Last winter, we were buried under about ten feet of powder. My teenage daughter had snowdays week after week, and it was pretty much impossible to go anywhere. Work slowed down as New England waited to thaw out. Even though my office is right upstairs, most of my clients were having a very hard time getting to theirs, and there wasn't much going on.
So, while my husband was busy shoveling, my daughter and I did what any self-respecting digital cable subscribers would do. We binged on Netflix.
For months, my daughter had been trying to turn me on to How I Met Your Mother. Being housebound gave us the perfect chance to watch it together. 9 seasons, 208 episodes, 20 minutes each (without commercial interruption).
You do the math. (Yikes.)
This wasn't my first binge. I've been known to devour all 6 hours of the BBC Pride & Prejudice in a single, heavenly, afternoon. And, sometimes, I have to binge in order to review a new show for my regular column in Women's Voices for Change, like Grace and Frankie, House of Cards, and my favorite Orange is the New Black. At one point, I even wrote a primer on binging for other would-be couch potatoes.
But, binging still feels like a very guilty pleasure to me. Not so for my daughter (who can't remember a time before on-demand TV, much less DVDs or VHS tapes); it's par for the course. Why stop your life for a particular time on a particular night to watch a particular episode, when you can watch any and every episode, anytime, any place and on any device.
I mean, really, adhering to a network line-up is so last century.
While I may be a dilettante, my daughter is a committed binger. Thanks to Netflix (which she can see on our TV, on her laptop, on our iPad, and on her phone), she has relished season after season of series after series.
How she continues to get good grades is beyond me.
Nevertheless, here are some of her best binges:
Gossip Girl
Suffice it to say, this is not the New York I grew up in! It's a show about the 2% and their teen children — who have better-looking homes, hair, outfits, and boyfriends than the rest of us.
The Office
Not quite sure what the allure was here. My daughter has never worked in an office and has rarely even been in one. (Plus, that handheld camera thing always makes me a little queasy.) But she stayed with it.
One Tree Hill
Between the love affairs, terminal illnesses, basketball rivalries, and hostage situations (seasons 3 and 6), who would ever want to live in this place? All they need is a guest appearance by Susan Lucci. Can you say s-o-a-p o-p-e-r-a?
Pretty Little Liars
Another town you would be well-advised to steer clear of. A group of high school girls have more on their plates than homework and SATs. Like murder, blackmail, secrets, queen bees, and the mysterious "A."
Grey's Anatomy
An ensemble cast portrays young doctors at a busy hospital. It has great actors and good writing, and it somehow feels more "real" than any of the above. I walked by the TV the other afternoon and a patient's artery exploded all over his attending medical student. Niiiiiiice.
My daughter's still working her way through Grey's. But, I may ask her to hit pause and watch something with me instead. Pretty much any season of Downton Abbey (5 years, 43 episodes, on Amazon Prime) will do.
After all, we have another snowstorm on its way this weekend.
If you've enjoyed this post, I invite you to order the book Lovin' the Alien here.
Sometimes it feels like the universe is trying to tell you something. Like this morning, for example. In the 15 minutes it took to walk our wayward puppy and the hour I spent walking by myself afterwards, I saw no fewer than a half dozen dogs and owners in the process of training. "Stay," one canine was told. "Heel," another was instructed. "Sit," "Quiet," "Come now." Was this some higher power upbraiding me for dropping the proverbial ball where our own pet's instruction is concerned? Was this the price I paid for neglecting his studies (well, this and several things he's destroyed, such as my daughter's copy of Jekyll and Hyde and the family room carpet ... twice!)?
Other times, it's not so much the universe as friends and family. A few years ago, my best friend, her two daughters and my own mum suggested (more like, insisted) that I needed to watch a certain series with my then tween.
It was Gilmore Girls, and they were right!
Gilmore Girls is a mother-daughter "dramedy" about two Lorelai's, the older (Lauren Graham) is an unwed mom who has built a life in Connecticut's colorful "Stars Hollow," without the aid of a husband or her millionaire parents (the late great Edward Herrman and the delicious dastardly diva — and Tony winner — Kelly Bishop). The younger Lorelai, better known as "Rory," (Alexis Bledel) is a prep school student with her heart set on going to Harvard. Together, they get into all sorts of emotional scrapes, pulling through with endless banter and quick-witted cultural allusions (there must be about twice the number of words in a Gilmore script as in other one-hour shows). With its repertory cast of quirky characters, the series was simultaneously funny and tender and irreverent and contemporary. And ...
