Why do new episodes of The Simpsons constantly start at 7:59PM? It’s not like my clock is wrong. I am looking at the time on the cable box.  It’s pretty accurate. I remember watching a different New Years 2000 counting down on 10 different islands — it was as accurate as ol’ big ben himself. My Blackberry has the right time. So does my computer, when I actually get the Windows time to sync. So why is the Simpsons starting 1 minute early every Sunday?

This isn’t new. It’s been going on for years. The reason this is frustrating me is that I tivo (timewarner DVR) it every week. Who watches anything in real time anymore? The DVR does have an option for starting the show a few minutes early. But I am usually in a hurry to leave and I quickly set The Simpsons along with King of the Hill and the rest of the Sunday night line-up. It’s not like I can set a season pass for new Simpson episodes, with it starting a minute early. Anyone with a DVR knows that doesn’t work. You will wind up recording every 6ish and 11ish (depending on your Fox affiliate) episode that week. So I manually set it, and I usually forget that for some bizarre reason it starts early.

Normally I wouldn’t care that I missed the opening credits of a show. But any true Simpsons fan knows the opening is what it’s all about. I have completely given up on recording anything on MTV. Not only does the cable guide not match the show, they are so messed up, shows are starting 40 minutes into the hour. Comedy Central loves to run 2 minutes over and Showtime runs just about 5 minutes over (Bullshit did). I have gotten used to that.

But why on earth is The Simpsons, the longest running comedy show, starting early? I can’t figure it out. Does anyone know?