It’s that time of year again, when all the networks set out to get their new programs in front of the public.  Tonight, on ABC, was the premiere of Hank starring Kelsey Grammer.  It’s about the CEO of a large company who gets the boot after another company buys his out.  From there, he must take his wife and children and move back to the little town where their road to riches began.

Though the show is only half an hour long, I couldn’t even watch that much.  Honestly, I thought being a Kelsey Grammer show, I’d enjoy it a lot more than I did.  Actually, I thought the show sucked.  Not just because I’m getting sick of these shows where the wife and kids treat the father like a worthless part of the family, but because this one is just too over the top.

The worst part for me was in the middle of the show, the wife’s brother is having far too much fun making the husband feel like crap.  As the movers are trying to fit the mattress up the stairs, it becomes obvious that it just won’t fit.  So, the wife’s brother offers to bring over a kids bed for them to sleep in, and will take the large bed off their hands.  What????  Are you kidding me???  I’m sorry, but if my brother tried to take my bed, I’d kill him.  I can’t believe that the writers of this show actually thought this would be funny.

That’s when I’d had enough and changed channels.  I’m tired of these so called comedies that allow the wives and children to treat the husbands/fathers like crap.  I’m tired of the fact that people who write for these shows seem to think that children who outright disrespect their parents is funny.  Or that today’s husbands are completely stupid and that if it wasn’t for the wives, men wouldn’t be able to wipe their own butts.

I don’t expect comedy writers to go back to the days when children were perfect and wives were only good at cooking dinner and waiting on their husbands, but it would be nice to see a few shows where the wife actually trusted her husband’s opinions, and the children tried to show a little respect for their parents.

I’ve been working on something really cool lately.  Yeah, I know, what else am I trying to get into?  Well, this is actually more for myself than anything else.  I’m a member of a site called Gather.com, and I absolutely love it.  The site is a social network for the masses.  Unlike sites such as Twitter and Facebook, this site allows people to write posts like a blog, and lets other readers rate and comment on the posts.  If you earn enough points, you can even get some money out of the deal, but that’s not why I’m doing this.  The money would be nice, but it takes a lot of points and I’m not even close to getting there.

There are many, many different groups within this site.  I’ve joined as many writing groups as I can, but one stands out from the crowd by far.  It’s called DailyFreeWrite and it’s become my greatest blessing.  Basically, you spend a total of 5 minutes just writing whatever comes to mind.  I’ve only gone through 3 days worth of freewriting, but I’m totally hooked.

I’ve heard many writers talk about the power of freewriting, but I was never able to master it.  My biggest problem is that I’m my own worst critic.  I can’t seem to NOT edit my work as I go along.  With this group, I’m forcing myself to just write and not think about the typos, punctuation errors, or anything else.  It’s just 5 full minutes of writing without limits.  Well, one limit.  It’s got to be family friendly.

There are a lot of great writers in the mix, but this exercise has gotten almost everyone involved , to look within themselves and explore.  Some people are discussing their dreams, while others are pondering the wonders of the universe.  It’s becoming more of a self-help group than a writer’s group.  However, because everyone is a writer, there are some pretty impressive stories coming out of it.

I’m going to try and implement all the things I’m learning with these freewrites and going to post them at this site.  I’ve been trying to come up with something to post here, and I think if I can start to get more into this whole freewriting thing, I could start to fill this blog up with all my thoughts and dreams.  I invite anyone who reads this to join Gather.com and join up with the DailyFreeWrites group.  It will help you in more ways, than just your writings.