Between TBS and local stations, I think they’re both on about 8 times a day at least here, or rather they were until a week ago when they started shuffling things for the fall. But I’m watching Seinfeld as I type this and watched Friends a couple hours ago. And for some reason both shows are often airing on local stations at the exact same time they’re also on TBS.
But in any case, the notion that Friends isn’t ubiquitous in reruns is absurd and uninformed.
I just did a search and found 11 showings for tomorrow, 9/24, 7 for 9/25, and 12 for 9/26.
Seinfeld is 4, 5, and 5.
I guess I was wrong about the syndication. Maybe I didn’t think it was on a lot because Seinfeld gets the better time slots. Either way it seems like the show is under appreciated in a way you would have never guessed when it was on the air.
That’s one of my favourites, both for the unusual but delightful pairing of Rachel and Chandler, and for my favourite Joey moment - as he walks up the stairs, he sees Rachel and Chandler eating cheesecake off the floor in the hallway, and his response is to take out a fork from his jacket (because who doesn’t have a fork with them at all times?), and says, “Alright, what are we having?”
Apparently “Friends” was not content to just phone it in for the last years; they taped in front of a live audience, and if they didn’t get enough laughs, they stopped taping and went to re-writes until the audience laughed enough.
I agree. At 47 now, I recall watching it in first run and my friends and I agreeing with the theme song - we were broke, our jobs were jokes, and our love lives were indeed D.O.A.
I think you’re all forgetting: Chandler was a transponster!
For the exception that proves the rule, the response was IIRC overwhelming when Monica’s older-man boyfriend was revealed as Magnum-Frickin’-PI, to the point of necessitating a reshoot of Tom Selleck’s entrance minus the audience.
That’s Miss Chanandler Bong to you! 
Friends was a very competent, enjoyable show. I wasn’t really in to it at the height of its popularity, but that was largely because of my “mainstream pop culture is stupid!” attitude at that age.
What’s really interesting to me, though, is that it’s something of a cultural phenomenon in China these days, I understand. It’s very popular for learning English and there are even a couple cafes meticulously modeled after the one from the show. The lifestyle depicted in the show apparently holds a lot of appeal to many younger Chinese. I’m not quite sure how to feel about it, but I suppose I can certainly think of worse cultural exports.
I was just watching one of the Tom Selleck episodes the other day!
A couple of things immediately stood out as a product of the 90s:
-Joey’s maroon oversized boxy Henley* style long sleeve T-shirt looked exactly like the one I just found in the back of my closet and sent off with my in-laws to sell at their yard sale.
a style of t-shirt consisting of several useless buttons in the front right below the collar that was frequently sold by J Crew, LL Bean, Eddie Bauer, Gap, American Outfitters and other popular “outdoorsy” retail stores in the 90s.
Henley shirts have been quite popular for a few years now.
I think Friends basically spanned the time when cellphone became very popular. They started out not using them, if I recall correctly, then everyone had one all the time by the end.
One of the things that really struck me about the series was the pants - holy crow, those were some high-waisted pants, on the boys and the girls!