Recently, when my country called on me to extend my brains, talent and good will for an important cause, I proudly answered that call with an enthusiastic “Yes, I can.”

I, of course, am talking about the fine people at Nielsen Media Research, who chose my roommate and me to be part of their national television survey last week.

The Nielsens are the weekly television ratings that result from measures of household television-viewing patterns around the country.

As part of the study, my responsibilities included keeping a diary of the programs I watched, the channels on which the programs appeared and how long I watched them.

They did not include, as I had initially hoped, watching as much television as possible, even if it meant missing class and work, and ordering in for pizza only during commercial breaks.

Nevertheless, being chosen as a Nielsen household may be the only lottery I’ll ever win, so I handled it with the utmost seriousness.

Throughout the week, I became much more attuned to – and consequently a little embarrassed by – my TV – viewing habits.

At times, I was tempted to fib. I mean, if I were to watch the same show twice in one day – and I have my reasons – do I really have to count it twice?

Even if it’s the same episode? And is it bad that my major sources of news are E! and Comedy Central?

In addition, many times the television is on, but we’re not actually watching it.

Surely those instances can’t count. It’s just that whatever we do – eat, clean, study – we can’t seem to do without the television playing in the background.

Maybe silence scares us. Perhaps it saves us the trouble of actually making intelligent conversation.

But really, what can we possibly say to one another that hasn’t already been so gracefully articulated on MTV’s “Newlyweds: Nick and Jessica”?

This newfound self-awareness prompted me to get out of my apartment.

I went to the park. I took the streetcar downtown. I went shopping.

I was thoroughly enjoying the three-dimensional world, until it occurred to me: I shouldn’t be out living life – I should be inside, watching others live theirs.

The Nielsen people were counting on me to watch television as I normally would.

Choosing this week of all weeks to get a life would result in misleading data, and as a student of social science, I just couldn’t let that happen.

After all, the Nielsen people are not here to judge anyone.

They never attempted to tell me what to do or when to do it.

They just wanted to know what I was watching.

They needed to know.

Most important, they gave me $10. Cash. Up front.

All things considered, they might just be the best friends I’ve ever known.