Most of my professional life involved continually being surprised how little most people actually read.
Then I went to say that in my spare time I like to listen to music and reading. You'd think I'd have said that I'm into being a serial killer. Just weird puzzled and uncomfortable looks.
It then struck me that many people, if not most, cannot comprehend spending their leisure time in any way other than passively watching movies, TV or videos on their smartphone or playing video games.
And believe me, I'm not saying it just to be pretentious, but a lot of the time, reading is way more exciting than whatever's happening on the small screen. There's nothing wrong with TVs and movies but they're certainly not the only way to spend your leisure time.
And then you go on to describe your own leisure time as two other passive forms of entertainment. There’s really nothing magic about the written word that makes a medium more challenging, because by historical standards people are literally reading more words than ever. And probably listening to more music than ever too. There’s just as much to dissect and analyze in artsy movies and TV as books and music.
Normally when you want to be snobby about leisure time you’re supposed to talk about creating over consuming.
I've found it best to avoid saying "I don't watch much TV" though, precisely because of the reaction you mentioned. People will either think I am a freak or just trying to sound smart (or both) - it is a lose-lose situation.
I’m now a two bullet point max kind of emailer.
Now if I need to ask someone about something over email I only include a single question per email
Because you can be sure that only one will get answered and the rest are just ignored.
1: https://www.pewresearch.org/internet/2016/09/01/book-reading...
Mortimer Adler's How to Read a Book illustrates this in the multiple levels of reading it describes. Critical and synoptic reading of complex works is a developed skill.