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Sunday. The last day of the weekend, which also happens to be the first day of the week (according to many calendars). The day that seems to be a weekly national holiday — "be a bum" day. The day that teachers, students, professionals, almost everyone love to hate ... if only because of the day that follows. And while most people will spend their Sunday evening moping around, whining about the next day, I'm usually found laughing myself to sleep with the TV on.

About a year ago, I ran across commercials for a program on Cartoon Network called "Adult Swim". This program was marketed towards adults aged 18 and older and came on late Sunday evening, with an encore performance on Thursday nights. The clips they showed with the commercial were centered around "Space Ghost: Coast to Coast", so immediately I was interested.

It took me three weeks to remember about Adult Swim. I would watch my normal Sunday night lineup on Fox, and when The X-Files was over, I'd flip the TV off and do something else. One night when I wasn't finished watching television, I happened across a very funny cartoon. When it went to commercial break, an Adult Swim bumper played. I couldn't believe I had forgotten, but was glad to find it.

It's been close to a year now, and it's my favorite part of TV now. I watch it every Sunday, and if I can't stay awake for it, I tape it. I've seen most of the shows twice, but they're wonderful. Here's a run-down of the Adult Swim lineup:

Home Movies

Home Movies follows the life of the third grade, budding movie-director Brendon Small and his world. His mother, Paula, is recently divorced and sometimes struggles to keep their small family afloat financially. Brendon has two friends, Jason and Melissa, who star in all of his movies. In addition to Brendon, his two friends, and his mother, the show's other big star is Coach McGuirk.

This show is extremely well written and the humor is witty and loaded with dry sarcasm. The show lives off of the relationships that Brendon has with his co-stars. Paula is constantly ignoring Brendon's problems in lieu of her own, whether it's asking for a raise, dealing with her divorced parents, or teaching a night class full of idiots. Jason, who seems to mumble quite a bit, plays the part of a rich snobby kid who always second-guesses Brendon's directing decisions. Coach McGuirk, who is probably the fan favorite, is a seemingly white trash fellow who boosts his egos by belittling his third grade (and younger) soccer team. He offers them A's for cash, or has them all fill out contest entry slips, or hits up Brendon for gas money.

This is one of my favorite shows, and definitely worth watching.

Sealab 2021

Back in the 70's, a show called Sealab 2020 aired. The premise was simple:

This is Earth 2020 A.D. and Dr. Paul Williams leads an underwater expedition to study living conditions while searching for scientific solutions in a domed experimental city with 250 inhabitants.

The show lasted only a year and was never seen again. Until now. The show's creators have gone through and re-edited, re-voiced, added to, all of the old show's footage. The end result is Sealab 2021, one year after the city opened. Except now, a year later, most of the scientists an inhabitants have gone a little nuts.

This show is wonderful. The plots (which range from all of the Sealab staff stuck in a broken maintenance closet to a corrupt Feng Shui con man swindling Sealab out of thousands of dollars) are hilarious and are topped only by the cast. Each week the episodes usually end with Sealab exploding and if that's not enough for you, Erik Estrada voices one of the characters.

Don't miss this if you have the chance to see it. You won't be sorry.

Aqua Teen Hunger Force

Aqua Teen Hunger Force is about three life-sized food items — a milkshake named "Master Shake", an order of fries named "Frylock", and a giant meatball, "Meatwad" — that somehow solve mysteries that threaten their South Jersey neighborhood. The three live in a house together and are usually too pre-occupied to do anything but chill out.

Shake is the life of the show. He is the self-proclaimed leader of the group and he's a know-it-all, or thinks he is. He doesn't like Meatwad at all, and is constantly trying to trick him or blame his shortcomings on him. Shake is often seen attempting to con their next door neighbor, Carl, or lounging in his pool.

Frylock is the brains behind the team. Blessed with the superpower to shoot lasers out of his eyes, Frylock also has the mental capacity to figure out what's going on and usually how to fix it.

Meatwad is the cute, lovable, shape-shifting idiot. Whether he's being fooled by one of Shake's tricks or stumbling across the mystery's solution, you can but help wishing you had a Meatwad of your own rolling around in your house.

The team's evil nemesis is Dr. Weird, who has never seen Aqua Teen Hunger Force, and vice versa. He is the one who creates a majority of the problems that the team must stop.

This show is unstoppable, and new episodes are on their way. Make sure you check this one out.

The other shows are:

• Baby Blues
• The Brak Show
• The Oblongs
• Harvey Birdman, Attorney at Law
• Mission Hill

I don't want to go into detail about every show, simply because I don't care much about the other shows. Don't get me wrong, they're funny, just not as funny as the others are. To find out more information, please visit AdultSwim.com or check your local listings for Cartoon Network.

Adult Swim isn't on Thursday nights anymore, but there is a new edition on Saturdays - which seems to be more geared towards the Anime crowd.

So, if you're not quite ready for Monday, make sure you check out Adult Swim. It's my highlight of the weekend and provides many laughs. Enjoy.

For some really, really good information about Adult Swim, and all of its shows, please check out The Unofficial Adult Swim Website at http://www.angelfire.com/tv2/adultswim/index.html