Covid-TV good for distraction

They say politics makes strange bedfellows. Well, if anything has created strange bedfellows, it would have to be a pandemic.

A big for-instance in the life of the Talkmistress: the governor of the great state of Arkansas is forcing me to look at a soap opera.

That’s just one of the things that has emerged from my working at home all these weeks and being exposed to what I call Free Covid-TV. When I’m home, the TV is my “radio,” something to have going on to provide a backdrop to the workday.

Those of you with cable and satellite haven’t encountered this. You have before you the usual couplehundred-or-so channels’ worth of shows you flip through at any given time, after which you conclude that there’s nothing on TV. You’re missing out, I tell you.

A few Free Covid-TV examples:

Law & Order, the original series (Bounce TV)

This is the show by which I noted some years ago that I was getting old. I realized that curling up at home, watching it, was preferable to going out partying. This is the show that most tempts me away from tasks at hand, especially the eppies with the late Jerry Orbach delivering those legendary, ad-libbed one-liners as Detective Lennie Briscoe. A couple lifted from websites:

Detective Ed Green (Briscoe’s partner): “Did anyone find any type of weapon in Peter Rubin’s home?

Briscoe: Not unless you count the world’s most boring record collection.

Perp: I want a lawyer! Briscoe: OK, just don’t shoot this one!

Briscoe on his past alcoholism: “After I traded in the Chivas bottle for the Grecian Formula, I became a saint.”

Briscoe, about a suspect: “Look at this: Nietzsche, Wittgenstein, Kierkegaard. Either we’re looking for a philosophy student, or we got one very depressed criminal.”

Cheesy 1980s scary films (Comet TV)

Confession: I like stupid 1950s monster movies. Why do I like them and hate 1980s horror/science-fiction movies? The introduction of sex, gore, bad hair and bad clothes, with the latter two being just about as bad as the former two? Probably. And how many times are they going to show Night of the Comet?

The Outer Limits (Comet TV)

These are the remakes that began in 1995; not the ’60s originals. Trouble with these is, you can’t just half pay attention. If you do, you’ll find yourself glancing at the end of the episode and wondering, “Wait, what scooped up half that entire town?” or “Why is the Luke

Skywalker dude attacking that machine?”

Days of Our Lives, the first half-hour (KARK, Channel 4)

I despise few things more than soap operas but if the TV isn’t already on KARK — if it’s still on Outer Limits,

for instance — chances are I’ll work right through Gov. Asa Hutchinson’s daily 1:30 p.m. press conference, which breaks into the hour-long show and updates us on everything covid-19. Unfortunately, I’ve see enough of DOOL to be in danger of getting sucked into some breathtakingly stupid plot elements. Like the guy who doesn’t believe he’s Stefan. Like the older guy named Stefano who brainwashed some folks including the object of his desire, who he caused to obtain a divorce and marry him. And how corny is it that there are characters named Xander and Rafe …. and that one dude even wears an eye patch? Geesh. Thanks, Governor!

The aforementioned press conference

This is the daily event that

lets me know the places that have reopened but which I don’t want to venture into anyway; includes a fashion element via the various masks introduced; and by which I, like others, have become a fan of Eddie Schmeckenbecher, the interpreter for the deaf.

The Doctors (KARK)

Doctors Travis Stork, Andrew Ordon, Nita Landry, Sonia Batra and Judy Ho offer topics and videos that either make me gag, make me shake my head about the state of health insurance, make me gag, help me save money on health costs, make me gag or simply make me go, “Whaa-a? Nope … Not trying the rear-end-tightening device.”

Judge Judy (KARK)

Nobody can call you an idiot like Judge Judy, a woman I would never cross. Why, of all judges, would people come to her court without their act, or their evidence, together? To spice the cases up, I’m sure. But I cringe when I know somebody is about to displease Judge Judy. Unlike the earlier days of the long-running Judge Judy,

plaintiffs and defendants talk back, interrupt, try to argue their case after she has ruled. Again, I know this is scripted.

Yet part of me still screams, “What’s up with these folks provoking Lady Vader?” and wonders how many insults the woman would hurl at me for trying too hard not to get on her bad side.

The local and national (if I’m working late enough) news

Daily proof that life, in so many ways, has gotten far nuttier than Days of Our Lives or anything else on Free CovidTV. Can’t blame the governor for that.