I Dream of TiVo

TiVo has become my new crack cocaine. Before TiVo, my crack was shopping for furniture, and before that it was herbal tea. Perhaps there was a time when my crack was actual crack, who can say?

Yes, I'm addicted to TiVo. And not because I watch a lot of TV. It's simply this: TiVo makes me powerful. I can pause, rewind, fast-forward and record live TV. Perhaps I can even affect weather patterns. Who can say? TiVo has many powers.

For example, I was watching the very end of the BYU-Notre Dame game last week with some friends, and apparently I missed an amazing catch. Oh no! But was I doomed to a bad reenactment of this momentous event through my feeble imagination? No! Thanks to Tivo, I just pushed the rewind and lived it all over again. (sidenote: it wasn't that cool.)

Sometimes I’m listening to NPR in my car and am temporarily deafened by a loud sound (usually from some dumb semi truck) and end up missing an important point. What was that, Neal Conan? We're still fighting a war on WHAT? The National WHAT is coming in November? I'm listening to “WHAT of the Nation?” So I instinctively reach for the rewind button before I have to stop myself. Holy crap, the radio is not a TiVo! This realization hits me like a thousand voodoo needles. Then I can barely even see the road because I can't stop sobbing.

TiVo would be great in real life too. No longer would you have to sneak peeks at some attractive young thing across the room. Simply reach for the remote, press “pause,” then gaze away. And think of all the dry, meandering conversations you could fast-forward though. Hear that, old man Johnson? Your gardening stories have no power over me.

Yes, life is better with TiVo. But is TiVo better with life? This is the great question of existence. Only God can answer. And I'm sure he will get to it eventually, unless he owns a TiVo, in which case forget about it. He's busy.