Believe it or not, it was really an easy decision that didn’t require the usual anguish and hand wringing associated with other major family decisions such as whether or not a trip to visit relatives should really count as a vacation.

There were two specific incidents that triggered this sweeping reform of our family lifestyle. The first involved my eleven-year old son. One evening, I walked into the room where he sat cross-legged in front of “SpongeBob SquarePants” and asked him to wash his hands before dinner. No response. I leaned over and playfully poked him in the ribs and in a sing song voice said, “Time for dinner.” He stared up at me curiously for just an instant as if I were a cloud passing over the sun and then turned back to the television.

No longer singing or playful I crouched down in front of him, blocking his view of the television and said, “Did you hear me? I said time for dinner. Go and wash your hands.” I had his attention then but that didn’t prevent him from craning his neck to look at the TV over my shoulder.

“Now!” I screamed. My son, finally shocked into a state of true consciousness, said okay and stood up. He took a couple of steps, and as I watched in amazement, he stopped in his tracks and re-glued his eyes to the television screen again as if it had desperately cried out to him, “Jack. Where are you going? I thought we were friends.”

We had a quiet meal that evening. Heavy on the sounds of silverware and scraping plates, light on conversation outside of the unusually polite requests to pass the butter, that sort of thing. While unpleasant for the innocent victims, I find that the occasional dinner overloaded with quiet seething and melodrama functions as a sort of chiropractic adjustment to restore the normal family balance. The kids really sense from the tension that they better shape up and you don’t have to worry about losing your voice from screaming. Win/win as they say.

The second incident, which occurred a short time later, did involve screaming, my two-year old daughter and “Caillou”, a two-dimensional wolf in sheep’s clothing from PBS.

I work out of the house and am responsible for getting the kids up and to school and daycare each morning. Often my youngest daughter is the first ready and she will ask to watch “Caillou” while the other kids get dressed and I prepare breakfast. I had no problem with her request; the show is pleasant enough although I find Caillou’s bald and disproportionately large head to be a bit disconcerting as I am convinced that anyone with a head that big would be unable to stand up for more than a moment before toppling over. You have to wonder, if the animators are that sloppy, how crisp can the writing be? Nonetheless, once everyone is seated, the rule is that “Caillou” is to be turned off.

So, on this particular morning, breakfast is ready and as I go over to turn off “Caillou”, my formerly even keeled daughter unleashes a temper tantrum so shocking it makes Courtney Love look like Audrey Hepburn.

Torn between calling an exorcist and enlisting in the Merchant Marines, I opted for losing my cool. I scream to the heavens above that we will no longer have television in this house. A moment later, the phone rings and the guy from across the street says, “What about the Final Four?” I unhooked the cable, seized the 27 inch TV in a bear hug and stagger to the basement, re-emerging moments later covered in sweat and with my heart thumping so fast, you could see it through my shirt.

“That’s that,” I announce, grinning maniacally about the room. “The only box you’ll be staring at from now on is the one that houses that overfed rabbit at the Library.”

A week later the television was back in place.

But we didn’t cave in all the way, I swear. First, we only use the television now for DVDs, mainly Friday night –which has become family movie night. The kids have to ask for permission on any other occasion.

Second, and this came as a complete shock to my wife and I, our kids have not complained. We play more games together, they read prodigiously, a word my daughter Annabelle taught me, and they haven’t even asked us to have the cable reinstalled.

My wife, who grew up without TV, is in Heaven. As for me, yes, there are times when I am miserable. It’s baseball season and I used to like watching the occasional game whenever one was on and regardless of who was playing. But the benefits outweigh the negatives.

I do not miss the news at all and no longer get headaches deciding whether to watch and listen to the correspondent on CNN or to read the news ticker, and just listen to the correspondent or to read the stock prices, occasionally glance at the correspondent and ignore the news ticker completely since it has become so overused it now carries the same sense of urgency as a Captain Morgan Rum banner flown over a beach crowd in August.

But do you want to know what the real upside is? Once again, I can actually recognize my children just as easily from the front of their heads as the back. Win/win as they say.

John Hartnett is the owner of Early Bird Publishing, a manufacturer of humorous greeting cards (http://www.earlybirdpublishing.com) and distributor for Send Out Cards: Changing Lives One Card at a Time (http://www.sendoutcards.com/hartnett). He is also the author of Now What?,at http://www.johnhartnett.blogspot.com. email:johnhartnett@earlybirdpublishing.com.