Nerd in the City

Has this ever happened to you? You innocently start a new show. Maybe someone made a suggestion and it sounded interesting, so you follow the thread to see where it takes you. Once you hit the point of no return, which depending on the show can be anywhere from episode 1 (LOST) to episode 4 or 5 (Buffy the Vampire Slayer), there’s no going back. With each new episode you dig a deeper hole that you cannot crawl out of. After the end of each subsequent episode you think to yourself, “this will be the last one for tonight. After all, I have to work tomorrow.”

Next thing you know, you’re calling in sick to work because, in your heart, you do you feel a little under the weather, come to think of it. Perhaps you’ve hit a cliff hanger and you can’t possibly be expected to put your big girl/boy pants on and adult today. What if she leaves and never finds out he loves her? What if he’s really dead? What if the whole town really did explode in that fiery ball of destruction?

So you settle in for a sick day…come to find out there are 10 seasons of this show. It’s gonna take a lot more than one measly, little sick day to get you through all the plots your eyes are waiting to behold. But then…a light at the end of the tunnel. A stopping point. A gentle lull in the storyline. It’s not that the show has gotten boring, it just allows you to breathe for a moment. You push stop, go to the bathroom, throw some water on your face and remind yourself that you don’t live in Sunnydale and you aren’t facing an apocalypse. The world is ok and you aren’t President Jeb Bartlett or Jack Bauer. It’s perfectly alright for you to go ahead and live your life outside of the TV screen.

Maybe you grab a snack and think about something else for a minute, maybe you even make it all the way outside where the sun is still shining and the birds don’t even have Netflix.

Then it hits you, that familiar feeling of longing for more, more, more, next, next, next. You look back and forth between nature beckoning you to choose the light and the dark cave that has become your TV watching space. The characters call to you. The darkness calls to you. And just when you thought you were out…they pull you back in.

Farewell world, God knows when we shall meet again. Perhaps there will be another lull in season 8.