tivo anxiety

In college, I almost wasn't an English major. I spent the first year and a half of school fearing the required British Literature I and II classes. My interest in literature never really ventured farther back than 1900, and even that was pushing it. I have a hard time with archaic language, and I didn't think I'd find much to capture my interest in the early days of Britain.

I was wrong, of course. (And I should have been dreading the sleepy semester of American Lit I; the Puritans are no strangers to archaic language themselves.)One of the things that endeared my Brit Lit class to me was our discussion of the anxiety over print culture that many people experienced after the advent of the printing press. Suddenly, there were thousands of books to read (well, maybe not suddenly, but relatively suddenly considering the time)and no time in which to read them. With neverending piles of books to read "for fun" after I finished my school reading, I sympathized.

And now, in addition to feeling this way about books, I've come to feel this way about my Tivo.

A few days after I hooked up my Tivo, I was interviewed for an article about Tivo obsession (you can read it here if you've got a free New York Post login, or here if you don't, though you'll have to scroll down a bit to find it.) At the time, I was oh so skeptical about the power of Tivo, the unique, pressure-filled relationship that I would come to have with the little box in my living room with the dancing television on it.

But now my Tivo anxiety has kicked in full force. 12:45 am one night last week found me in front of the television--not watching anything, but rather staring at my "now playing" list and my "to-do" list, obsessing about when I could find the time to watch and delete. At the quality my Tivo is set to record, I can fit about 18.5 hours of television on it. You would think that would be enough, but one week of putting Netflix and reading and going out over Tivo (and VH1 rerunning the entire first season of America's Next Top Model) and it was nearly full.

A quick Google search shows I'm not alone, though this older article from the San Diego Union-Tribune might take things a bit too far:

TiVo television recorders that allow viewers to replay programs and skip commercials have turned casual TV watchers into prisoners shackled to sofas, unable to keep up with the flood of their favorite shows.

Or maybe it doesn't. These casual TV watchers that this quote speaks of? That's not me. I tend to think that even without Tivo, my television fanaticism would crop up in other ways. And nothing is more relaxing to me than a few hours spent with Tivo. Hopefully I can continue to cope with my Tivo anxiety . . . at least until the day I can afford a bigger Tivo.