That...Annoying...Dramatic...Pause

I don't know if you've heard of the television show Recipe to Riches at all. If you haven't, it was a contest throughout this wonderful country of ours for seven new President's Choice products. Each of those winners recieved a monetary prize, and the big winner would be the recipient of an even grander sum of money.

Well, I was watching the finale this evening (it was a replay from earlier, but I digress), and as always, the host was guilty of committing one of my pet peeves: the drawn-out dramatic pause. I can understand having a pause for a single heart beat, perhaps two, but beyond that is just foolish.

Somehow, I doubt I'm the only one who finds such pauses incredibly irksome. It's like a miserable William Shatner. Just. Because. He. Was. Able. To... Draw... Everything out... Doesn't. Mean. That... Everyone... Else... Has. To... Do the same. Annoying, right?

Whoever said, "hey, let's have long, drawn-out pauses," ought to be fired. You're not creating drama, you're not creating tension, you're just really irritating the viewers. You're reading a card. I doubt it has more than a single sentence, and I get the feeling that it's not that long either. Probably something along the lines of, "And the winner is... (insert name here)." Am I right?

But seriously, though, the space between, "and the winner is..." and the name of said person is so damn long that I could probably cook a multi-course dinner, take a nice, long, bath, or make like Rip Van Winkle. If you have that much time to waste on a show, then the length ought to be shortened, or find some other useful tidbits to fill up the space.

I know, I know, I really shoudn't be so irritated by a television host's duties, but when it's late, and all you want to do is go to bed, drawing out the good news doesn't help. If you're like me, you'll fall asleep, miss the grand anouncement, and then have to catch everything on reruns again anyways. Perhaps that's why I don't really watch reality t.v anymore, but the rest of that is a whole other tangent in itself...