🔍 CID reruns still oddly comforting to have on in the background

Have started leaving old CID reruns on in the background most weekend afternoons recently, not really actively watching in any focused way, just having the familiar theme music and predictable dialogue patterns playing quietly while doing other actual tasks around the house that genuinely need doing regardless. There is something genuinely soothing about the specific predictability of it, the same handful of recurring phrases repeated across episodes, the exact same dramatic camera zoom used for every single reveal regardless of how minor the actual reveal genuinely turns out to be in the end. It requires literally zero real mental effort to actually follow along with, which honestly makes it perfect background noise for folding laundry or cooking without needing to pay close attention the entire time. My roommate finds this habit genuinely bizarre, given how objectively predictable and formulaic the show actually is by any reasonable standard, but there is something comforting specifically in that exact predictability that a genuinely tense, unpredictable modern crime thriller simply could not properly replicate as effective background noise the same particular way. Mentioned this specific habit to a colleague at work, and she admitted to something genuinely similar with a completely different old show entirely, suggesting this might actually be a fairly common way people specifically use nostalgic, familiar television now, not really for the actual plot or content quality itself, but purely for the comforting, familiar atmosphere it reliably creates in the background of an otherwise fairly ordinary day. Part of the specific appeal too is that I genuinely already know most of these old episodes reasonably well from having watched them years ago originally, so there is zero actual anxiety about missing something important or needing to actually pay close attention, unlike watching anything genuinely new for the first time properly. Does anyone else have a specific old show they use this exact same way now, not really watching it properly anymore, but keeping it on purely for that particular familiar, comforting background atmosphere while doing other actual things around the house?

Nothing that demands real attention, everything predictable from one episode to the next, an entire category of television seems to exist purely for this. Says less about the show itself and more about how starved most people are for something dependable in an otherwise fairly loud and chaotic day at work, myself included on most weeks lately, if I am being fully truthful about it.

Different show, same exact habit here, on purely for background noise while I cook dinner most evenings after work. My wife stopped questioning it a while back, she just turns the volume down herself whenever she needs to hear something else happening in the house without asking me to mute it first, and I appreciate not having to explain myself every single time this happens between us at home.