In a previous post for the My Favorite Things series, I revealed that I had a problem with movies as a child and as a teenager. I also revealed in that post that once I understood how those movies are made, those problems have largely gone away. On this edition of #MyFavoriteThings, I will be reflecting on a subject that is about as varied as my interests in music: my favorite television programs. I will not be talking about sports on television, since that will be a subject for a future post.

Back when I was growing up, we did not have cable full time until the 2000 Summer Olympics, and even then my mother and grandmother had most of the channels blocked to prevent the problems I was having with movies. Despite that, I still had access to the local stations, including Fox Kids and PBS Kids on WOSU TV (the PBS station here in Columbus.) My favorite PBS Kids shows growing up were Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood, Bill Nye: The Science Guy, Wishbone, Reading Rainbow, the Magic School Bus, and the Carmen Sandiego game shows (Where in the World? and Where in Time is Carmen Sandiego?) I only watched Fox Kids for one show, and it is a show that I still watch to this day: Power Rangers, my favorite season from that show growing up was Lightspeed Rescue.

During my teenage years and into my early 20’s, my television viewing habits began to change. Most of the kid shows I had been watching (with the exception of Power Rangers) had either stopped airing, or had given way to newly discovered shows on other networks. While most of what I watched during that time were either shows or specials related to my pursuit of an architecture career, I did have some favorites from that time, mainly from watching HGTV, Food Network, Science and National Geographic channels. Some of my favorite shows include Divine Design, Holmes on Homes, Good Eats, Unwrapped and How It’s Made. I caught up on some of the childhood series that I missed out on by checking out the TV seasons sets from the Columbus Metropolitan Library. Some of those included a few of the Disney era seasons of Power Rangers and the Garfield and Friends series from the 90’s. There was also a lot of change in the technology in that time, we got a Sony WEGA televison (a flat screen that looked and weighed like a traditional CRT television in 2004.

The year 2006 saw me get a new laptop, and the ability to stream television on said laptop. One of my favorite sites from the early days was the original Disney XD streaming site. I would spend some time on that site when I needed a distraction from my college homework. Eventually most of my television viewing moved to either my laptop computer, or any one of the tablets that I owned. It was around that time that our family swapped out our old cable box for a new model with a DVR, that allowed us to record any of the shows that we watch (namely sports) without the VCR that we had used record stuff in the past (any recordings that we did were for personal use).

By the start of the previous decade, we had moved twice, and had acquired our first LG flat screen television. By that time, my television viewing habits had largely been reduced to sports, and watching movies on my tablet. One of the shows that I did manage to watch was Doctor Who ( and a couple of its spinoffs. I was also seeing the TV spinoffs for the How To Train Your Dragon franchise. In 2014, I signed up for a couple of streaming services for the first time: Netflix and Hulu, and began to move towards seeing more adult content, such as the dark political comedy The Thick of It. By the end of the decade, I had subscriptions to HBO Max, Disney+, and Paramount+ (known as CBS All Access when I subscribed)

During the COVID-19 pandemic, I began to watch some of the series that I have wanted to watch. In 2020 alone, I watched Star Trek: The Next Generation, Game of Thrones, and True Blood for the first time, as well as some new shows like Star Trek: Lower Decks and Euphoria. Late last year saw the addition of a new television for my bedroom, and the start of my at home fitness program. The trend of watching series that I have not seen before in addition to new content continued in 2021. So far this year I have seen 30 Rock, The Office, Modern Family, Schitt’s Creek, and Parks and Recreation for the first time. The new series that I have seen so far are Bridgerton, WandaVision, The Falcon and The Winter Soldier and The Mighty Ducks: Game Changers.

In conclusion, my television viewing habits have changed significantly over the years, and given the current streaming climate, who knows what other series that I want to see. If anyone has any suggestions for new television series, drop a comment over on Facebook and Twitter.