television by jean-philippe toussaint

Hello everyone -
My husband will deny it, but he watches a heck of a lot of tv.
To be fair, with the help of his remote, he never actually watches one program from start to finish; therefore it may not seem to him like he watches tv.
Anyway, I am not immune. Over the years I have watched way more tv than him, and
I have steeltrap memories of thousands of theme songs and commercials to prove it.
But recently I have been making the righteous effort to reduce my viewing, especially since his quick draw prowess with the remote gives me vertigo. So what have I been doing? Reading, talking to the cat, pacing....
So when I heard of Television , a slim, popular novel from France by Belgian Jean-Philippe Toussaint. I read it and enjoyed.
The narrator is on sabattical in Berlin. His wife and child are on vacation.
He is supposed to be writing a book, and he decides to give up watching television "cold turkey."
This guy doesn't do much, but I found him hilarious, rather, as the French might say, tres amusant.
He is a Woody Allen type. He procrastinates bigtime. He swims. He neglects the plants he is supposed to take care of. He fantasizes about all kinds of odd things like Baywatch, libraries, and why he stopped watching tv. He writes two words of his book ("when Musset...")
He stares at the tv. In the end, his wife returns. Nothing much has happened. But, I enjoyed being in his head. It was funny. It was relaxing. And, guess what? the whole time I read it, I wasn't watching television! bc