You know what I hate about insomnia? YOU CAN'T SLEEP, THAT'S WHAT! And, to add insult to injury, you finally get to sleep for an hour or two and suddenly your cat pounces onto your cuddle pillow, purring furiously and squirming around in his best "draw me like one of your french girls" poses while demanding to be petted without mercy.  *sigh* I guess I should be happy he's finally getting comfortable enough to do it, but I was so comfy and sleepy, and now I can't sleep again. It's partly the Lymes and partly the anxiety about not having a job or an income anymore and being disabled. Reality can really suck sometimes.

Since I'm awake anyway, I may as well address an issue close to my recliner-ridden heart. Here it is.

AN OPEN LETTER TO HOLLYWOOD

Dear Sirs,

WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU PEOPLE? Do you think the American public is stupid? How many times do I have to watch the same episodes of "American Justice" relabelled under another series title? Do you think we really needed six seasons of "Jersey Shore" to inform us that our collective culture is in the chamberpot? And why do we need a whiny, rude, unimpressive Sherlock Holmes and a Dr. Watson who is a cypher in "Elementary" when we have Jeremy Brett, Benedict Cumberbatch, Basil Rathbone and their associated Watsons to compare them with?

What happened to a full season of a series every fall? We used to get 26 episodes a year with one set of reruns. Nowadays, everything seems to be working according to the British model--a short burst of episodes which are then played to death until someone sees fit to have mercy on the poor fans of the series and create another short burst (a la "Sherlock"--2 years, 5 episodes per year. Shameful)  Meanwhile, we don't even have quality reruns of classic shows to watch on channels like TVLand. Whither "Dick van Dyke" or "Carol Burnett"?

While some shows are critically acclaimed, do we really need another rehash of "Battlestar Galactica" when "Eureka" could have gone on a few more seasons? Why is Joss Whedon now considered a genius for "The Avengers" when he was no less a genius when Fox killed his series "Firefly" by playing musical chairs with it in the schedules? It was a cult classic whose following only increased each year. Instead we get series about people, frequently privileged ones, behaving badly and serving as a lousy example of humanity on the back burner. Those aren't "Real Housewives" in any of those states--they're self-absorbed, greedy, manipulative wenches who should be beaten around the head and shoulders with their designer shoes. You want "Real Housewives"? Come to my house and run a vacuum. That's reality, honey.

Speaking of reality, let's get back to quality tv, huh? There are so many  competitions anymore and reality shows like "Bad Girls Club" feature people behaving badly as a form of entertainment. Great. As Rodney King once said, "can't we all just get along"?   Like I want to watch mean people verbally abusing and physically beating up on less-mean people every night. If I wanted that, I'd put on my braces and go back to high school. And people wonder why we have a problem with bullying behavior nowadays?

Now, don't get me wrong--I love having many, many stations from which to choose when I want to watch TV. While growing up, I considered myself lucky that I lived between New York and Philadelphia, so we had channels 2, 3,4,5,6,7,9,10,11, and 12. Smorgasbord! Nowadays we have hundreds on cable. So why is it so hard to find something good to watch? Even the documentaries are lame anymore! Is is any wonder that people are turning off the TVs and tuning in to Hulu? I just recently subscribed to Netflix, which means that I can get rid of my last premium channels, which show the same crapola over and over again all month for $12/month, and watch any movie I want for $8.99 a month, and I don't have to wait for another premium channel to finish running a new release movie before I can see it on my own set.

Hollywood, wake up! You're losing your audiences due to crap programming! Pull your heads out of your Nielsons and give us quality TV before we all move to Canada!

We now return you to your regularly scheduled blog.