Tara Biberstein and the November Fourth Experience

On any given day during the week, I am not inclined to watch any particular amount of television.  In fact, during the week I probably watch less than hree or four hours, none of it together.  However, during the date of the election I tuned in, mostly to news, but I also went "channel surfing " to attend to this assignment.  Besides C-span and CNN, where my boyfriend and I watched the election polls, we also watched the local news on ABC.  This was rare for me since I usually avoid the news by leaving the room or closing my eyes and ears when it comes on, since frankly, I fear it.  I watched most of an episode of General Hospital, a soap opera my boyfriend had turned me on to a year ago, but that I've since not seen for at least six months.  I gave another show a shot, though I do not like the show; I sat through fifteen minutes of Will & Grace merely for logging purposes, but in the end my opinion remained the same about the show.  CSI is a show that I do watch parts of somewhat often, because my parents record CSI, CSI: New York, and CSI: Miami and watch it morning, noon, and night, I do, on occasion, join them when I am home.  The final show of my night was The George Lopez show, which I do enjoy watching on the rare chance that I have the TV on at the time the show airs and I am not watching anything else in particular.  Besides the election, which I watched, I had had no particular desire to watch anything else and therefore did not miss anything in particular nor did I feel the need to record any shows that night to be watched later.

  Most of my choices in the shows I watched that night were actually influenced by my boyfriend, an avid television viewer,  since we were watching together on his television.  I did not watch any other TV that day at all, but I would like to note that when I watched General Hospital daily, I generally did so on youtube.com and that most shows I watch now, such as Alias, Heroes, X-Files, and The Office, are bought on DVD and watched at my convenience.

By logging the television that I watched, I found that when I do watch television, I watch it at shorter increments and always change the channel during commercials, none of which I could do while logging this information.  I stayed at particular shows for at least fifteen minutes even if I did not enjoy it.  I think these journals could be somewhat reliable if everyone merely logged what they already watched.  I feel that I had tuned into more  TV than I normally watch and felt constricted by the fifteen minute increments.