Accident Prone

I have become accident-prone. By this, I do not mean that I have begun having a lot of accidents. Rather, I have become addicted to watching TV shows about them. Thanks to “Nat Geo” (that’s the National Geographic Channel for those of you with jobs) I look forward to Tuesday like most people look forward to payday.

Tuesday is the day of the week when my TIVO gets deposited with “Air Emergency”, “Seconds From Disaster”, “Critical Situation” and “The Final Report.” All of these shows have the same premise: to tell about someone else’s misfortune in about an hour, including commercials (which of course, I can fast forward through, thanks to the miracle of TIVO.)
I don’t know if it was my illness or unemployment that first made me so attracted to other people’s bad news. Maybe I just got tired of movies and sports, although I still watch those, too. But, I don’t look forward to them the way that I do my disaster shows.

When Tuesday rolls around, I eagerly take inventory of what has been delivered to my television for the week. Then, I carefully portion out the shows throughout the week, so as not to make the mistake of feasting on them all at once. I have made that mistake, and then had nothing to look forward to for six whole days. There’s nothing quite so depressing when you’re unemployed, like knowing that you won’t get to watch a plane crash for a whole week. Ok, that didn’t come out quite right, but I know what I mean. I think.

Thanks to Nat Geo, I am on a first name basis with Greg Feith, the NTSB investigator that has handled hundreds of “Air Emergency” cases; I consider myself an amateur volcanologist, thanks to “Seconds From Disaster,” which has handled many volcano stories; I like those best, since I get to discuss “polyclastic flows” (those are the lava flows that are the most deadly parts of the volcanic eruptions); and due to the many hours of “Critical Situation” and “Final Report” I have a better understanding of things like the Oklahoma City Bombing, the 1972 Olympic Hostage Crisis, and the first and second Gulf wars.

I am aware that I watch too much TV. There’s no question. But, I’ve been working on dialing it back little by little. I’m not watching “I Survived”, “The Dog Whisperer,” or most of the Food Network anymore. There’s nothing I can do about the fact that it’s baseball season. And I just can’t give up on “The Alaska Experiment” before I find out if the four teams of regular people that volunteered to live in the wilderness for 90 days make it out alive. Although, I suppose it’s unlikely that Animal Planet would let anyone expire on camera. But, you never know.

It’s not easy being unemployed. It’s certainly harder than I expected. There’s the obvious economic hardship, but there’s also the pride thing. It’s embarrassing. It’s boring. It’s kind of bewildering. I am not sure what to do each day, after I have browsed around the ‘Net and seen the rather slim pickings for jobs. So, I get busy doing what I know I must. I get involved: in my disasters. These people need me. I need them. We are working together to prevent calamities like plane crashes and hostage crises, train wrecks and volcanic eruptions, wars and job loss, from happening to the next person.