I love christmas movies but that garbage they put on hallmark channel is NOT christmas. They are dumb,sappy,predictable love stories set in wintertime. NOT Christmas movies.

That being said, I let people like what they like. My sister loves those movies and when i heard they were playing them I told her about it so she can tune in.

SO is constantly irritating me about what I watch on tv. We have 2 tvs,I dont know why he can't leave me alone. Yes, i watch the same types of shows over and over. Cooking shows, dr pol, critter fixers, house shows. ... So what? All he wants to watch is the news,shows about cars or racing and violent movies. I don't nag him about it. Well, okay yes I do. If we are in the same room and he has the news on,I will start to squirm once the news starts repeating the same stories over and over and over and over and over. And he still wants to keep watching it. I just leave the room. I suppose my silent protest is a form of nagging,since he knows why i abandon him.

I will never understand people who stay glued to the news, waiting to grasp and hold onto any form of gloom and doom. I will really never understand people who listen to the same news over and over and over and over and over and over and over......... I heard it once,I am informed, thank you.

I'm not sure...I don't watch the Hallmark Channel much. But, I think the Christmas shows are supposed to give people something pleasant to

think about right now. I noticed an article that there are people who

are turning their Christmas Lights back on...to remind people of kinder,

sweeter times. I'm not sure, but, I would guess, you have the right to

not understand that if you want. That's between DH and you, IMHO.

Luckily, it isn't going to bother me and I won't dislike you for that

attitude...won't even think about it anymore, actually. Thanks for the

post.

I have to admit Amylou, I do rant on DH about what he likes to watch and he never says anything to me about my choices. Yes, to each their own, I just DON'T UNDERSTAND other people's choices. It sounds like you and I have the same preferences when it comes to TV watching.

I'm a sucker for reading things I'm told I'm not supposed to read... so even though I don't watch TV - I do watch YouTube. And I watch videos on Amazon Prime that are sometimes from television. I want to find Poldark, now that's a TV show I can get behind. ATM I don't get much reception in the hills here because I still need a TV antenna to be put in, and there's no cable yet in my rural area. (On the plus side, there's not much COVID-19 here yet, either.)

I didn't pay much attention to YouTube or Amazon selections for Christmas, other than the occasional classical music offering.

I watch a bit of news, probably a bit more now just trying to figure out what scientists and medical professionals have to say about the virus, and where it is impacting in my region of the country (as well as friends and family's locations).

I have always watched foodie things. And homesteading things, because I am farming/beginning to farm. This morning I got a good belly laugh before getting out of bed watching a Gordon Ramsey's early British Kitchen Nightmare episode where he was trying to get a couple of the waitstaff to promote the specials - and they were flubbing it entirely. Gordon spontaneously dropped to the floor not able to contain his own laughter. It was good to get away from today.

Oh, I did watch the first three seasons of Game of Thrones on Amazon while being laid up, but while I enjoyed that, I stopped simply because of the price for each season, even despite being an Amazon Prime member. But I can always re-watch those for no additional fees, since I already paid...

On YouTube for humor I rather like Awaken with JP. Some of his pieces fall flat but that's true with any comedian.

Hard to imagine someone watching violent shows AND the Hallmark channel.

DH and I have opposite tastes in TV. I don't actually watch much TV and I do so in the kitchen while cooking or when he is not in the house. He loves the cowboy shows. I think it the women's roles that get under my skin. They are either old maid school marms or saloon girls. A few hang out with the men in isolated cabins and get murdered. Of course the whole show is about men's adventures on horseback. Toss in some corny twangy music and I am outta there.

Outlander. That works for me. Intriguing plot and strong women.

I think it's to get our minds off of the day-to day doom and gloom.

I don't like those 'Christmas" shows either. The fake snow, the girl often wears shoes instead of boots, often no coat, just a sweater. I started to watch one at Christmas and it was such poor acting, sooooo predictable and saccharine sweet and fake.

DH and I were on the exact same page with tv shows. Everything from food movies, and watching Jacques Pepin or ATK on PBS, to British shows and gritty detective shows. There were only a couple that he liked that I didn't. (1 tv here).

