Dave on Demand: Dying to tune in

After last week's column, several readers wrote in to suggest that perhaps I could not tell the difference between Audrina Patridge and Whitney Port, two airheads from MTV's docudrama The Hills.

Guilty. But in my own defense, I don't think Patridge and Port can either.

Anyway, from here on out, I have an alibi for any and all errors: I'm in a terrible hurry due to the fact that I don't have much time left on this Earth.

A study released by Australian researchers this week finds that TV watching after age 25 dramatically reduces life expectancy. For every hour you watch, you forfeit up to 22 minutes. Boy, is that a harsh deal!

Watch six hours a day, and you shave nearly five years off your life. For some of you, that's not worrisome. For me, it means the Grim Reaper is holding the remote. It's a miracle I'm still alive. Please just spare me the humiliation of dying in the middle of America's Got Talent.

The fallacy of this study is that it treats all television viewing as equal. The fact is, it matters very much what you're watching. I never once felt time being drained from me while tuned in to Arrested Development or The West Wing or Gilmore Girls or The Larry Sanders Show or Lost or Buffy, the Vampire Slayer or 30 Rock. Shows like that have only enriched my life.

Make no mistake, though. There are dangerous blood-suckers out there, prime-time ghouls who plunder your time and vitality.

For example, every time I have ever watched a program featuring Jim Belushi, Alan Thicke, William Conrad, Scott Baio, or David Spade (to cite a handful), it was with the sickening sensation of life slipping away like water through my fingers.

You know the old expression, "Well, that's an hour I'll never get back"? Well, Belushi and his Crewski aren't time-wasters. They're time bandits.

That 22 minutes lost per hour of TV time? It's an average. Most shows are perfectly benign. Then you have that rapacious breed that lops two hours off your existence for every hour you spend with them.

Life is too short. Viewer discretion is advised.

Can I finish my coffee? I haven't always been a morning person, but as long as I have been an early riser, I've been a devoted Today show watcher.

Until now. I really cannot bear Ann Curry in the coanchor seat. It's that hushed, reverent, egregiously solicitous tone she brings to every segment and interview. Doesn't matter if she's talking to a Powerball winner; she approaches them as if they've just lost a beloved family pet.

She has the lugubrious air of a mortician, which is a little hard to take first thing in the morning.

Cancel that snack. The commercial campaign that I could do without comes with the slogan "Your favorite foods fighting you?"

A chicken wing slathered in barbecue sauce smacks a man in the face repeatedly every time he tries to take a bite; a taco jumps in a guy's hand like a fish out of water, spraying its ingredients everywhere; spaghetti strands viciously whip a woman's cheek; an egg roll knocks an old woman's dentures across the room in a Chinese restaurant. It's all kinds of gross and not improved by the loud whiplash sound effect that accompanies these attacks.

I guess it sells antacids, though, because my stomach gets upset every time I see one of these ads.

A made-for-TV marriage. Riffing on this weekend's Kim Kardashian wedding, Jimmy Kimmel said, "There won't be a dry eye in the house. Except Bruce Jenner. He had his tear ducts removed 10 plastic surgeries ago."