Total Drama DVR

Seriously, sometimes something has to go. And last week that something was Grey's Anatomy.

I was up to my eyeballs in the show. At least two, if not three episodes leftover from last season, plus everything from this season, and the pressure was killing me. I know, it's just TV. Not actual brain surgery like McDreamy would perform.

One day last week I took a seat on my couch (sadly, one of my favorite places to be - I think my end of the couch is actually visibly lower than the other end, which is very, very sad), check out my DVR, and find it's about 97% full. I had a little baby panic attack.

Here it is, fall season in full swing, and I'm just not keeping up. One of the problems is that there is just not much Kayla-free TV time. So you don't want to watch a show like Grey's Anatomy, what with them cutting people up and all the blood and guts and stuff with your almost-three-year-old running around and telling you to get off the couch because she wants to jump in that spot, and ordering you to hold Dolly Deigo so that he can watch her jump. Frankly, when my TV is on, it's usually playing Charlie and Lola, Go Diego, Go, Wow, Wow, Wubbzy, Caillou, or Max and Ruby. All delightful shows in their own right, but sometimes when you're pushing forty you need something a little meatier.

But why Grey's, Jen? I'll bet you're asking, especially if you're one of those with whom I've talked about how good this episode was and how much that episode made me cry. I will always have affection for the show. I actually broke up with it before and started watching it again, so perhaps, down the line, when the DVR gets somewhat cleaned up, I'll let it back into my life. Right now, I just can't commit to it. Kind of the way that Meredith can never seem to quite commit to Derek (and please, can someone explain that to me, because while I know that she is even more neurotic than I am, and that is really saying something, I don't care how nutty I am, when Patrick Dempsey is all, "Marry me, this will be our house, I love you, love you, love you," sorry, but you wouldn't find me hesitating for a single second about whether or not I could commit to him), although the commercials I've seen make me think that maybe they are finally back together, but I suppose someone will clue me in on that at some point.

There were other shows that I could not even consider giving the old heave-ho: Chuck, 30 Rock, The Office, Ugly Betty, Kitchen Nightmares, Burn Notice, Pushing Daisies... these are some of my non-negotiables. And then there is a show like Life on Mars, which literally, I've only seen the first 10 minutes of the first episode, but now Don is watching it so that one has to stay. And then there's Life, about a cop who was framed for a murder he did not commit and was wrongly imprisoned. While this is certainly not the best cop show out there, I am into the storyline about who framed him which started with the very first episode of its premiere season last year, so I have to hang with that one to see what happens. I'm sure there are other shows I'm forgetting, and I could get up and go take a look at the DVR right now, but frankly, I'm feeling too lazy to do so.

Then there is Total Drama Island. This is a show on Cartoon Network, and yes, it is a cartoon. I accidentally started a relationship with this show. One night, in a zombie-fied state because I'd only slept a few hours within a span of nearly 30, I was looking for something to watch while I packed for a trip, and when I saw the title, I was intrigued so I checked it out. I think I came in part of the way into the first episode, and they showed a few more episodes that night. My mom was at my house, and she comes in my bedroom and is like, "What the hell are you doing, you zombie, you are supposed to be packing." Well, maybe it wasn't that bad but it was close. Then we leave for our trip to Reno with the kid the next day, and in the hotel room there are only a couple of "kid" channels, and Cartoon Network was one of them, and both nights we were there they played several episodes, so this is how I got hooked. It was as if it was meant to be. AND Kayla likes it, or at least does not tell me to change the channel when it is on, so it doesn't get much better than that.

I know what you're thinking: "Jen, I'm a grown-up person. Why on earth would I watch your silly cartoon with a silly name like Total Drama Island?" First of all, watching cartoons will make you feel young, and who doesn't want to feel young? Secondly, it is an extremely entertaining, amusing, and clever show. A satire of reality shows, especially Survivor, it is about 22 teenagers who show up at Camp Wawanakwa and engage in a series of totally absurd challenges (one was a "trust" challenge where a teammate was charged with preparing potentially lethal blowfish for a fellow teammate) and try to avoid being voted off by their teammates. During the elimination ceremony, marshmallows are passed out to team members who get to stay, and whoever doesn't get one has to walk the Dock of Shame to the Boat of Losers and "never, never, never, ever come back," as Jeff Probst-like host Chris Maclean takes an inappropriate amount of glee in telling the campers.

This is like Survivor meets Big Brother meets The Real World meets a Saturday Night Live spoof of those shows (well, back when SNL was funny). While it parodies these reality competition shows filled with people willing to do just about anything for their 15 minutes of fame (the fast-paced, very catchy theme song lyrics proclaim, "I wanna be, I wanna be, I wanna be famous!), it's way more entertaining than any of those shows could ever be (although that is not really fair of me to say because I only watched Big Brother the first season, one half of one episode of Survivor, and I've never watched The Real World).

Take my advice and check this show out. I've been watching previous episodes on Comcast's On Demand. If you are looking for some silly entertainment which will sometimes having you laugh off your you-know-what, you should give it a shot.

But if you get hooked on it and wind up getting a full DVR, don't come complaining to me. I've got enough DVR drama of my own.