TV or not TV, that is the question

Your choice: bad programs or boredom

Now that I've graduated, I have a lot more time to sit around and watch television -- something I haven't been able to do since eighth grade.

I can wake up at 11, click on the tube, and have the Magical School Bus take me on a cartoon tour of the rain forest. After that, I can watch "The Price Is Right," followed by all the goofiest talk shows.

In the afternoon, the cartoons come back on and I can watch the Power Rangers marathon, then play video games till my eyes bleed.

It seems like everything I've ever wanted from a summer vacation, except that it's about fifteen years too late.

My problem now is that I have about 80 gazillion percent more free time than I know what to do with. Without any classes until the second term and only one issue of Ka Leo to do each week, I find myself with a sever shortage of stuff to do.

And this TV watching is getting old. It was fun at first because of all the season finales, but after watching the ending of my favorite show, "Mortal Kombat Conquest," it's all ruined.

Because it aired late on Saturday night, it was the only show I'd been able to keep up with on a regular basis. With marital arts galore, cheesy dialogue, and a sequential plot that become more complicated with each additional show, MKC rocked.

In the finale, though, all of the suspense that was built up over 25 episodes was suddenly wiped away in a flash of easy-ways-out.

Basically, everyone was killed.

There were no explanations, no tie-ins to the beginning of the video game and no intelligent plot developments. There was no deeper meaning in any of the characters' deaths; it had to be the quickest closure to a television show I've ever seen.

But the Mortal Kombat finale was by no means the stupidest thing on TV recently. "The Jesse Ventura Story" won that honor, hands down.

Ventura, an ex-Navy SEAL in his first term as governor of Minnesota, got his start in professional wrestling in the '80s. Most recently a radio talk show host, Ventura won the election as a third-party candidate supported mostly by young men in their 20s.

But Ventura's not even done with his first term yet!

There's just something wrong with doing somebody's life story before they die. In essence, the producers have concluded that there's nothing more interesting that can happen in Ventura's lifetime.

He's at the peak of public interest right now, they figure, so it's best to do the story before his popularity wanes -- before he shows his true political ineptitude and embarrasses himself nationally.

If I were Ventura, I'd be mad. I'd be thinking: "How do they know I'm not going to win the Novel Prize in Economics or something in the coming years, or in the face of great adversity solve some of Minnesota's most difficult problems?" (Don't ask me what that could be -- maybe something like the lack of good duck-hunting grounds).

All in all, I'd say this television stuff is highly overrated. Maybe I should switch to something I can get a tan doing, but is just as time-consuming -- like surfing.