I don't have cable TV, mainly because it's not worth the cost for as little as I would watch it. That always makes me sound like an anti-TV snob but really I just don't have time. So visiting my parents is always a dip into the pop cultural mainstream when I can pig out on 140+ channels and, well, still not find much worth watching.



What struck me most this time is how vile VH1 has become. It's not like this is the decline of The New Yorker or what have you but VH1 is now one a celebrity-grubbing whine, sort of E!-Lite if that's even possible and considering that my fingers almost refused to type that perhaps it's not. The whole channel emits a greater stench due to the limping parade of talking-head sub-celebs and "journalists" (the quotes for once fully justified) who have somehow managed to turn zero self respect into a job criterion. Maybe that keeps them from clogging up the suicide-prevention hotlines but watching some shrill nobody ranting about Bjork's Oscar dress as if she's tabling an issue at the Constitutional Convention is just another thing that makes you wonder if democracy really is such a great idea after all.