Shows Becky and I Have Watched Together

Becky and I don't watch a lot of television, that is to say, we don't have cable or local channels and haven't since 2007. It's not that we don't watch TV shows, we do, we just don't watch TV. This is partly due to my vicious hatred of commercials and, well, most advertising, and the fact that we don't have time.

That said, Becky and I have realized that some of the most distinct memories we have of the homes we've lived in are of the books we've read, TV shows we've watched, and video games I've played while there.

Highlands Apartments, Boone, North Carolina – When I moved to Boone to attend Appalachian State University, I moved into University Highlands Apartments on the Highway 105 bypass. Initially living alone, I met a nice girl named Becky whilst a student at ASU and she eventually moved into the space with me. A science-fiction fan for most of my life, I had never indulged in Star Trek.

It's a great book, but don't take his word for it.

Becky, meanwhile, had been raised on Star Trek: The Next Generation, watching the show with her mother with religious devotion.

Soon I became enmeshed in the world of Picard, Riker, Worf, sometimes Guinan, and the lot. The show, created by sometimes-Shinto Buddhist, Gene Rodenberry, was a classic science fiction morality play full of peaceful resolution, heroic action, tolerance, and other things which made The United Federation of Planets an ideal place in which to live, and Starfleet a badass place to work.

Not nearly as campy as its predecessor, at least once the first episode came and went (Deanna Troi in a Starfleet skirt), the show took on a darker tone once conflicts with the Borg began.  Still, the show stayed true to its heart, and Data, the non-emoting android, even got an emotional implant chip and learned the value of human swear-words.

If you keep watching, he'll tell a Lewinsky joke.

The Duplex, Boone, North Carolina - I'd been a fan of The X-Files since roughly 1999, catching the show in its later years but quickly devouring the whole series before the finale aired in 2002.

In its heyday, the show was known to be one of the scariest things on television aside from Barney the Dinosaur.  Almost as famous for its theme song as for its two moody, good-looking main characters, the show was perfect for the 1990s when the millennium was just around the corner and cults were popping up all over.

Becky and I certainly had our crushes, hers on David Duchovny, mine on Gillian Anderson and David Duchovny - and Mitch Pileggi, who played FBI Assistant Director Walter Skinner.

Hot federal employees aside, the show was emotionally tense and, I'll admit, could be pretty damn scary.  Becky definitely has distinct memories: a man slouched over on a swing, completely blue and drained of all of his blood.  A parasitic twin trying to leave its host and burrow into other people.  

Becky and I were by ourselves in the theater when the movie X-Files: I Want To Believe was released to little fanfare in 2008 - it didn't have quite the same spark as the series but I'd have loved it if it were just Duchovny, Anderson, and Pileggi playing miniature golf for three hours.

The Apartment, Charlotte, North Carolina – and then for something completely different than the previous tow, Becky and I began to watch Scrubs.

With a rare emotional honesty and a hilarious, almost inside-joke sort of feel, Scrubs was unique television.  It was nothing like Spin City, the prior creation of Scrubs leader, Bill Lawrence.

Thorough people.

Scrubs was self-conscious and its humor was ever present.  Combining poop jokes with serious hospital drama is, I would assume, not very easy to do.  Zach Braff was perfect for the role of goofy, socially-inept but well-meaning John Dorian, even if he hasn't been perfect for any other role ever since.

Ad-libbing and an obviously at ease cast and crew made Scrubs a very simple and happy show.

Becky became so attached to it that she began to have dreams that she was best friends with all of the shows characters and she and I consistently consult the show even today for relationship advice and philosophical one-liners.

That's it for this installment of "Shows Becky and I Have Watched Together" but I promise to flesh out the list of our television habits over the next few blog posts.

Stargates, wizard-sleuths, and stone-faced, criminal-profiling cops with psychic abilities will be just some of the delights to come.