Narrowing the focus to the square idiot box

I've been at this whole blogging game for almost a year, and in that time, I've noticed some things. As a result, I will be trying to narrow the focus a bit, as the end of the football season will mean the end of the regular Bob, Steve and Kristin column for a bit.

Basically, the entries that get the biggest response on here are generally 1) about television or 2) about me or 3) about sports. And, although I like writing them from time to time, nobody likes reading about music. I'm basing this on a combination of evaluating hit numbers on individual entries and the comments on various entries (quantity and quality).

This makes sense to me on an intuitive level, because unless the person is a master wordsmith, my eyes normally glaze over when reading about music as well. For example, I love reading Cousin Brandon's take on music, and I've started to cherry-pick some of his songs in order to expand my listening range.

However, if anything, my talent seems to lie with television criticism. This is no doubt because I love watching it, on one hand, and on the other, there isn't really established giants in the field. For whatever reason, television doesn't attract the same quality of writing as movies, where Roger Ebert and Gene Siskel were doing landmark work for years before they even got on television. (To this day, Ebert remains one of my writing idols, and he still hasn't lost his fastball. Need proof? Check out his review for Transformers 2.)

So, in an effort to embrace this, I will be trying to do at least one television-related post per day. Ideally, I'd like to watch a random 30-minute to 60-minute program, and then post about it. Sometimes, this will be in lieu of a non-television entry and be posted at the normal 7 p.m. time. But, for those of you not relying on Blogger's dashboard or an RSS feed to follow my blog, any alternate entries will be going up at 12 p.m.

What will I cover? Basically, anything on television. This includes commercials, which I've loved to hack at in the past. (Sneak preview: My first entry will be on a ridiculously appealing and clever new commercial, for a change.) It includes commentary on sports commentary. It includes reviews of new and old and really old television shows, since one goal with this is to expose myself to new shows. (And yeah, I realize how bad that sounds.) And, most excitingly of all, it includes watching the Home Shopping Network, QVC and informercials, all three of which have the best unintentional humor on television.

If you have any recommendations for something you'd like to see me tackle, like a television show to review or a commercial to mock, well, my e-mail address remains the same - sgre6768@gmail.com. Use it, folks!

The absolutely great image is from this rage-filled and well-written entry.