2002-08-02 11:02 p.m.
Dear Nielsen Diary: Day 2
The Nielsen Diary can be used for good as well as evil.
As far as I'm concerned, USA Network has redeemed its entire existence with Monk. It's a detective show; some of the stories are a little cliched but the acting is terrific. I can't describe it in a way that doesn't make it sound dumb, so just go turn on your TV, suspend your disbelief, and watch all of the little subtleties Tony Shalhoub brings to the title role. Fridays at 10.
The "small-market" (hah!) A's need our help too, so up until 10 we both "watched" a suck-ass game against the Tigers. Actually, TheBoy watched bits and pieces of it, occasionally reporting the score to me. I had to assure him that I wasn't going to force him to watch the whole thing for the sake of the ratings; I'd only do that if I had one of the monitoring boxes on the TV. He didn't quite take that as reassuring.