In the case of the child looking at the Christmas tree I have to beg off of any criticism. Who knows what's going on in their little minds? For all we know, they might be thinking the Christmas will never come again with all this craziness.

Here, the Animal Planet channel has been playing the show "Too Cute" for days on end. I hope that it's calming and soothing for those that are housebound, those with dementia and the young ones.

Apparently people will watch anything when there are no sports to watch! lol

NASCAR is even broadcasting E-racing where several NASCAR drivers are completing against each other on simulators.

My dh has the same feelings you do about certain shows. Then he watches 24/7 political crap I can't stand. We've battled over the tv station since he's been home again. I don't watch a whole of tv. He likes to turn the tv station he likes and leave the room. Originally, I turned the channel. I finally just started turning it off.

ritaweeda -- Maybe your DH is trying to achieve 'a balanced life'? <snork>

Almost everything on TV, in novels, etc. is *Escape From Reality*. Even the endless cooking shows with that end-product perfection. (Don't you think people should *take a hint* when nearly every vanuted 'chef' is OBESE?)

Whatever people need to get them through a day feeling ok is fine by me.

I can’t watch that channel but I thought if it makes some people feel better, GREAT.

My husband loves old movies. I do too, but not like him. Because of him, I’ve become a baseball fan after all these years. (Since1983) We both miss the games.

I like any nature or animal program. I like documentaries.

I do love the old movies. 1930's in particular. Preferable pre-code. And film noir.

I don't think it's so odd that your hubby likes such different genres of shows. It's like music, you can like lots of different kinds. Me, I like anything from Hard Rock to Country to Gospel. Just depends on my mood.

On our cable, I have a list of favorite channels, and the Hallmark channels are not included. We can program the remote with several "favorites" lists, and when we select a certain favorites list, only the channels on that list show up on the menu. That way when I surf channels, I only see the channels I like, and the list is not that long. Also, when I signed up for cable, I made sure that we got as few sports channels as possible, and I even gave up one channel I wanted because the only way to get it was to get a slew of sports channels that I would never watch. It ended up being a lot cheaper this way as well.

Whatever makes people happy, watch what you want, it's not my problem. As for us oldtimers at home, two tvs, two computers, in two different rooms, problem solved.

I absolutely cannot stand the sappy movies on Hallmark Channel. No way am I spending time watching (in my mind) vapid icky-wicky everyone is happy at the end junk. Especially the Christmas ones.

Now - on the other hand, I DO love to watch the oldies & moldies on Hallmark. For example, Diagnosis: Murder, Murder She Wrote, Monk, and so on.

So - - - for others, THOSE are the vapid waste-of-time shows. To each their own - no judging.

I agree with the two TV solution. My brother has a good TV in his bedroom in L.A. with surround sound, and he will watch violent movies there that I cannot handle. I do not understand the reason anyone wants to watch violent movies, but there must be a psychological reason. I don't think it's the same reason people watch sports necessarily. I only watch sports that I personally like to play myself. I have no interest in watching baseball, football, or soccer because I do not play them.

For the most part, my brother and I like to watch the same movies, except that I like some of the 1930s Bette Davis and Joan Crawford movies more than he does. A friend of ours wrote a book on Film Noir and another book on Hollywood Pre-Code.

My DH and I never watch TV together but we also never criticize one another for what we watch. I watch hallmark sometimes (Good Witch) or sometimes they play some murder mysteries but I do tend to avoid christmas movies.

I will watch Star Trek movies over and over and over again, as well as all the Star War movies (except I, II, and III) and all the Indiana Jones movies and DH never says a word. He;s a good man. My DH will watch a hockey goal over and over and over again and I never say a word.

We don't have Netflix. I did hear about Hallmark playing Christmas movies during this time.

We have our Christmas lights up and on, as do a number of our neighbours.

I love the Hallmark channel. We need more peace and love to watch, not all this violence! I don't like them having Christmas shows on starting in March, then again in July then Oct till Christmas, It makes me not even want to see Christmas shows when its time for them.

I have never understood why folks watch what they watch on TV :-) I'd guess 95% of it is just personal preference. For instance, my sister adores watching tennis and will watch it day or night!! No thanks! My ex only liked sports or more 'guy' shows like any sci-fi or things like MacGuyver, A Team, etc. And since he maintained control of the remote, I had to watch what he watched or not at all.

