10 - Where the Hell Was I?

March 1, 2006

10

Charlie’s “100 ~~Things~~ Posts About Me”

#10. My brain wakes up at around ten each morning, regardless of when I get out of bed.

It’s always been this way. I can go to bed at five am, and function on just three or four hours of sleep (insofar as I really function at all). But get me up at seven, and you get nothing from me. It doesn’t matter what time I went to bed, or how much sleep I got. I can turn in after the six o’clock news, get twelve hours of sleep, and I’d still be a drooling moron if I woke up at seven the next morning. (Yeah, yeah — ‘So what would be different?‘ Man, with friends like you…)

Anyway, I’m steadfastly a night person. I have been for as long as I can remember. I just hate that groggy, fuzzy, Dan Quayle-y feeling I have when the alarm wakes me up. My brain’s even gone so far as to stage boycotts — more than once, I’ve slept through an entire hour of blaring music, and I mean loud blaring music, only to wake up afterwards and say, ‘Wha?‘ This makes me later, of course, but infinitely happier that I got those extra sixty-five minutes or so of sleep. Even if I usually do dream of rock concerts during that time.

Luckily, I’m a software programmer. We’re usually not asked to be in the office at the crack of dawn, or anything near it, so it’s often okay to wake up at eight-ish, or even later. I also live pretty close to work, and can therefore wait until the very last minute before rushing into the office. Like around ten, ten-thirty. It’s sweet; no traffic, no honking. Just a smoooooth ride all the way in. Very peaceful. I think everyone should start their day that way.

On the other hand, if everyone did, then I’d be stuck with all the honking and traffic that I’m trying to avoid. So forget that. Keep getting up and in to work before the damned sun comes up, and encourage your friends to do the same. I mean, I love you — I really do — but I don’t want to have the first damned thing to do with you before ten o’clock, and I don’t want you cutting me off in traffic until at least noon. Otherwise, I won’t be able to think of anything clever to say when I’m cursing at your back bumper. And it’s all about the comebacks, folks. A snappy automotive repartee is the only thing separating us Bostonians from the hoodlums in New York and LA, where they just get out of their cars and beat the living shit out of each other. Or shoot the living shit out of each other. And before ten, I can understand how they feel. So watch it out there, would ya? Don’t mess with me until my brain’s kicked in, or I’ll have to use other parts of my body to deal with you. And nobody wants that.