Wednesday, August 23, 2006

The One Where I Try to Watch Television, Hate It, Miss Old School MTV

I don't think I've fully watched a television program since like, 1998 (because I have to always be doing at least three things at once, and TV is so passive it's basically only half a thing anyhow, like eating), but I'm still fairly selective about my background entertainment. Since we just got cable (and I've been without cable since like, January), I've been trying to develop my new Top 8. This is me watching TV. You can't see my computer, crossword puzzle, magazine or dinner, but um, you can see visual evidence of me wasting time by taking photos of myself and making them into a comic strip starring myself.

Sometimes I pick a Top 8 for a certain show: (e.g., 50% of TNT's programming blows, but the other 50% is Law and Order) or just a general faith in that channel's programming (e.g., Bravo, The N, Oh! (yeah really, seriously, I'm endorsing that channel and I'm not embarrassed about that, except I'm a little embarrassed about the exclamation point)). MTV used to be my #1--unless it was claymation wrestling, the chances were pretty high that they'd be showing something relatively awesome. But apparently I'm like, either a hundred years old, or MTV is dumb.

OK, so, um, I just did a blog search and discovered it's MTV's 25th anniversary. I can't believe that actually even matters. Who Cares? Guess who else is having a 25th anniversary this year and doesn't have any relationship to Ashley Parker Angel, whoever that is? Yeah, that's right: ME. The 25th anniversary of my birth. HOLLA!

Wasn't it their 25th anniversary last year or like, the year before that? MTV is an Anniversary Whore. They're that lame couple that "celebrates" every freakin' anniversary on earth: "It's our one-month!", "It's the anniversary of our first kiss!" "It's our two-point-five month anniversary!" "It's the anniversary of when I met his parents!" "It's the anniversary of the first time he busted a nut in my eye!" bla bla bla bla ...

So anyways, as I look back at the last 25 years of my life (cause my b-day's in one month, exactly!), this is what I miss the most:

Beavis and Butthead: Putting your t-shirt over your head and saying "I am Cornholio, I need TP for my Bunghole" is STILL FUNNY.


Loveline: This is where I gained 75% of my early sexual education (the remaining 25% was provided by Seventeen and Our Bodies, Ourselves). I also learned that most sexual hangups or bizarre fetishes are a result of childhood trauma. Like having a Super Sweet 16.

The Tom Green Show: Um, before that awful movie, this guy was really funny and also he tought me some really important comic skills, e.g. poking your friends in the face while they're trying to talk.

Undressed: When you're 16 and you have insomnia and it's summertime and you live in Michigan, there is no better way to spend every single night between midnight and 5AM than watching an Undressed marathon. It needs to be on DVD ASAP. Plus it's super duper gay. It was gay before the Gays Took Over America (ha!).


I guess people are really into that Laguna Beach nonsense, but the kind of convos they have on that show are the exact convos I hear from 17-year-old biznatches in skinny jeans at the Bloomingdales Train Station (aka 59th street) that I turn up my ipod to block out.


Singled Out:Before every dumb bitch on TV started acting like Jenny McCarthy, there was Jenny McCarthy.

-True Life: Before They Ran Out of Topics and started doing "True Life: I Have a House on the Jersey Shore"
How many times did you see that one with the two dumb blonde girls who kept getting plastic surgery and always ate a lot of Chinese food the night before they went to the surgeon? That was awesome.

Why is Cribs still on? Who cares what kind of palm trees Beverly Mitchell has at her tropical pool? I'll tell you who: morons.

We all know "The Real World: Gammorah," which replaced the original TRW in like, 1999 (the original which involved seven people living in a house and having Coversations about Issues and Personality Conflicts), is mostly just about Sucking Face. I can't even handle watching it. For the first 10 years or so, the people weren't that dumb, but now they are almost all dumb.

Speaking of the real real world....STEPHEN IS THE NUMBER ONE HOTTIE IN PUBLISHING! Thanks for your votes, kiddos.

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

you look hot in those b&w shots

Matt Brand said...

I think YOU"RE the #1 hottie in publishing!

Anonymous said...

I was really into Newlyweds and The Ashlee Simpson show, but yeah...it's been really upsetting recently. I have switched to MSNBC...Keith Olbermann is way cooler than any of those TRL bunnies.

riese said...

Word on the MSNBC. Plus they also do a top ten, right? That's that thing you watch and I watch with you?

Never got into Newlyweds. Or Ashlee. But you know what I forgot about?
1. my so called life! they used to show it on mtv.
2. I WANT A FAMOUS FACE. that show was fucked up...slash AWESOME. (you know how we do...;--))

Anonymous said...

It can't be that you're old, because I'm 16 and I *hate* MTV. And myspace. (Possibly just a freak of nature.) The comic strip is cute. I have a similar type of hobby, involving finding a zillion pictures all fitting around one theme, conglomerating them into one image, and using it as a wallpaper, usually adding words or changing some to b&w so they won't clash with eachother. occupies hours of my time...

riese said...

Um, it's offical.

We are spiritual soulmates. This suspicion will only be cemented when you get to Interlochen and stand on toilet seats smoking pot in the vents, make out in the woods, fall in love with the collected works of stephen dunn, rejoice in mr.delp's "deadman poems," find 30 ways to melt cheese on some sort of carbohydrate and call it a meal, grow ten years artistically, almost die of a blissfull panic attack, and read something you were told was innapropriate at the senior reading and just glare at the glaring Ms.O on your way out.

I think.

In fact, speaking of myspace, I kind of did exactly what you are referring to for my myspace page (the wallpaper thing), but mainly i enjoy the old fashioned art of collage, which i employ with photos, found art, magazine pics, words, poems, construction paper, origami, stickers, etc.

Anonymous said...

ohhhh marie. my roommate has undressed on vhs! she recorded all the episodes when they originally aired, she even went as far as to skip the commercial breaks. we get bored/drunk/high and sit around watching said show. good good times.

don't forget that daria was also on mtv!

p.s. your latest lj post was sooo sad. sad, but true. lj is dying, and maybe it is its time to go, but lj is so full of memories for me. a diary of my teen years. sigh. not to mention, i miss the more personal posts from you. it was like reading a juicy tween novel. hah.

i'm glad to read that you're well,
jenna.

Anonymous said...

I dated one of the girls on UNDRESSED. I would LOVE to see her episodes! She was a pretty thing! And a very saucy actress!

riese said...

haviland:say what you want about mercedes....;-)

jenna: i do clearly miss (clearly) the fact that we can't respond directly to someone else's comment but instead have to add a comment to the end of the thread AND the lovely, lovely LOVELY 'friends page' (i keep hunting blogger, certain that they must develop this feature i mean COME ON!). i felt like livejournal was a little community, like sending a mass e-mail to your closest friends and some people you've never met but whom you trust in this odd distant totally stripped-and-informal kind of way. and that was really nice. this--i think--is something else altogether, almost? i just went on LJ and saw that they're creating new templates...aw...still pushin' on...but really, i think that was their trouble from the start--aesthetics.

and about your roommate and undressed....FUCKING AMAZING.

glad to hear from you,
and that you are well.

Anonymous said...

Jenny McCarthy!