Sometimes, when I’m lying alone in my bed, sulking about my pitiful existence, crippling debt and bevy of incomplete homework assignments, I decided to flip on the good ol’ boob tube. As I scrolled through the onslaught of bland sitcoms, inappropriate cartoons, reality shows that are more scripted than fictional shows and softcore porn, I realized one important thing: television sucks (except for the softcore porn because that is pretty cool. Especially the ones that have deep storylines and background stories for the characters, like a woman’s husband is ill and she can only cure him by fornicating with the pizza boy. That’s just quality television).

            It got me thinking back to my childhood, the heyday of television, the 90s. Nothing got me jazzed up more than spending my Friday nights with Cory, Shawn and Topanga. Or watching a crazy-young Will Smith do his thing all over primetime.

            Back in those days good TV actually meant something. A show didn’t have to have bare boobs around every corner to be watchable. I can’t believe that I am advocating for less boobs on TV but I am doing God’s work here, guys.

Back in the late 20^th century, a show could be funny without making a distasteful joke about abortion every few minutes. I definitely make my share of inappropriate jokes, but there’s nothing I appreciate more than someone who can make me laugh without talking about buttholes or cursing every other word. The glorious Danny Tanner and the entire Tanner clan were able to do that for me every single day.

            Not only were sitcoms much better, cartoons were immensely greater. Every cartoon around now, and I’m talking on Nickelodeon and Cartoon Network, is some kind of whacked-out adventure. In order to watch shows like “Adventure Time” a seriously high amount of LSD is needed in the blood stream to know what the hell is actually going on.

            Just thinking about “Rugrats,” “Hey Arnold,” “Angry Beavers,” “Dexter’s Laboratory,” and “Rocko’s Modern Life” titillates me in ways that I can’t actually verbalize.  I remember watching my favorite Nickelodeon cartoons every night before my big boy bedtime of 7:00 p.m.

            Even in the late 90s, when I was a little bit older, the television rotation was solid. I developed my first fictional crush on Buffy Summers, and filled my days with a lot of “Spongebob Squarepants” episodes. It blows my mind when I think about the quality of shows that are on now compared to back then. Sometimes when I’m alone thinking about it I like to spit on my hands and rub it on my friends’ pillows out of anger.

            I realize after thinking about it for a while that I really shouldn’t be this upset about television. Maybe if I had spent more of my life reading or painting I might be qualified to do more than sit at a computer and bitch about things that I have absolutely no control over.  But unless I magically discover some other serviceable skills, this is all I will continue to do. In the immortal words of Michelle Tanner, (although completely out of context and unnecessary, I can’t think of an ending so shut up) “you got it dude.”