We both loved it.
My mother thought that Rory and my daughter were doppelgangers (Bledel has darker hair, but they have similar features and profiles). However, my daughter had other ideas.
"You're like Rory," she told me, confidently, "And, I'm like Lorelai."
"How so?" I asked.
"Because you're serious and I like to have fun."
Okay, then.
Gilmore Girls ended in 2007, but in these days of DVDs and on demand, Netflix and Amazon Prime, nothing ever really goes away. More afternoons than not, we can find an episode in syndication. And, just in case, a certain Mr. Claus left a box-set of the complete series under a certain teenage daughter's Christmas tree. Back-to-back Gilmore Girls have filled many a snow day around here.
This week, Netflix announced that it will produce a limited sequel series. (OMG! Best. News. Ever.) Four 90-minute "epilogical" (my word, btw) episodes, written by the show's original creator Amy Sherman-Palladino. Fans everywhere are as excited as we are. Even Madeleine Albright, former Secretary of State, and a Gilmore guest star once upon a time, tweeted "I hope the rumors are true — bring back #Gilmore Girls @ Netflix! #gilmoregirlsseason8."
Can we pause for a moment to reflect upon just how cool Albright is? She's 78 and tweets like a rock star.
Post-announcement elation, I do have some concerns. Will Gilmore be the same when both Girls are adults (my least favorite episodes were the ones in which a too-fast maturing Rory and Lorelai were estranged)? Will enough of the old cast agree to participate? Will the rapid-fire humor of ten years ago still make us smile today?
Even if it bombs (please, dear universe, don't let that happen), my daughter and I are happy. It will be something to enjoy together again. And, anyway ...
We'll always have Stars Hollow.
If you enjoyed this post, I invite you to order a copy of my book Lovin' the Alien at www.lovinthealien.com.
I have little doubt that my teenage daughter and her friends get tired of their middle-aged mothers waxing poetic about "the good old days."
Often, our memories aren't even that rose-colored. Much of the time, we're pointing out all the privileges and luxuries that our offspring enjoy that we didn't — or couldn't — way back when.
Invariably, the greatest contrast between the then and the now falls into the category of technology.
When I was growing up, our family had one television. (In fact, it was a black and white one until my father splurged when I was in the sixth grade and we moved up to color.) Five people, one TV, and just three networks plus PBS and a couple of independent stations — until cable came along which more than doubled our options and gave us what seemed like a magical new one, the commercial-free movies of an early HBO.
Even with all those alternatives, though, the television was a great entertainment unifier. When it came down to it, you had one choice really: watch what everyone else was watching. Or don't watch at all.
(Does anyone remember books? But, I digress.)
Consider the very different situation in our wired household today. We have a much smaller family, but many more screens. We have three televisions, all color (a small one in the kitchen, a medium one tucked into an antique Chinese cabinet in the living room, and the widest widescreen we could fit into a built-in in what we call a family room but what is, in essence, a TV and a couch). And, we have far fewer televisions (per capita or otherwise) than most contemporary families we know.
But, wait. There's more. With apologies to Madonna, we are living in a digital world. So, we need to count the four computers in the house (one each, plus a company-owned laptop that my husband brings back and forth from his office each day). I received an iPad for my fiftieth birthday (the screen of which has since been cracked, and not by me). Plus, we each have an iPhone, which can stream YouTube videos, entire TV episodes and movies too.
So, measuring by today's more varied options, we have eleven screens for three people. I'm sorry (or maybe proud) to say that no one owns an Apple Watch yet.
Then again, check with me in a year or so.
What does all this mean? Well, choice, obviously. We have more than a thousand channels via our cable company, plus time-shifted DVR recordings, on demand options and pay-per-view. Thanks to my brother (who has, for years, been the supplier for our media habits), we have access to Netflix and Amazon Prime, which adds tens or maybe hundreds of thousands more titles to the mix. Our DVD and VHS (yes, VHS) collection would be massive by 1999 standards and is still respectable today.
And so, in addition to a rather mind-numbing number of options, the other byproduct of all this is that there is no reason, pretty much ever, for the whole family to relax together in one room in front of the same screen.
