Earlier this week, I threw a pile of food on a plate and sprinted up to my room. It wasn’t anything out of the ordinary; just a regular stop in my weekday routine.

Little did I know that in a few minutes, part of me would die.

I sank into my couch – quite literally actually, it’s a really bad couch – and settled in with my lunch on my lap and my clicker beside me, ready to take in my daily dosage of ‘Saved by the Bell.’

After all, it was noon. What else was I to do? Go to class? Please.

Then my heart stopped. The show wasn’t on. Not on TBS. Not anywhere – believe me, I checked all 128 channels on my cable. It was nowhere to be found. And I didn’t know what to do.

In place of the Greatest Show of Our Generation, TBS had decided to run ‘Ed,’ a show I actually enjoy very much. But it wasn’t the same. I felt like I was cheating on my girlfriend. And that only made me feel worse, mostly because I don’t have one.

So I just sat there, blankly staring at the screen. But I didn’t pay attention to ‘Ed.’ Instead, I stared straight through him, like I was looking at one of those Magic Eye pictures. I hoped to see ‘Saved by the Bell’ hidden somewhere behind the faces of the residents of Stuckeyville. No such luck.

Somewhere around the 45-minute commercial, I gave up. ‘Saved by the Bell’ had left me. It was gone forever.

Or was it?

Using my Internet savvy, I checked out TBS.com. Alas, ‘Saved by the Bell,’ was still being aired on the network. Too bad, I’d never be able to see it again. The evildoers at the ‘Superstation’ (and yes, I use the quotation marks to show my distaste for the network) had only taken ‘Saved by the Bell’ off of one of its timeslots – it would still be shown from 7 to 8 each morning. But I don’t get up that early. And I rarely stay up that late. So as far as I was concerned, I’d never see it again, thanks to the people at TBS’ newfangled schedule. Very funny, indeed.

After an hour (or two or three), I stopped crying. Not out of choice, and not out of cheeriness, but because my tear ducts had dried up.

Then, like a knight in shining armor, my friend instant messaged me. ‘Hey, they’re showing reruns of ‘Beverly Hills 90210′ every day at 5 on SOAPnet now.’

My tear ducts swelled up again. This time, I cried for joy. I may have lost one show from my childhood, but I had gained another.

Maybe television executives aren’t that bad. Now if only I felt comfortable watching SOAPnet.

Pete Freedman is the feature editor at The Daily Orange, where his columns appear irregularly. Email him at pjfreedm@syr.edu

Published on January 26, 2005 at 12:00 pm