More than 50 readers (some of them online, which we'll get to in a moment) weighed in, and the results told me a lot about the viewing habits of people who read this column. You folks really like TV, for all the right reasons -- and the main one is quality entertainment.

I've listed just the painstakingly tallied top five (well, six, really) picks here, because after that there were so many tie scores that a top 10 list would have looked like a big muddle. The No. 6 slot alone would have included five entries -- including USA's great "Burn Notice" and NBC's strong freshman "Life" -- with six votes each.

So how did your tastes line up with mine?

My top three picks, published in Sunday's Arts & Entertainment section, were HBO's "Big Love" and "The Sopranos" and Sci-Fi's "Battlestar Galactica," in that order. Those shows didn't do so well with readers. "Big Love," a drama series about polygamy, got only one mention, "The Sopranos" got none (!) for its final season, and "Battlestar Galactica" only scored three.

The poor reader support for the HBO shows makes me wonder how many voters have premium cable. Or maybe I'm just a big old premium-cable snob. Still, two of your picks ("30 Rock" and "Mad Men") made it onto my best-of, and your top two picks were among my honorable mentions. So we're pretty much on the same page.

Here are the readers' picks:

1. "Law & Order: Criminal Intent" on NBC/USA with 22* votes. Why the asterisk, you wonder? Someone posted my last installment of TV Eye on the Vincent D'Onofrio fan site thereelvincentdonofrio.com, and as a result, I got "Criminal Intent" votes from places as far away as Georgia, California and even London, England. Those should count, too, right? I mean, it doesn't reflect "our readership," per se, but you have to admire the dedication. And this fine police series is indeed worthy of such fandom.

2. "The Closer" on TNT, with 20 votes. This almost got an asterisk, too, because a lot of out-of-town "Criminal Intent" fans dug this one and said so. Ah, what the heck -- it also got plenty of local votes, as I expected.

Plus, I appreciate all the votes and comments, such as this one from "Closer" fan Lorry Evans of Cedar Rapids, Iowa.

"I love the premise, the characters, the acting, everything," she says. "It's the right combination of drama and comedy, just like real life."

3. "30 Rock" on NBC, with 10 votes. This was my No. 5 pick, so I was gratified that readers also loved Tina Fey's hilarious sitcom about the farcical goings-on behind the scenes at NBC. You people have good taste.

One of its fans, Michael Bird of Cary, calls the show "funny as hell," and adds: "I love Tina and Alec [Baldwin]."

4. "The Big Bang Theory" on CBS, with eight votes. I've only viewed this sitcom about two geeky roommates living across the hall from a blond hottie twice, at review time. I liked it OK, and gave it a B on my blog. Since then, a few readers and associates have assured me that I'm missing out, so there you go -- another series I need to pay more attention to in the new year.

"It's hysterical, and [I] really hope it comes back," says Julie Davis of Durham. "I love the [give and take] between Sheldon and Leonard, and I'd love to see Sara Gilbert show up more often."

5. It's a tie: "Boston Legal" on ABC, and "Mad Men" on AMC, each with seven votes. "Boston Legal" is an entertaining show that I never get around to watching, so I'll take your word for it and resolve to catch a few more episodes in 2008. As for my No. 6 pick "Mad Men," the brooding series about New York ad execs in 1960 really wowed a lot of people this year.

"I will have to jump on the 'Mad Men' campaign, as it really was the best show of 2007," says Claire Meyerhoff of Raleigh. "Chilly and brisk, like a straight-up martini in a cool Manhattan nightclub circa 1960. Except we're in North Carolina, but that's the beauty of TV. It takes us wherever we want to go."

I'll drink a dirty Absolut with two olives to that.

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