Pop Q my ass.

Today as I lay on my couch recuperating from the terrible after affects of an office shared flu, I got a taste of daytime television. No not the soaps. I prefer a certain popular British soap that doesn't drag their story lines on for longer than a few months. American Daytime soaps can kill someone off 'technically' and drag the mystery out for years - yawn Stephano (enter other Villan here).

No this daytime extravaganza (since I don't have cable) was a show on CHCH or "E" Network out of Hamilton that airs country wide - Pop Q.

The scenario seems lively enough. Two, 30 something metrosexuals, gender distributed; had a lovely banter going on in between telling people to call in so they can call them back or text at a low cost of $2.00 and if that call or text was the 10th, they'd call you back.

So how many people just spent $20.00 and didn't get a call.

Think about it - Advertising isn't going to matter too much longer - just ask the folks at home their opinion and the response is instant with cash as well - its kind of evil genius and I wish I had thought about it.

No more shilling out to the likes of adult diapers, denture whitners and pet insurance during the daytime. Time will tell - remember no one was dumb enough in the 80s to pay for water unless you wanted to look pretentious with Perrier....

Back to my point, though the show is an HOUR long and they take one call between commerical breaks up to the last 5 minutes where they blitz. So...... instead of watching people across the country suck at game questions....... we get banter or what I like to call air fluff. Thats a funny shirt you are wearing - oh not as funny as the one I borrowed from you last week hahaha - Robots. The guy was seriously peacocking though with his belt buckle bling and yellow tuxedo shirt, metrosexual designer frames and spiky hair. Kinda cute but yawn again. The other host well.... she was... forgettable.

What was the most irksome was the quiz itself - Name the Top Christmas Specials of all time. You would think this was easy - NOT! First of all I don't know who they surveyed but really these people haven't watched much tv or they haven't watched tv before 2005 - they should have gone to family feud survey veterans.

Canucks were calling in with definitive classics such as Miracle on 32nd street (or is it 34th), The Grinch who stole Christmas, White Christmas, A Christmas Story(the best BTW), Its a Wonderful Life - WRONG!

See where I'm going with this... so finally the lowest scoring questions are found with several duh do - hints. Rudolph, Frosty and Santa Clause is Coming to Town????. Even more irksome - they finished the show without broadcasting the other questions. 10 shows out there and the above mentioned are not on this list - what is left. I googled the show to find the answers to what backwater town was surveyed and no such luck.

I can't beleive I wasted an hour of my day watching this but more so - I can't believe people tune in daily and run up their phone bills trying to get on to this show to win big jackpots of $100, $250 and $500. Its kinda like my regional Northern Ontario's longest running show - Big Money TV Bingo - that actually has more action then POPQ, you go to the store - you buy the bingo cards anywhere in the CTV region, you wait for Saturday at 630 (don't pee yourself with excitement and/or adult diapers) and you play for the entire 1/2 hour. There is a bit of chat in the way of community announcements but if there were to be 2 hosts on the show the bingo players would be irritated and revolt - its about the game bucko (thanks Happy Days) not you not so successful host that you are stuck here on a Saturday evening. I'm nasty - but I speak the truth as I see it.

Speaking of which Frosty the Snowman is on the CBC on Wednesday.