Ah, television. All you need is a remote control and you can bounce from channel to channel, getting a disjointed view of the world as you immerse yourself in laughs, tears, reality, fantasy, astonishing beauty and horrendous garbage.
And 2005 had plenty of every category.
Here follows a disjointed, non-comprehensive view of some of the best of the worst of the year in television:
Best cop show: "The Shield"
Best TV teen: Veronica Mars
Best sci fi show: "Battlestar Galactica"
Best late-night show: "Late Show with David Letterman." (Honorable mention: "The Daily Show")
Best sitcom nobody watches: "Arrested Development." Darn.
Most underrated sitcom: "Two and a Half Men"
Dumbest controversy: Allegations of vote-fixing on "Dancing With the Stars."
Best farewell (drama): "Six Feet Under" which not only wrapped up its storylines but let us see decades into the future.
Best farewell (comedy): "Everybody Loves Raymond" signed off with an episode that was just a good, half-hour episode.
Biggest TV news news: CBS anchorman Dan Rather rather suddenly, ahem, retired. And ABC's Peter Jennings passed away, succeeded by Elizabeth Vargas and Bob Woodruff.
Dumbest TV news news: The report on how Rather & Co. screwed up their "60 Minutes" report on George W. Bush's military service.
Best TV news images: When The Powers That Be told us that recovery efforts were going great in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, our own eyes told us differently.
Worst TV news moments: Excessive, exploitative coverage of Natalee Holloway's disappearance in Aruba. Leading the charge into the slime were the Fox News Channel's Greta Van Susteren, MSNBC's Rita Cosby and CNN's Nancy Grace.
Worst investigation: Fox's look into the "American Idol" judging scandal — determining that, even though Paula Abdul slept with a contestant, it didn't matter.
Least credible reality/competition show: "American Idol"
Most annoying reality show: MTV'S "Laguna Beach" — and it's quite an accomplishment to beat out Paris Hilton and Britney Spears.
Weirdest movie-star moment (tie): Tom Cruise jumping on Oprah's couch; Tom Cruise arguing with Matt Lauer.
Most surprisingly good new sitcom: "My Name is Earl"
Most annoying cancellation: "Reunion" wasn't the greatest show on TV, but Fox took us 13 episodes into a seasonlong murder mystery and then murdered the show without a resolution.
Second-most annoying cancellation: We were left hanging about our friends on "American Dreams" when NBC axed that show, although part of the blame goes to the show's executive producer, who (despite clear evidence his show was doomed) left us cliffhanging.
Third-most annoying cancellation: The WB didn't stick with "Jack & Bobby" despite the fact that it was one of TV's best shows.
Weirdest TV news moment: Passengers on board a JetBlue airliner with faulty landing gear watching their own drama on the plane's TV sets.
Dumbest financial move: Dave Chappelle suddenly disappearing from his Comedy Central show and ditching his $50 million contract.
Dumbest politicking: The head of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (which is designed to shield PBS from political pressure) exerting political pressure and misusing funds to make PBS less "liberal." Turns out he committed a crime in doing so.
Biggest ex-con miscalculation: Thinking that America wanted to see Martha Stewart make like Donald Trump on "The Apprentice." (Although Martha's daytime show is doing OK.)
Most desperate housewife (tie): Bree, Susan, Gabrielle, Lynette and Edie
Best medical show: "Grey's Anatomy"
Most overrated medical show: "House"
Best reality show: "The Amazing Race" (the misguided "Family Edition" notwithstanding)
Reality contestants you most love to hate: "Amazing Racers" the Weaver family
Weirdest wave of the future: Paying to download shows you can watch for free so you can watch them on teeny-tiny screens on your iPod.
Best TV comeback: "The West Wing," which once again became must-see viewing. Too bad so few people noticed.
Worst TV comeback: Whitney Houston, making a fool of herself along with her husband on "Being Bobby Brown."
Best nostalgia since "The Wonder Years": "Everybody Hates Chris"
Worst infotainment: The E! Channel's re-creations of the Michael Jackson trial
Best family show (tie): "The Gilmore Girls" and "Everwood"
Utes are No. 15: Utah's Fiesta Bowl win over Pittsburgh was 15th in the prime-time ratings the week it aired — which was decent but not great.
Most successful local reality contestant: Shawn Nelson, who won on "The Rebel Billionaire: Branson's Quest for the Best." Most of America missed it, however, because virtually no one was watching the show.
Most deluded local reality contestant: Audrey Evans, who didn't last long on "The Apprentice." The real surprise was that she thought she came off looking great on the show — unaware that she was portrayed as a foul-mouthed, immature shrew.
Best addition to late-night TV: Craig Ferguson, the improbably good new host of CBS's "Late Late Show."
Best addition to the local sports scene: Real Salt Lake, which had several of its games telecast on Ch. 5, Fox Sports Net, the Fox Soccer Channel and ESPN2.
Best hand-off: Although he's still the radio voice of the Utah Jazz, Hot Rod Hundley handed the TV play-by-play chores to Craig Bolerjack — and it was a seamless transition.
Worst TV movie on CBS: "Spring Break: Shark Attack." Or was it, "Category 7: The End of the World"? No, wait — it was "Vampire Bats." Or, possibly, "Locusts."
Bravest new drama: FX's "Over There," which became the first TV series about a war to air while that war (in Iraq) is still going on.
Worst procedural crime drama: There's a lot of competition in this category, but "Criminal Minds" sinks to the bottom.
TV friends we'll miss: Don Adams, Eddie Albert, Barbara Bel Geddes, Johnny Carson, Ossie Davis, James Doohan, Bob Denver, Ralph Edwards, Skitch Henderson, Peter Jennings, Pat Morita, Richard Pryor, Nipsy Russell, John Spencer and Ruth Warrick.
Best show about ancient Rome: "Rome"
Top talk-show summit meeting: Oprah Winfrey appearing on Letterman's show.
Second-dumbest controversy: The "scandal" over the Nicollette Sheridan-Terrell Owens promotion for "Monday Night Football."
In like a lion, out like a lamb: "NYPD Blue" launched with a huge splash in 1993. It exited with barely a ripple in February of this year.
To boldly stop: For the first time since 1987, there isn't at least one "Star Trek" series on the air — "Enterprise" got the ax after four seasons, making it the shortest-lived incarnation since the original back in the '60s.
Greatest irony: In its fourth season, "Star Trek: Enterprise" finally got it right and became the prequel it should have been from the beginning. But it was too little, too late.
Best warning: When Ted Koppel retired from "Nightline," he told viewers to keep watching the show. "If you don't, I promise you the network will just put another comedy show in this time slot."
Best show set on a deserted island: "Lost," which captivated viewers with its intriguing tale.
Worst show set on a deserted island: "Lost," which became increasingly annoying as it asked more questions without answering the old ones, and bogged down because NOTHING HAPPENS.
Most in need of a new act: "American Idol" judge Simon Cowell, who's become a parody of himself.
There is a limit: Viewers proved they can only stomach so many permutations of crime dramas, as "Law & Order: Trial by Jury" — the fourth show in the franchise — was canceled after 13 episodes.
Best quote about a frog: WB chairman Garth Ancier, commenting on his network's abandonment of cartoon character Michigan J. Frog as its symbol: "The Frog has been on life support for a long time, and then we got permission from a federal court to remove the feeding tube."
Best follow-up quote about a frog: "I just got off the phone with Sander Schwartz at Warner Animation who said that Michigan J. Frog is actually alive and well," said Brad Turrell, the WB's executive vice president of communications. "He's living in Bolivia under the witness-protection plan."
E-mail: pierce@desnews.com