>Instead, this sounds more like what my girlfriend uses "The Office" as: TV that you're so comfortable with you like to have it on when you're doing other things and not actually watching TV.

Friends is the same way. Much of the hubbub over its becoming big again when Netflix won the rights a few years ago was from young women discovering the show, but I suspect that just as many of the viewers were slightly older women who've seen every episode multiple times and put it on in the background while going about their day.