Looking for something mindless to watch as I worked tonight, I pulled a random animated series DVD off the shelf at the library. ("American Dad". It appears to be "just like Family Guy, but with war-on-terrorism jokes". If you like one you'll like the other, and if one annoys you ditto, but I digress.)
I watched a couple of episodes, got a vague idea what was going on (and ironed my shirts). Then I sat down, paid a bit more attention, and watched one without getting distracted.
And the test.
I then read our (characteristically exhaustive) article on that episode, and came away knowing about twice as much about what had happened in it as I had by actually watching the damn thing.
I'm not sure if this is a positive or negative sign, but it struck me as an amusing experiment!