I watch very little network TV - most of it is cr*p. I do watch a wide variety of cable channels, mostly dealing with nature or animals or cooking and home improvement. But never the Hallmark channel as it is just too sweet and fluffy and unsubstantive for my taste. Mostly I stream - Netflix, Acorn and Britbox.

Rusty, i Iisten to Christmas music year round for that same reason! Its almost 90 degrees today and it's only March! It is also so happy and cheerful! But i try to restrain myself from watching Christmas movies until after Thanksgiving. I don't always succeed.

I think that regarding Hallmark Christmas movies,you either REALLY love them or REALLY hate them. Obviously, a lot of people love them or there would not be such a fuss over them!

Whatever lightens the mood. Whatever gets us through. We’ve got to keep our spirits up.

DH likes news to the point of insanity and he likes more violent shows-European cop shows that make ours look tame, I gather they have insufficient real violence so they make it up, but he has a headphone set so I don't have to listen to it. He is a TV pig so if I want to watch something I have to fight for it and frankly there is very little I want to watch enough to argue about it. It does tend to take the shine off for me and I am sure he knows that. I read. I do enjoy watching the Saturday afternoon cooking shows they show on our local PBS-when they aren't squalling for money. I cant see sending money for infomercials for fake doctors or dubious financial advice in rerun no less for weeks on end, or old chestnuts of music from the 70's etc. the decay of PBS is just too sad but when they have them (mostly reruns) I will watch to see what bizarre thing they will do to make cooking something more complicated. He is supposed to keep mum since he gets the whole rest of the week.

Patricea, you sure hit the nail on the head about PBS. Those old re-runs are all they can dredge up to make money? Not to mention that our tax dollars help support these people anyway. On the whole I do like to watch a lot that's on PBS but not when they are begging with the same ol' stuff they offer season after season.

I read a news story recently about the Hallmark movies. They are all identical themes, but with different actors in different settings. There's a written formula that is followed for each film. They start with a 'meet cute' and progress along the same setries of 'setbacks' and 'almost love', etc. The article said that actors love to be cast in these things because they can work weekdays, 9 to 5, on a stage set (no 'locations'), with almost no retakes. Everyone from the cast to the crew knows exactly what's required. I WISH I could remember where I read this.

<regarding Hallmark Christmas movies, you either REALLY love them or REALLY hate them>

I'm really in the middle regarding Hallmark Christmas movies - I absolutely don't love them but I certainly don't hate them. I feel the same way about NYC - I neither love it nor hate it, but I do like it more than I like Hallmark movies. As far as favorite cities go, NYC barely makes my top 10 list, at #9 at the moment. As far as cable channels go, Hallmark does not make my top 40, but it would probably make the top 50. PBS is much higher up on my list, although I usually do not watch it on cable, as we get many more PBS channels via our antenna than we do via cable.

Chisue, I took a screenwriting class in Hollywood at The Lee Strasberg Theatre & Film Institute (Santa Monica Blvd & Fairfax), and one of the things they taught us was the formulas used for movies. For example, on page 40 of a certain type of movie, a particular thing is supposed to happen. They have the formulas down to what happens by page, and the scripts are written so that each page takes a very specific amount of screen time. Of course you don't have to follow the formula, but it's easy to do without much thinking. I'm not good at following that kind of formula, and so I did not do that well in that class.

Isn't half of a week about three and a half days, patricia ... and some others who seldom get the opportunity to touch the remote?

olr joyful

He gets six and 3/4 days and I get 1/4. I am watching Milk Street even as I type- I intensely dislike this Chris guy. Outside of his serial marrying, affair divorce thing he has going (what women?) he is snide and abrasive. Why are all his co-cooks so short? He tastes a dish somewhere-fabulous! Marvelous! takes it back and makes some sort of bizarre not the same dish. His thing.

I neglected to say I am not a Hallmark channel fan but I don't have much opportunity to object to it.

