The flu didn't get me, but I thought daytime TV might

I spent a few days on the sofa last week, recovering from what may or may not have been the H1N1 virus. It seemed like way too much effort to drag myself out to the doctor, so I just dosed up with a liver-busting amount of ibuprofen for the fever, and called in sick to spare my coworkers, just in case I did have Hamthrax. It took four days to chase the fever away, and I have to admit it--I felt like I might die a couple of times. Oh, not from the (maybe) flu, although that certainly wasn't pleasant. The real danger was the possibility of dying from boredom, given the suckitude of daytime TV.

 Mr. Nerd and I made an uncharacteristically frugal decision last year, and cancelled the "extended" cable TV package. Our plan was to rely heavily on PBS and the Discovery Channel, which were included in the "basic" package. Most of the time, I don't miss the channels that we lost too much. But, spending three solid days on the sofa, too unwell to commit to watching a movie, nearly made me weep for the Food Network or TLC.

Even in my fever-addled state, I knew that the network stations would be a wash during the day--it's all soap operas; various hard-edged judges delivering justice to a series of lunkheads;  and Oprah, Dr. Phil, and Dr. Oz (it would take a lot more than a fever to make me watch Oprah or anything Oprah-related). So, I turned to my old standby, Discovery, expecting to be able to sink back into my semi-coma and enjoy some reruns of Dirty Jobs, Mythbusters, and Time Warp. And, you may ask, what did I find there? Fishing, in many forms. A couple of shows about pimping out cars, some ghost-hunter-type nonsense, and a whole lot of other junk that I didn't care one iota about. By the second afternoon, I had given up. I didn't feel like surfing (which should give you some idea of just how rotten I felt), but I decided to check Netflix, to see what was available via their "watch instantly" feature. Hallelujah! There, I found many seasons' worth of all of my favorite BBC comedies...more than enough to get me through the next couple of days with my sanity intact. (What sanity I had to begin with, that is.) That alone was worth my $14.99 a month. All hail Netflix! And ibuprofen, and Luden's throat drops! Whatever I had, I couldn't have gotten through it without you guys.

(Image courtesy www.santacruzhealth.com)