the 1950s and 1960s.  Unfortunately, GSN added a lot of interactive and original crap that never measured up to the quality of the old favorites.  And I heard they were bringing back a block of Chuck Barris shows like The Newlywed Game and The Dating Game, which I never liked to begin with.  Then, my cable provider, Comcast, decided to play dirty and suddenly move GSN to the digital tier, which means I’d have to pay more for it.  I pay Comcast quite enough as it is, thank you, so I’ve been without GSN for a while now.  Somehow, I’ve survived.

TruTV, which used to be CourtTV, carries a few cool shows like Forensic Files.  I don’t care for the Most Shocking or Most Daring video shows, but the CSI: fan in me does enjoy the Forensic Files-type shows.  But I can watch CSI: and still get that kind of content, even if it’s more fiction than fact.

Sci-Fi Channel used to be a favorite, but I don’t care for most of the sci-fi they run nowadays.  And History Channel used to be a favorite, too, but I honestly haven’t tuned in there in months.

Turner Classic Movies and American Movie Classics are great channels; I just watched Adam’s Rib on one of them the other day.  But I can always pull out an old Hitchcock film if I’m wanting a classic.

I’d like to take that nearly $60 a month and pay other bills with it.  And I’d like to put the time I’d spend searching for something to watch to better use, like more reading, more writing, and some Bible study that my friend Archie has inspired me to do more of.

I still love television, and I think I’ll always be hooked.  But some things are more important than TV.  (And yes, it’s really me saying that!)

If Comcast would let me cherry-pick five channels and charge me just $10 over the “local reception” package, it would be worth it.  But short of that, I think I’ll drop down to the few-dollars-a-month local reception and just see how it goes.

So tell me this:  Are there even 10 non-local channels that you watch regularly? Are there any that you think you couldn’t live without?

“Put me in this dumpster!”

This isn’t the type of thing you ever hear many people tell you. Especially not a television news anchor. But it happened to me, and it’s a funny story I thought I’d share.

This was probably about eight or nine years ago, and the television station I worked for at the time was about to undergo a major nightmare: changing its news set. A set change is a particular nightmare when there’s only one studio and the new set will pretty much take up the entire thing. (That’s because there’s suddenly no place to have the old one while the new one is being built.)

Behind the old, crappy little set, was a little vanity and shelving for various people’s make-up collections. The engineers, who were only too happy to rip the old set apart, had posted several notes and emails to “talent,” which is a term used to describe the on-air people, warning them to remove all of their personal belongings by a specific date or it would be tossed out. A giant dumpster had appeared behind the building, as if to reinforce this point.

All of the anchors had taken some degree of action in terms of removing their belongings from this area. But people who work in TV are notorious for not cleaning up their messes.

One anchor, who was doing weather and some reporting at that time, had gathered all of her make-up and cosmetic paraphernalia neatly into a Tupperware container. Unfortunately, she still left the neatly-organized Tupperware container on the vanity behind the set.

And engineering made good on its threat. The next morning, the old vanity and everything that had been with it, her Tupperware included, was gone.

As I recall, I was there working late — or maybe working early — and I heard the clip-clop of women’s high-heeled shoes. It was a loud clip-clop, as if the person generating it was either really angry or trying to power-walk like those seniors at the mall.

Before I could close my edit bay door and pretend no one was there, she came around the corner and saw me.

“My make-up is gone!”

“Gone?” I hadn’t seen anyone actually throw anything away, but I had guessed that it was what had happened.

“Where did they put everything that was behind the set?”

“Well, I think they threw it away.” That’s what all of those notes said, I did not add.

“My TUPPERWARE?!? Where would they have put it?”

“Probably that dumpster right out back.”

“Come on,” she said and stormed down the hallway.

I think, just as she turned away, I caught a glimpse of real fire in her eyes. Even though this particular anchor was only about 5’6” or so, I was smart enough not to ignore a direct order. So I followed her out the back door to the large dumpster. She peered over the side, on her tiptoes, searching for any glimpse of her Tupperware. Then, she saw it.

“There!” She pointed at a heap of lumber. I didn’t see anything that remotely resembled Tupperware, but I moved closer to where she was and saw about a fraction of an inch of something that looked like it might be made of plastic. It was clear that she had a stronger-than-usual attachment to this particular container if she could recognize such a small sliver of it. Then came the famous line:

“Put me in this dumpster!”

I lifted her up over the top so she could climb in and start rooting around for her prized Tupperware and its contents. I only wish I’d had a camera handy; this would have made that night’s news one way or the other.

I heard her mumbling, even growling, as she realized that the lid had come loose — the engineers must have failed to properly “burp” the Tupperware — and her makeup had spilled. She gathered each piece, as steam began coming out of her ears.

Gathering the last piece, she glared at me, realizing how hard I was laughing at her. I helped her out of the big green monster, and the clip-clopping began again, back into the building. She was headed, undoubtedly, for whomever cleared out the studio. As she turned the corner, she said, “Somebody’s gonna have a bad damned day.”

I’m just glad it wasn’t me!

Sometimes, when I think about being a Christian, I think about a character from one of the all-time greatest sitcoms:  All in the Family.  His name, by sheer coincidence, happens also to be Archie.

I mean, what are the odds?

This particular Archie, of course, is Archie Bunker.  He’s arrogant, he’s opinionated, and he’s not hesitant at all to explain why you’re the one who’s wrong.

And Archie has his own unique takes on stories from the Bible, such as Adam and Eve’s banishment from Eden:

“Adam and Eve, they had it pretty soft out in paradise. They had no problems, they didn’t even know they was naked. But Eve, she wasn’t satisfied with all that, see? And one day against a direct order, she made poor Adam eat that apple. God got sore, He told them, ‘Get your clothes on and get the hell out of here.’”

Or this interesting take on proving that Jesus is the son of God:

“All over the world they celebrate the birth of that baby, and everybody gets time off from work. Now if that ain’t proof that He’s the Son of God, then nothing is.”

Ironically, I think people like Bunker genuinely believe they’re trying to do the right thing, and that they’re trying to do what God wants them to do.  I think all of us have someone like that in our family, someone who is just looking out for his or her family, trying to keep things the way they “ought” to be.

And sometimes, I wonder what God has to say about something like that.  I think — and this is my opinion — that God will find a way to open your eyes at some point to see where you’re right and where you’re wrong.  I think that if you are genuinely trying to do the right thing, but it turns out that you misunderstood what the right thing might be, God will take that into account.  That’s not to say that you get a free pass for being wrong, but I just don’t think that a loving God — and the God I worship is a God of love, not hate — would punish you if He sees in your soul that your heart was in the right place, even if your actions didn’t quite hit the mark.

But when you’re suddenly given that kind of reality check that makes it clear what you have right and what you have wrong, you have a chance to grow so much more as a person along this crazy journey we’re all in.  And I think that’s where we begin to be able to touch other people’s lives in a major way.