There is No Escaping

There are televisions everywhere! And I am a little put out about it. What is the deal with this, anyway? Can people not live for a few minutes without the artificial stimulation of television? I do not care if you have multiple televisions in your home, but they are now turning up everywhere in public places.

Here are some of the worst offenders:

• Restaurants are filled with televisions. It seems to me that the art of dining and conversing is going away. It is hard to have a conversation when Chris Mathews or Bill O'Reilley is screaming at you from the other side of the room. Who can focus on people when there is a perfectly good football game going on just a few feet away? The thing that gripes me is when I take my newspaper (or a magazine, or a book) to a favorite restaurant for some time alone, and I am bombarded with noise! I understand the culture of the Sports Bar, but fast food, Mom & Pops and family restaurants do not count as a sports bar.
• There is a television set in the waiting room at my doctor's office. There are magazines on tables all around. I make it a habit to carry my own reading material. But who can focus when Malcolm in the Middle is in trouble once again?
• There is a TV in a local bank. Apparently it helps people lose track of how long their wait is. I do not know which is worse, the fact that the bank staff uses a distraction to disguise how slow they are, or that their customers are so dim-witted that they do not notice.

I am sure that I am probably a minority on this issue. The televisions keep popping up so someone is watching them. Some people are enjoying them. But, I am not one of them.