They Watch Television

I have a 5 year old son who splits his time between my place and his mom's. He's bright, curious and active. If I do say so myself. Oscar (not his real name, but the name he calls himself) never watched TV when he was an infant. We tried to do everything we could to discourage him from getting in the habit.

And now he's an addict. A stone cold, shakes and shivers, arm-itching, addict. First thing he does when he wakes up or gets to my house is say "PBS Kids." And you think, PBS is OK. But really, its not much better than any other lousy kids programming.

Anyway, you give in and put on the television, and he's gone. You could yell right in his ear and you wouldn't get his attention. Its like he's shot up some H or something.

What he really loves, though, is Scooby Doo. Someone gave him a dvd of the first 5 episodes ever made, and he'll watch them as many times as I let him. Its kind of a bizarre retro experience for me since Scooby was huge when I was a kid. What's interesting is seeing the early 70s vibe, though: you expect pot smoke to come pouring out of the Mystery Machine at any moment.

I love being a dad.