Assuming my husband has no handyman projects, I have no deadlines and the offspring has no homework, you can usually find us in separate rooms, consuming different programs. This leads to peaceful cohabitation perhaps. But not much else. When your show of choice is over, there's no one to compare notes with.
There are a handful of exceptions. (We watched Downton Abbey together — via a boxed set pre-ordered from amazon.uk. I highly recommend this route to any other rabid fans. You'll get the final season two full months before the rest of the yanks.) But, in general, in our house and others, television has become a rather private and isolating activity.
Would I rather take a step backward to less choice but more family time?
Yes, yes I would.
But, don't tell my daughter.
She doesn't need another confirmation of how out of it I am.
If you enjoyed this post, I invite you to order a copy of my book Lovin' the Alien at www.lovinthealien.com.
We have been buried under snow for more than three weeks now. Truly, the piles are ten and twelve-feet high, effectively making every single intersection a blind-spot death-trap. There are no sidewalks to be seen. And roofs have quite literally caved in. The riding ring at my daughter's stable is officially closed until March (a beam cracked last week and can't be repaired until the roof is snow-free — if and when that ever happens).
Potentially more traumatic ... the roof of a small strip mall in our town collapsed and the building may be condemned. It wasn't historic (or particularly attractive even), but it contained the town's sole Starbucks! No more decaf, low-fat caramel macchiatos, no more friendly and surprisingly literate baristas.
The horror!
So, with six snowdays so far, impassable roads and frigid temperatures (and my husband shoveling indeterminable amounts of snow in 50 mph winds), my teenage daughter and I have spent an inordinate amount of time on the sectional in front of the television. For many moons, she's encouraged me to watch How I Met Your Mother (all nine — yes, nine — seasons are available on demand on Netflix). Two blizzards ago, I finally agreed.
We are now on season four, episode sixteen.
Before you do any math, let me explain that each episode ran only thirty minutes when the series was on in real time. Without commercial breaks, they run just about twenty.
Okay, you can do the math now.
Wait. Please don't.
The thing is, now officially halfway through the series' entire run, I understand why my daughter loves it so. It's really very funny. The characters are just quirky enough to be entertaining. Their scrapes and inside jokes border on the absurd but are true to their own wacky logic.
How I Met Your Mother revolves around a group of young professionals in a mid-1990's New York that looks nothing like that city but exactly like a backlot at some Hollywood studio. To my credit, I've only pointed that out once or maybe twice per episode. The group includes Ted, an architect and sort of the moral compass of the show; Lilly and Marshall, a teacher and lawyer respectively, who are so in love it would be sickening except that they're also so oversexed; Robin, a newscaster and former mall singer from Canada; and Barney Stinson.
Ah, Barney.
If the stories weren't funny (they are), if the writing wasn't good (it is), and if the rest of the cast weren't fine (and then some), I would still watch because of Barney.
Barney, a determined playboy whose mysterious job affords him a sleek bachelor pad and countless custom suits, is played to perfection by Neil Patrick Harris. Every time I think I've heard all the possible Barney-isms ("Suit up!" "Legend — wait for it — dary!"), he creates a new one ("Possipimble!"). He has very few admirable qualities (all right, none, it's pretty much none). He has no problem lying, cheating, stealing to get into a girl's bed, and less than no problem sneaking out of it while she's in the bathroom after the deed is done, leaving a "Dear Jane" note on his now ex-lover's pillow.
The character is fairly despicable, but NPH is entirely adorable. Who knew Doogie Howser would grow up to be such a louse — and such an amazing talent. I'm more sorry than ever that I missed him as Hedwig on Broadway this past year.
Still, there's something to look forward to. This coming Sunday, The Oscars will be hosted by none other than Barney Stinson himself. Still basking in the success of her recommendation and our How I Met marathon, my daughter has agreed to watch the awards with me.
After all, if I can watch 27.3 sitcom hours with her, she can watch a 6-hour awards show with me.
If you enjoyed this post, I invite you to order a copy of Lovin' the Alien at www.lovinthealien.com.
When I got home from London nearly two weeks ago, I had to catch up. On work, weeding, laundry, grocery shopping, ten days away from the gym. Was it painful? Yes.
Was it worth it? Of course.
When my teenage daughter got home from Spain a few days later, she had to catch up too. "On what?" you may ask.
