Sigh. Another night without internet.

This is getting monotonous.

But, on the other hand, I do get to catch up with my television viewing. I'm so far behind that I don't even care that there's nothing on for the holidays... I just watch deliciously fresh episodes of shows like Grey's Anatomy and be happy (well, they're fresh to me). Sweet!

The only problem with overdosing on television is that I am starting to notice some freaky trends that would otherwise go unnoticed... such as the phrase I never meant to hurt you. I hear it over and over and over again on a variety of shows and genres, and it's so puzzling to me because it doesn't make any sense at all.

Seriously, I just have to ask... does anybody EVER buy it as an excuse?

Izzie catches her new semi-boyfriend Alex sleeping with another woman and, when they finally get around to talking about it, he runs right into the "I never meant to hurt you" excuse. And I'm sitting there like WTF? Gee Alex, when you slept with the bitch, you KNEW Izzie would be hurt if she found out so, in fact, you DID mean to hurt her! What you REALLY meant was "I never meant for you to find out."

On another show, a man murders his wife's father so that she will inherit the money so he can then kill her and have it all... when he gets caught, there it is again: "I never meant to hurt you." And again, I'm all WTF? Dude, you were going to KILL the bitch! Were you planning on using lethal injection or something? Is THAT what you meant by "hurt"? You honestly didn't think that killing your wife's father was going to hurt her?

Then I heard it again when a woman has to bail out her husband because he was arrested while trying to pick up a hooker. She's standing there in the police station with this disappointed look on her face as her hubby comes walking in and screams "HOW COULD YOU DO THIS TO ME?!?" The man just bows his head and says those magic words: I never meant to hurt you as if that's going to fix everything. You'd think the woman would wait until he falls asleep and cut his penis off... but, from what I can tell, they actually ended up staying together. WTF?!?

Surely this is just a television thing. A crutch TV writers use when somebody's done something bad and they just don't know what to make the character say. It couldn't possibly work in real life.

Could it?

Perhaps I should try it...

Disgruntled Motorist: YOU BASTARD! YOU JUST RAN INTO MY NEW PORSCHE!!
Dave: Sorry, I never meant to hurt you.
Disgruntled Motorist: Awww, that's okay.

Checkout Person: YOU IDIOT! THIS IS THE 10 ITEMS OR LESS LANE AND YOU'VE GOT 48 ITEMS!!
Dave: Sorry, I never meant to hurt anybody.
Checkout Person: Oh... well in that case, let me ring you up.

New Wife: DAVE, HOW COULD YOU?!? YOU SLEPT WITH MY SISTER, AND ELIZABETH HURLEY, AND THE POOL BOY... ALL AT THE SAME TIME... ON OUR HONEYMOON!!
Dave: Sorry, I never meant to hurt you.
New Wife: Really? Oh, well never mind then.

If this works, I'm going to be seriously pissed off that I never knew about it until now.