Bu - Bu - Bu - Buffy!

I had one of those nights the other night. You know? The kind of night where you wake up tossing and turning, sweating, trying not to think about pressing concerns, thinking about pressing concerns; thoughts racing, pulsing, moving in circular motion and always, always returning to the same spot. I’m sure you’ve been there. Anyway, I was having one of those nights – I think my circadian rhythms were all mucked up by my debauched activities on the weekend – and, in my hour of need, I turned to a long forgotten friend – late night television.

I used to love late night television; I could find within its comforting confines all my old television favorites: 21 Jump Street, Booker, The Wonder Years; old, obscure black & white movies; and other visions of randomness that you can only really find at the zombie hours. If you are prone to insomnia on weeknights you’ll know exactly what I’m talking about. Over the last couple of years late night television’s star has faded. It has become populated by soul-numbing infomercials and soul-stealing Christian television madness. I mourn the death of late night television.

In fact, given the Paris Hilton inspired, reality TV brewed and MTV percolated anti-cultural gruel being dolled out these days, I don’t watch much television – day or night – at all; just the regular news and occasional documentary for me.

So I wasn’t expecting much when I lit up the boob tube at 3am the other night.

Enter Buffy!

Buffy was probably the last great series that I followed with some diligence. Maybe that is why I feel a sense of nostalgia when thinking about it; maybe it’s the fact that I watched a great many episodes of it with someone that I care about a great deal; maybe it was the sexy gothic-ness of it all; maybe, even, it was the fact that I found a rare character that I identify with (James Masterson)… Who knows? But, what I do know is - I love me some Buffy.