Do you remember Juliet Bravo? It was the name of an English police drama from the 1980s. I have vague memories of it. Because my brother and I would have had our bath and would be watching this as we sat patiently waiting for Dallas to come on.

Dallas days

Looking back, should we have been allowed watch Dallas with all that gluttony and the sex and the drinking? Well, I don’t think there is an ’80s’ child who didn’t watch Dallas. Although I do remember a boy in my class in primary school who wasn’t allowed watch it. But he wasn’t allowed watch Grange Hill either due to the gratuitous violence!

TV Free

There was another boy who didn’t have a television. I enviously admired him for that. He was from a very intelligent family and they all did well. But they missed out on Dallas, Glenroe and Swap Shop. And then there was The-A-Team, Chips, Knightrider, Magnum, Starsky & Hutch and The Incredible Hulk. All great shows that would still hold their own in today’s TV space, I’d argue.

Netflix revolution

And what a selection we have now. Netflix has revolutionised television. And I am all but addicted. And I can see how people can adapt now to not having the conventional TV channels and it is why public broadcasters like the BBC and RTÉ must be concerned. Back in the ’80s, we had to wait seven days for the next instalment of Dallas and Glenroe. Now we can watch a whole series of our favourite shows in one sitting.

3am addiction

I found myself looking at my watch one morning and it was 3am and I had started watching Homeland at around 8pm the evening before! I had to confide in friends to make sure this was alright, like? Normal, like? I was comforted in the fact that I wasn’t alone.

But joking aside, there is a worrying side to the idea of being able to watch what we want on demand because, whatever about us adults, carefree teenagers will use their viewing time to watch what they want at the expense of having no choice but be exposed to the news as the family sat round the television.

News versus Narcos

Who wants to watch the news when they could be catching up with the latest series of Narcos in the comfort of their own bedroom? We must take self responsibility, of course, and if we want to be informed, then it’s our choice.

But you wonder if some of the millennial generation, with such a choice of entertainment at their fingertips, have ever watched conventional television and just where do they find time or how are they consuming news and current affairs?

Each to their own

I was chatting to this man at a function last September, the week before the All-Ireland hurling final. He was from Waterford he told me.

“So, you must be looking forward to Sunday,” I opened.

“Sunday? What’s on?” he responded.

“The All-Ireland final. Waterford and Galway?”.

“Oh, I didn’t know Waterford were in that”.

I stood looking at him like he had two heads, me being the one-dimensional backwoods Irishman I am when it comes to culture.

I have to get over the fact that just because a fella has no interest in the GAA, doesn’t mean that he needs to see a doctor.

Sure who am I to talk? Because I have a cultural blind spot of my own when it comes to that “national treasure”, Christy Moore. I just don’t get the adulation or hype or the sweat. Never have. Now you are probably looking at me like I have two heads. Well, everyone to their own as they say. Anyway I better get my shovel, it’s time to go to work!

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The routine of going to mass

Hello? Can you hear me now?