The last six-eight weeks of the summer hiatus can be hell. The new season hasn’t started rolling out its schedule yet, so you can’t decide which shows look the most promising. The old season is long over and hasn’t yet been released on DVD to give you a chance to re-live it all before the season premieres. Even with some channels (like TNT) offering fresh programming, you still can’t fill up your evening “tube time.” It’s very frustrating!

So why not do, what I do? I have a few standard shows that I fall back on when I know that I have a while to wait before my next Netflix DVDs will show up and even longer before my favorite series start back up. When I reach this period of limbo, I have a few shows that I bought on DVD that I can watch over and over again, no matter what mood I’m in.

One of these shows is The West Wing. Even for those who are not political, this show is a fantastic character study and will inspire you to…okay, well it inspires me to learn more about my country and its political system—and to explore the careers of the actors involved in the show. Shake your head if you must, but I can put in just about any of the discs in any of the seven seasons of this show and know that I will be entertained.

Another of these shows, when I want to laugh, is Scrubs. Scrubs is still running, but there are enough seasons of it that there are plenty of hours of television to keep me occupied before the fall season starts. Dr. Cox never gets old and is always funny. This show is moving to ABC for what is most likely its final season, and I can’t wait to see how it all ends!