I am not a fan of the great American morning show. Sure I used to start my younger days with the spunky co-hosts of Today on NBC. Katie Couric and Matt Lauer were once faves, but one day that sprightly-spunky duo started seriously getting on my nerves. Perhaps it was the endless milking of news events: The tragic shooting deaths at Virginia Tech come first to mind. As I recall, the hosts spent something like a week on location in Blacksburg, Virginia. Why? To speak to every living soul who was anywhere near the campus on that awful day. It was positively pornographic if you ask me, to watch the local aggrieved get their 15 minutes sharing their anguish with Matt and co.

Then you have the cooking segments where hosts pretend they care to learn how to grill the perfect summer burger, celebrity puff pieces, the man who turned blue, the girl who couldn't stop hiccuping, or the guy who still loves his wife even though she did something horrendous. You get the point.

When George Stephanopoulos left the Sunday morning standard, This Week, to replace Diane Sawyer on ABC's Good Morning America, I tried to watch that show just to see George, but I couldn't stomach it for long. And what now? Just when I had embraced Christiane Amanpour in his former role as host of This Week, they canned her last week and brought George back just in time for the Iowa Caucuses. Apparently he will continue doing both shows. This shit is making my head spin.

Now it's one thing to play games with George Stephanopoulos, as my affection for him is fairly mild. But when I heard that Charlie Rose, my very heart, would be anchoring a revamped CBS morning show with Gayle King and Erica Hill, well that was just a step too far! Word is, Rose will continue to do his syndicated nightly show on PBS, but can he truly bring his "A-game" to both? And  why would anyone with a respected evening talk show want to get up at the crack of pre-dawn on a regular basis anyway? Beats the hell out of me.

According to the network, the new CBS This Morning, which made it's debut on Monday, will focus more on hard news. No cooking gurus and no useless weather man to show up on location and sway to the beat of a hurricane. Instead they will cut to local stations for weather. Good for CBS on that score. The networks could use a more serious alternative to rival MSNBC's Morning Joe, which is over-long, but bearable in small doses. Unlike Joe Scarborough, Charlie just doesn't fit the morning mold. Besides, I don't want him too tired for his nightly PBS gig, one of my favorite shows of all time. Charlie Rose, which airs in my market at 11 pm is mostly pre-recorded, but he will often broadcast live after a major news event. Presumably, now that he's on in the morning, fans of the PBS show can kiss those live moments goodbye.

Just look at my Charlie, much more at home in a black-swathed studio sitting at his famous oak table. Since the show debuted in 1991, Charlie Rose has hosted luminaries from the arts and sciences, film makers, stars of stage and screen, and politicos of all stripes. I daresay I've learned as much from his guests over the years as I learned in four years of undergraduate study. Mr. Rose, who is also the show's executive producer, often goes on location to interview foreign leaders or to do in-depth reporting on hot topics around the globe. Now that he's a "morning" guy, who knows what the future holds.

I should be happy for him. Clearly he chose this new endeavor with his own goals in mind. Perhaps I will get over it, even embrace the morning gig, but not today. Today I am not pleased. Who will the morning beast take next?