If you've been reading my posts as of late, you might get the impression that I watch a lot of TV. But in reality, I usually only catch a couple hours a week (baseball games on in the background don't count!). But last night, I tuned into my first basic cable original show. It was a new show called '30 Days' on the FX Channel. The show is the brain child of Morgan Spurlock, the man behind the great documentary 'Super Size Me'

Last night's episode featured Spurlock and his fiancee, as they descended upon Columbus, OH for 30 days of a minimum wage lifestyle. First they moved into a $350/month apartment in the "bad part of town". Apparently the cops had just busted a crackhouse downstairs the week before. They then both embarked upon minimum wage jobs, Morgan doing various labor jobs for a temp agency (sometimes pulling double shifts), and his fiancee washing dishes at a coffee shop. Over the course of the month, they pinched their pennies and lived very frugally, and both had to take a trip to the hospital for health issues. At the end of the month, they made it by but calculated it would take 3 more months to pay off the hospital bills (it was funny/ridiculous when Morgan had on his bill a $40 line item for "medical supplies", which consisted of a lone ace bandage). It was a rather eye opening show, especially since it was fairly close to home. During the show, they pulled no punches in emphasizing how insane it is that the minimum wage has not gone up in 7 years (despite Ted Kennedy proposing an increase every single year)! During that time, Congress has increased their own wages $26,000. I've stated my opinion of this before, and this show only further increased my outrage.

Next week's episode features a 30-something guy taking anti-aging medication to try to get back some zing. And after that is the episode I'm really looking forward to, where a Christian moves into a Muslim community and lives for 30 days. This show has some great potential, so I advise you to tune in Wednesday nights at 10pm.

This entry was posted by Brad, on Thursday, June 16, 2005. You can leave your response.