Summer assignments? Her disheveled room? A fitness routine? No, no, and no.
She had to catch up on Pretty Little Liars.
Pretty Little Liars is a weekly show on ABC Family (although how it constitutes "family" fare is beyond me). It's billed as a teen mystery-thriller, and it's based (loosely) on a series of YA novels by Sara Spencer. To my daughter's credit (I guess), she read all the books prior to sitting down and bingeing the series on Netflix.
Two asides: I'm actually very happy whenever my daughter picks up a book instead of her iPhone. And, I can't really criticize the bingeing thing. I myself watched the entire first season of House of Cards in a single weekend, and got through three full seasons of Call the Midwife in less than a week. The whole "on demand" thing is deadly for those of us with a predisposition to compulsive viewing.
Back to Pretty Little Liars.
ABC Family describes it this way: Rosewood is a perfect little town. So quiet and pristine, you'd never guess it holds so many secrets. Some of the ugliest ones belong to the prettiest girls in town: Aria, Spencer, Hanna and Emily, four friends whose darkest secrets have been unraveling since Alison, the Queen Bee of their group disappeared. As the mystery surrounding Ali's disappearance resurfaces, the girls begin getting messages from a mysterious “A,” who they quickly realize is out to get them. Now, after years of tormenting and numerous shocking revelations, the Liars are united and ready to kick some “A” and uncover the truth! No longer just wanting to sit by and wait for "A’s" latest cruel attack, Aria, Emily, Hanna and Spencer take matters into their own hands and try to finally put a stop to their tormentor. As relationships are put to the test, new and old secrets are revealed and the stakes are raised higher than ever before as the Liars come closer to the truth. Will all of their sacrifices be worth it in the end?
Cue ominous music: dum dum da dum.
Now in its fifth season (wow), it maintains a steady viewership of 2.5 million (and as high as 3.7 for season premieres and year-end finales), making it ABC Family's most successful program.
Critically, it's had a less positive reception. It received a D- from Entertainment Weekly, which mused "Imagine the pitch for Liars: It's I Know What You Did Last Summer meets Gossip Girl, but like not so subtle."
(Like I wish I wrote that.)
But since when do teenagers listen to authority?
Last night, my husband had to go to a black-tie business thingy (no plus-ones, bummer), so I suggested a special night for us girls. We would order in pizza and watch a movie. My daughter demurred ...
"I have to watch something in real-time at 8," she told me.
Having caught up on everything she'd missed, she wanted to watch ... you guessed it ... Pretty Little Liars. Or just PLL for those of us in the know. I asked if I could watch with her and she seemed genuinely pleased. I warned her that I wouldn't understand what was going on, but she delightedly reminded me that actually viewing something in real-time meant that there would be actual real-time commercial breaks, during which she would fill in any blanks.
And so she did. My questions went something like this ...
"Wait, which girl is that again?"
"Wait, I thought that one was dead?"
"Wait, is she a lesbian?"
"Wait, why was she in rehab?"
"Wait, is that guy she's kissing her teacher?"
"Wait, who is A?"
Mainly, I was wondering why the so-called grownups in the little town — y'know, parents, principals, police detectives — weren't more concerned about teenagers disappearing and dying.
Frankly, I didn't understand much, but there was enough murder and mayhem to keep me interested. (Plus, I kept trying to figure out how old these supposed high school girls really were. 'Funny how Hollywood thinks nothing about shaving ten years off an actress's age to play a teen, but then ignores them completely once they reach 40. At any rate, these girls are matuuuuuure. Then again, you might be too if you'd seen everything they have. Remind me not to move to Rosewood.)
Did I love Pretty Little Liars? Ummm, no. I'm filing it away with that time I read all the Twilight books. Let's face it, I'm not the target audience. But, as long as my daughter is willing to share (and to explain, when necessary), I'm game.
And, maybe PLL puts things in perspective. After all, I sometimes watch 24 when I'm feeling stressed. A day in the life of Jack Bauer makes my own life look pretty cushy. (No matter how tight my deadlines are, at least I get bathroom breaks.)
The next time I reflect on all my daughter's teen drama, I'll remind myself that things could be a lot more ... dramatic. Dum dum da dum.
If you enjoyed this post, I invite you to order a copy of my new book Lovin' the Alien at www.lovinthealien.com.
