This is National Turn Off the Television week. I get the point behind the week. I even support the point behind it. However, my daughter and I just spent a joyful evening watching “NCIS” and “House.” On Monday, we watched Jack Bauer fight to save the world on “24.”

I guess I’m one of “those” parents.

This, I suppose, is a confession of all my sins. I feed my children ice cream. Not low-carb, sugarless natural frozen treats, but real ice cream. I have chocolate if they want to sauce it up. I buy them chips. I fry chicken. I make mashed potatoes with real butter and gravy. When I’m tired and they’re hungry, I’ll stop for their favorite fast food.

Once, when all the kids were without driver’s licenses and hungry and I just didn’t feel like cooking, I went to four different drive-through windows to satisfy their individual hungers.

I have always tended, when punishing them, to search for punishments that did not involve grounding them. If they were grounded then they were not only surly but also at home. That always seemed to punish me more than it punished them.

I let them crawl into bed with me when they were little. It was also far past the recommended weaning date when their bottles were replaced by sippy cups.

I have let them skip baths and, once in a blue moon, skip brushing their teeth.

Bad mommy!

All of you new parents who are busy trying to be perfect, let me caution you of something that the woman who used to make her own baby food discovered. We aren’t perfect. Not the parents. Not the children.

In this crazy house, there are plenty of flaws. One of them is, that I was halfway into “24” before I realized what week it was. It’s a good thing that I’ve learned a few lessons along the way. Striving for perfection isn’t bad. However, expecting it of yourself can drive you crazy.

My children watch television. So do I. We laugh about it and talk about it. We also read books, sit down and have good conversations, visit friends, play board games and do numerous other things. We eat food that isn’t good for us. We also eat salads, fruit and all those other food pyramid things.

I’m not denigrating the week. I believe families get to choose what their traditions are, and that’s as fine a tradition as any. I’m just saying if, in the rush of getting everything done, if you finally sat down, clicked on the TV and lost yourself in an hour of silly escapism before it dawned on you that you had violated the spirit of Turn Off the TV Week, don’t feel guilty. The perfect parent police will not arrest you.

As for not watching TV, we’ll all do it together, next time there’s a power failure.

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Terry Murry can be reached at tmurry@eastoregonian.com or by calling (541) 966-0810.