Why do I claim to "hate" television?

"Extreme Makeover," the series version of a special ABC ran earlier this year that featured a trio of participants going through extensive plastic surgery.

Also, this:

AMERICA'S STRANGEST FAMILIES (CBS) - More details have emerged about Gay Rosenthal's reality project at CBS. The series, now titled "America's Strangest Families," will feature three oddball clans each week showing off what makes them so weird. Viewers then get to pick the freakiest of the freaks.

Bah. Okay, what else is ghastly in television? Or at least potentially ghastly? (All information courtesy of the futon critic.)

AMERICAN PRINCESS (NBC) - The Peacock has committed to six episodes of the reality project from the U.K.'s Granada TV. The series mixes elements of "Cinderella" and "My Fair Lady" as a group of regular Janes is sent to England for a sort of royalty boot camp.

CASINO EYE (NBC) - Frank Santorelli ("The Sopranos") has been added to the cast of Peacock's drama pilot about the security surveillance team at a Las Vegas casino. He will play the right-hand man to the team's leader (James Caan). Vanessa Marcil ("Beverly Hills, 90210") is on board.

HEARTS AND MINDS (HBO) - HBO has give Bruce Zabel's ("Dark Skies") drama series a pilot script order. The project revolves around the world of military intelligence and the twin tasks of fighting terrorism and building nations. Previously, the pay channel had only committed to a treatment of the idea.

HENCH AT HOME (ABC) - Tracy Pollan ("First to Die") will star in hubby Michael J. Fox's ABC project. She'll play Kay Hench in the comedy pilot which stars Craig Bierko as a hockey player who winds up spending more time at home after his career suddenly ends.

MR. AMBASSADOR (NBC) - Megan Ward ("Boomtown") has nabbed a role in the NBC/Touchstone comedy pilot. Rupert Everett headlines the series which features RonReaco Lee, Meredith Eaton and Derek Jacobi.

PEACEMAKERS (USA) - The cable network has committed to eight episodes of the western in addition to its two-hour pilot. The series stars Tom Berenger as a tradition-bound federal marshal in the Old West of 1882 who clashes with his young sidekick, a Yale-trained exponent of the newfangled science of forensic investigation (Peter O'Meara). The drama is set to bow later this summer.

SIXTEEN TO LIFE (WB) - Jon Tenney ("Get Real," "Kristin") will star as a down-on-his-luck father who's taken care of by his 16-year-old daughter (Sprague Grayden) in the Frog's comedy pilot.

SKIN (FOX) - D.W. Moffett ("For Your Love") has joined the cast of the drama pilot from Warner Bros. TV and Jerry Bruckheimer Prods. as Skip Ziti. The series is described as a modern-day "Romeo and Juliet" set against the backdrop of the adult film industry.

STUCK IN THE MIDDLE WITH YOU (NBC) - Emmy winner Timothy Busfield is set to star opposite Annie Potts in the Peacock's comedy pilot.

THE MULLET BROS. (UPN) - David Hornsby ("Six Feet Under") will play one of two boys with the unfortunate hairstyle in the UPN comedy pilot presentation. John O'Hurley ("Seinfeld") and Loni Anderson ("WKRP in Cincinnati") has signed.

THE POOL AT MADDY BREAKER'S (FOX) - Jodi Lyn O'Keefe, Jill Ritchie and Reagan Pasternak have been cast as the three leads in Fox's comedy pilot about three 28-year-olds who were popular in high school but went nowhere after that. Nicholas Brendon ("Buffy the Vampire Slayer"), Eric Nenninger ("Malcolm in the Middle") and Matt Bushell ("Angel") are set as Jeff, Bob and Rodger respectively.