Lent...

I've decided to give up watching TV for Lent. This is not because I think TV is bad. In fact, a lot of it is very good. However, there's a lot of average stuff out there, and I think that I watch too much of it.

Currently, my weekly watching schedule involves the following shows:
- Lost
- Heroes
- Battlestar Galactica
- ER
- Chuck
- The Mentalist
- Being Erica
- The United States of Tara
- How I Met Your Mother
- Dollhouse
- Masterchef
(And Pushing Daisies and Eli Stone until they got cancelled)

Added up (counting 50 minutes for the longer shows and 25 for the shorter), that's nearly 10 hours of my week. Plus the dvd series of Black Books and Flight of the Conchords that I've been given as gifts and am working my way through.

Now, which shows am I actually bothered about?
- Battlestar Galactica is top of the list. Brilliant. Genius.
- Lost is also up there as the last couple of seasons have been great.
- Chuck is enjoyable and always entertaining.
- How I Met Your Mother is very funny, mostly due to Neil Patrick Harris.

And to be honest, that's it. So that's about a quarter of what I currently watch. Hmmmmm.

Lent to me is about trying to break some of the habits that are a bigger part of my life than I'd like. My TV watching isn't at the point where I've turned into a hermit with no social life, but it does take up a lot of my spare time when I'm in the flat. I can't remember the last time I read a book (and finished it). Plus, as I'm wanting to devote more time to writing, that time needs to come from somewhere. And so I'm hoping that I'll be able to put those 10 hours to good use over the coming weeks.

When Lent is over, I will go back to watching a couple of shows (probably the four listed above, plus ER as it only has a couple of episodes left before finishing forever). But I want to break the habit of watching shows that I watch just because I watched the previous episodes, despite not being that keen on them. The Mentalist is probably the best example of this - I started watching it when I was ill, and have just carried on losing 50 minutes a week to it simply because they keep churning out episodes. And Dollhouse? I'm watching on the blind faith that it might get better. Hmmmmmm.

I realise this is truly terrible timing. Battlestar Galactica has something like 4 episodes left before finishing. Lost has a few more, but is still going to be getting pretty interesting over this period. So I'll just have to cope with that and threated everyone not to ensure they don't let slip crucial plot points til after Easter.

I'm also a fan of taking something up over Lent too. So this year I'm taking up letter writing. With these extra 10 hours a week, I'm sure I can knock out one a week...