Real Life Has Got to Go

It's my favorite season of the year: The new TV season.

Many of my friends, acquaintances, and family members are all, "Oh, I never watch TV!" or "The only thing I watch on TV is CNN" or "There's never anything good on TV!"

Whatever. They can have their books, their relationships, their LIVES. I'll take my TV.

I am coming out of the closet as a full-blown TV-sexual. I love TV--and I'm talking regular TV! I don't even have cable! Not that I wouldn't give my left arm, a couple of toes, and one of my kidneys to get it. (Hello, Mr. Peevie?)

So here's what's on the line-up for me this season:

First, we had the two-hour season opener of Prison Break on Monday night, which totally threw me because of the holiday. I missed the first 45 minutes, and when I finally tuned in, whoah! There's Sarah! No longer headless and no longer dead! Crazy writers.

In case you missed the epi, you can read the recaplet at the always-hilarious Television Without Pity, which is my favorite source of TV mockery.

You will enjoy Prison Break if you like TV shows with explosions, shooting, double-crosses, complicated plotlines, tattoos, car chases, prosthetic hands, and moral dilemmas. Oh, and eye-candy. The boys are very, very yummy.

Tonight we'll have the season premiere of Bones. Mr. Peevie and I both have crushes on this show. Mine is, of course, David Boreanaz, who I fell in love with when he played Angel, the caveman-browed vampire-with-a-soul. Mr. Peevie's TV crush is the beautiful and talented Angela, played by Michaela Conlin.

You will enjoy Bones if you like crime procedurals, characters that are so smart that they seem like weirdos in social situations, beautiful people, sexual tension, mysteries, and forensic anthropology. It's kind of like CSI without the showgirls.

Uh, oh. I'll have to fire up the DVR to make sure I can catch the latest episodes of another favorite crime procedural, Criminal Minds, which will also be airing on Wednesdays, starting September 24. This one I initially loved because of Mandy Patinkin, who has since left the show because it showed too much violence. Even though I love the show, I gotta respect that about him.

But I have come to enjoy the other characters on the show as well, including the adorable, brilliant geek played by a former Calvin Klein underwear model; the colorful computer wizard, Penelope; and of course my home-boy, Joe Mantegna.

(Bonus mini-movie review: I have loved Joe M. ever since I saw him in House of Games, a crime and con story that had me surprised and guessing right through to the end.)

And then there's Life, a cop show with a conspiracy angle that totally hooked me in before the writer's strike last fall. The main dude is a detective who says zen-like things, but also has a secret conspiracy wall where he's trying to connect the dots to figure out who framed him for a crime he served 12 years for. I love the conflictedness of it all.

Of course, I will be watching the re-broadcasts of the Law and Order: Criminal Intent episodes on network TV SINCE I DON'T HAVE CABLE. Even though I cheat on him with many other Hollywood boyfriends, my number one pretend boyfriend is still Vincent D'Onofrio.

The one non-crime drama that I hope to watch is Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles. I've been catching up on the re-runs this summer because I just could not squeeze it in to my regular rotation last spring. It's a futuristic survival-of-the-human-race-hangs-in-the-balance thrill ride with lots of chases, shooting, and, in the quieter moments, snippets of clever dialogue.

I do not know how I am going to keep up with all this TV, plus check out some of the interesting-looking new shows, plus, you know, maintain my real life.

Real life has got to go.