So as I was saying before, I started to write down what I was watching on TV on Monday. I started off the morning by watching TV online. My choice was 'Live with Regis and Kelly', I first saw this chat show style program when I was on holiday in America last summer. As it is not on TV in the UK I do not regularly watch it, however sometimes in the mornings I like to go online and watch their 'host chat' which is basically a segment where they discuss topical issues and tell stories about their life. It's not hard hitting news but its an easy watch and can sometimes be quite funny.
For the rest of the day we had classes so I didn't get round to watching anything until about half ten at night. At first I only had the TV on as background sound whilst copying up my notes into my technical diary, however I somehow managed to get drawn into watching 'Americas toughest prisons- kids behind bars'. This type of program is by no means the type of television which I normally like to watch. I am not a fan of prison shows in general as they normally seem to act as a device for the criminals caught on camera to display just how tough they really are. However although I cant say that I enjoyed this program it did appear to be slightly better than other shows I have seen that are focused on the same subject matter. I think this program was more compelling as some of these boys who were prisoners in this very scary American jail were only 15 years old. I found it shocking to see children who are a similar age to my younger brother talking about their life in prison and the serious crimes that they been accused of such as murder. These boys seemed much older than their actual age, it was hard to believe that they should still be at high school. The program also focused on the prisoners rehabilitation into society after leaving the prison, I found it interesting to see the young adults meeting with their parents again during their graduation ceremony from the jail bootcamp. However at the end of the program text came on the screen informing about the location of each of the men featured within the episode. I found it quite a shame to see that most of the people were either still in jail or had been released and committed other crimes and now have another prison sentence.
Moving on from that I decided to flip over to channel four and watch the program 'Did Heston change Little Chef?' It was about 11/11.30 ish at this point so I wasn't really surprised when there was nothing amazing on ( If I had sky I could have watched 'Sex and the city' but oh well). I did quite enjoy this program, I mean it wasn't an amazing documentary and the audience always knows that by the end of the program Heston will have infact improved Little Chef, but still it was reasonably entertaining, at least enough to keep me awake.
Finally that night when I was getting really bored I watched 'The Apprentice USA'. This episode was shown at around 12am and I think that the entire season was running throughout the night on BBC1. I had really enjoyed the UK version of 'The Apprentice'. I really got hooked on it this year and I think it is one of the best reality TV program's on TV. I like the fact that they are not competing simply to be famous, well maybe some of the contestants are, but still they are competing for a prize with some academic and intellectual basis. Plus the tasks look really fun, it even makes me want to become a business woman every time I watch it, I think that really shows the power of television. Anyway I felt very disappointed when I watched the American version as it seems to be nothing like the British version. For starters it seems way to over the top, the lighting looks like that out of a movie and most of the female contestants all look like they are going to step out of the office and go on to compete in a beauty pageant. A realistic representation of most women professional women in America? I don't think so! I also found Donald Trump totally unappealing, Alan Sugar is a much better boss when comparing the two shows. In this particular episode Donald Trump seemed to be using the program to show America how good he is, and even though he is so rediculously rich, he still does his bit for charity by building a park for kids. Even though I watched the whole episode I dont know if I would watch any in the future. I might give the celebrity version of the US Apprentice a try but who knows.
So that was pretty much everything I watched on TV on Monday, now onto Tuesday. As it turns out I actually didn't watch any program on an actual television, I caught up with the Xfactor on the ITV version of iplayer whatever thats called. Even though I had seen most of the results show and already knew who got voted out (poor Rachel) I missed seeing everyone actually sing and just had to see how everyone was before casting my expert opinion on who should get voted out! (JOHN AND EDWARD, JOHN AND EDWARD, JOHN AND EDWARD!) I actually think that this hype within the media about how terrible they are is actually doing them more good than anything else. Think of the amount of press attention they get within the media, its tons more than most of the other contestants. Although I think that John and Edward wont win the X Factor, simply because most people aren't stupid enough to think that they are at the same standard as Leona or Alexandra, I do think that they might be around for a couple more rounds yet. God knows what silly costumes and uncoordinated dance moves we will be forced to watch during there next performance but I am sure it wont be pretty.
The only other thing that I watched last night was Grey's Anatomy. However this was a brand new American episode! I would normally have watched it on Friday night as it is released in the USA on Thursday but I was busy and didn't have a chance to get round to it until yesterday but trust me it was worth the wait, it always is! I know that it is cheating and that i should wait until it comes out on TV in the UK, but I cant, its just to good. I feel as though if I dont watch it straight away when it comes out I am not a proper fan, and plus I wouldn't want to be missing out on anything. I don't watch all my American programs online though, only Grey's Anatomy, Private Practice, America's next top model, Project Runway and Desperate Housewives. Okay that is quite a lot but these are only my favourites. Plus I think it is more exciting when you know that you are watching the show at the same time as everyone else, not a couple of months later when it gets around to appearing in the UK.
From looking at the amount of television programs I have watched over a 48 hour period and from reading other peoples blogs, I get the impression that most people tend to watch more television than they actually think they do. This may be because the majority of programs are viewed without the audiences full concentration and sometimes simply as background sound. Therefore people may not remember how much they actually watch, sometimes time seems to slip by when watching television. For me it is easy to look at my watch after three hours and think 'what have I been doing for all this time?'. When considering what I watch in general, not just within the 48 hours i documented it seems that if I actually set out to watch a program it will either be online, on iplayer or on a dvd boxset. Very rarely will i go and switch on my TV at a certain time to watch a particular program. Why bother when you can watch it any time you want? If I am watching TV it will just be because I have some spare time, I will look through the menu and see what catches my eye. So in other words I typically watch TV when it is the right time for me, not at the precise time it is transmitted on television.
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