PBS, oh mercy. What has gone wrong there? All we get is athon-ing. They are telling us that we are going to get TWO Whole Weeks of no fundraising. Oh GEE. If I send money I get to watch them beg for money. Do they feed it to chickens? We get rerun shows when we get shows and the occasional spate of new stuff shown back to back as late as midnight(?) like glutting on it and don't tell me they don't have ads. They show many of the same ads as mainstream TV plus the special ones for kitchen equipment etc for the cooking shows. Hmmmm. Add a couple more and call it good. Seems like a death spiral as they compete with streaming.

Sorry for the diversion. Back to Hallmark-it is the visual version of romance novels so popular with so many. soothing I suppose.

Well at least we compromised tonight. Both of us like watching the dog show. He likes the toy and working groups. I like them all but look forward to seeing the Staffordshire Bull Terrier.

The Hallmark Channel is harmless so it's existence doesn't bother me. I do wonder who is watching "best of" sports programing from a decade ago. To each his own. I am very thankful that our cable and wifi are up and running!

Hubby and I also have our own spaces for tv viewing and it works out fine, esp. now that he's taken to wearing headphones, since he's a bit hard of hearing and has to have the volume cranked way up otherwise.

He likes the violent dark stuff too, but I do not, so this keeps everybody happy.

The local over the air or cable PBS channels sadly do seem to be in constant fundraising mode, but we cut our cable last year and now have Roku, which has the PBS app and we can watch ALL their programming on demand on all our devices for a small Passport membership fee of $5/month. I enjoy Antiques Roadshow - actually we both do - and it's kind of amusing to me when we're both watching the same program in separate rooms 😄

And I much prefer reading(online) or listening(npr.org) to news rather than watching it on TV. I have little to no interest in TV opinion/ punditry, which is what is mainly on the cable channels. I do watch the local & network news headline stuff over breakfast, but as soon as they start opinionating or repeating, I move on.

And what is there to understand? We all have different things that please or comfort us.

As my grandmother used to say: 'There's no accounting for taste, said the man as he kissed the cow.'

If we all liked the same things, what a freaking boring life this would be. I like true crime shows over fictional shows. I love comedies. They're total opposite types of shows. Greys Anatomy? Watched two episodes and said it'll never be ER and haven't seen a show since. But it's been on the air forever so someone is watching it. Reality TV? Why? Why would anyone waste their time watching it? BUT: it's not for me. Do I care if you like it? Does it affect my life? NO and NO. It may be brain numbing to me, but people love it and it doesn't affect my life so do I care? NO.

We do enjoy watching some shows together. There aren't a lot I enjoy anyway but we both like NCIS. He could watch reruns of MASH, Last Man Standing, JAG, and a few others. Thankful for more than one TV and DVRs. I'm a one-and-done viewer as a rule although there a few movies I will watch again now and then.

DH will also watch anything that has the word FBI, Army, Police or whatever in it. He is retired military (retired from the reserves with 29 years), was a police officer for 5 years and was on SWAT team way back in the day when he first got out of the active military and went back to finish his degree. So he likes to pick apart some of the shows on technicalities. No thanks for me.

I don't care for Hallmark movies at all. I've tried, really, but I can't tell one from another. As for current things, I do like This is Us and Stumptown. I can miss one and it's not the end of the world.

I'm not a fan of Hallmark much. I have certain shows I watch on certain days.. rest of the time I'm reading. Only issue BF Nx I have is I mute the commercials and he doesn't.

SamKaren Your resident dj

The only 'live' TV we watch is the news. DH and I enjoy the same movies and TV series (streamed mostly from Amazon) . We have a pot of tea and an hour of 'something' most afternoons. Today we went overtime and watched an entire black comedy set in Maine, "Blow the Man Down". (Recommended)

Ratherbesewing, "I do wonder who is watching "best of" sports programing from a decade ago ... that would be my SO 😠. We do have a few shows we both like and over the years have struck a TV schedule that each of us can live with. I watch my shows during the week and he has the weekend for sports & such. We both do alot of taping 😊. I do like a love story but find Hallmark movies a stretch. I'm actually glad to see that there are people that enjoy them. Diversity is good and I agree, each to their own.

Chisue, Blow the Man Down is on my list to watch.