So you finally got time over the break to soak in the forbidden delights of the 8,000-channel satellite-TV setup Mom and Dad got to console themselves when you left for college. When they went out for the day, you no doubt snuck into the living room to indulge the twisted fantasies of your extended adolescence.

Absorbed into the spectacle before you, you didn’t hear anything outside the plasma screen’s 12-band-stereo-equalised orgy of sound until the door to the garage opened. You fumbled with the remote in your lap. The shopping bag full of Oreos and Wheat Thins, specially purchased for your nine-day visit, slipped from your mother’s startled hands.

Strangely, you aren’t embarrassed. Thanks to Cartoon Network and its Adult Swim (Sunday-Thursday, 10 p.m.-4 a.m. CST), cartoons are now cool. (Still, your mom may question why you are so engrossed in the Powerpuff Girls at two in the afternoon.)

Of course, to those in the know, cartoons have always been cool. Those designed for kids were still designed by adults, who often (maybe just to avoid boredom) had to slip in some more sophisticated ideas. These in-jokes created generations of adolescents and adults who could still find more than just nostalgic reasons to watch Woody Woodpecker and Scooby Doo.

In October, 1992, Turner Broadcasting, armed with a back-catalog of Hanna-Barbera cartoons and other old favorites, launched Cartoon Network — a part of the magazine-rack trend in cable TV — a channel for every interest.

But more so than other selective-audience stations, Cartoon Network had a built-in demographic: kids. With every other network fighting for the young-adult audience or, on occasion, pandering to the growing population of retirees, toy and cereal companies had an easy choice for where to spend their advertising budgets.

After a couple successful years, the Cartoon Network began to expand its horizons. In a moment of gen-x inspiration, an archaic Hanna-Barbera character was updated for a contemporary audience …

The question was posed: “What if Space Ghost were involved in the late-night talk show wars?” recalls Jim Babcock, the Cartoon Network’s director of public relations. And a new era was born. This April will mark 10 years since the premiere of “Space Ghost Coast to Coast,” the dry, surreal satire of both talk shows and campy old cartoons.

“Space Ghost Coast to Coast” took a big step in outing the inside joke in kids’ cartoons. The title character’s action-hero self-importance was ready-made for satire. With a cynical post-grunge population reaching college age, the show gained Cartoon Network a major foothold with a different (and economically significant) demographic.

It took seven years to move to the next stage, but in September of 2001, “Adult Swim” began, airing “sophisticated” cartoons two nights a week, designed to draw in a college-age audience.

The long delay was due to a desire to maintain high standards, in terms of quality and often weirdness — as demonstrated by “Aqua Teen Hunger Force,” one of Adult Swim’s original programs, which features anthropomorphic foodstuffs.

Through selective purchasing and deliberate development, Adult Swim has within three years grown to 30 hours of programming per week, over five nights. During these nights, the programs rate as well as or better than the major-network late-night talk shows with young-adult viewers.

With a daytime audience of kids and a growing young-adult following at night, Cartoon Network and Adult Swim may be an ad man’s dream come true. In a supply-and-demand context, Cartoon Network has done an admirable job at regulating the supply to maintain the demand for both its audiences.

Recently, Cartoon Network’s skill at opportunistic acquisition has also become noteworthy. With the Fox Network failing to do justice to two of its best animated series, “The Family Guy” and “Futurama” soon found themselves in syndication on Cartoon Network under the Adult Swim banner.

Adult Swim synchronized its premieres of the two shows with respective releases on DVD. Both shows’ huge success, on DVD and on Cartoon Network, has been a shock to many, but not to the programmers at Adult Swim, who will announce significant programming upgrades today in New York.

When asked if new episodes of “Futurama” and/or “The Family Guy” would ever be produced exclusively for Adult Swim, Jim Babcock hinted at this week’s announcements: “It’s not that those things (new first-run episodes) aren’t possible. Perhaps in the next few days you will find out how possible they are.”

The small Turner offshoot has grown to a staff of about 160 between Los Angeles and the main office in Atlanta, including an Adult Swim staff of about 20. Cartoon Network is constantly looking at new shows to produce, but has gained greater flexibility in purchasing ready-made shows by the success of Adult Swim.

With the promise of improvements in the already exceptional Adult Swim lineup, it is a golden age for cartoons. Cartoon Network has found its perfect niche, providing airtime for classic cartoons and new shows for kids, while embracing the post-Simpsons culture of sophisticated animated programs.

The latest local Adult Swim 21+ promotional event takes place this Friday, March 26, at the Orpheum’s Stage Door, 121 W. Johnson at 10 p.m. Adult Swim vs. Hip-Hop night will feature free champagne, t-shirts and other prizes, and music by Tha 446 and opening act Tron Solo and the Digital Ninjas.