Day one

Let's begin at the beginning. The child was mortifying. And it wasn't his fault. This is a three-year-old who is usually so articulate and self-contained it leads people to ask, "How OLD is he?" But here he was, his feet sprawled on the floor, his body tangled around his father's arms, making a sound that went something like this, "Eeeeaaawwwwwwkkkkkk!" Then he flipped over raised his hind quarters and issued a loud spray of gas.

The aunt to his right gasped. The grandmother made a nervous giggle. The great grandmother didn't hear it, but if she had, on this 99th birthday celebration, she would have scolded her grandson, my husband, with a cajun "tsk, tsk, tsk."

Husband and I looked at each other with a cringe. Who was this child?

On the way home, we talked about it.

And then it dawned on us. That day, he'd watched Disney's "The Incredibles" twice. In the car, he'd watched Disney's "Treasure Planet." At home, he'd also watched "Lilo and Stitch."

We are on our way to creating the next Mike TV from Willy Wonka's "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory." Demanding. Loud. Rude. And completely, utterly addicted to the day's flavor broadcast on television.

Let's get back to "The Incredibles." It is a brilliant film. Well written and witty. With voices of recognizable actors making one-liners that are aimed at adults so they won't go nuts watching the film over and over and over. This is what Disney does best. The film aired on a new channel, "Disney XD." I calculated that the film is 115 minutes long. Yet on our TIVO it runs 150 minutes. That means the kids get exposed to 35 minutes of commercials for every viewing. Most of them in the amped up, thirty-something male voice that sounds like it belongs to a retired X Games athlete, selling things like guns and plastic aliens. Don't get me wrong, we have a lot of plastic aliens in our house. But I feel assaulted with each of these messages.

On that drive home from the great grandmother's 99th birthday, during which we squirmed in embarrassment at the appallingly rude behavior of our precocious three-year-old, we challenged ourselves. Could we go without television? And then, like the quick precipitation that falls on hot summer afternoons, we decided. Just like that. At the crossing of two intersections in our not-so-big city.

I turned around and looked at the children.

"The television is broken," I said.

"Then I guess we'll have to watch the one in your room," the three-year-old responded.

"No. That one is broken, too," I said.

"Oh," he said. "Then I guess we'll have to play in my room."

And, just like that, the experiment began.

For now, the adults will be allowed to watch television in the evening, after the kiddos are in bed. Sure, that feels like a bit of a cheat. What kind of diet begins with a slice of cake at the end of the day? Then again, come to think about it, most diets have room for sweetness here and there. Otherwise you go ballistic. Trust me. I once went on a low-carb diet and found myself shakingly consuming diabetic chocolate and peanut butter in the bathroom.

The husband and I will have our reward. Otherwise, I'm not sure if we'll make it. And there will be movie nights for the kids, too. But today we are telling them the television is broken.

And you know what? They just don't seem that upset about it at all.