Wednesday, June 2, 2021

Post 4016 - Wednesday Night Thingies

Well, hello again.

You'll be pleased to know that I got up before 11:30 on Wednesday morning. It was 11:20 to be exact. Now, it is past 1:30 in the ayem on Thursday, and I really don't feel tired. Like I said before, my sleep pattern post CPAP is thrown off to the point where I am not sure how to get back to the kind of pattern I had when I was a working stiff. Maybe I never will. Maybe I don't need to. I am not sure yet.

I remember when I was growing up that my mother would have "her" night on Saturday. She would do a some combination of taking a long bath, sitting out on the front stoop, sitting around in the kitchen, often times until 3 or so Sunday morning. I never really asked her why. Like I said, I think she thought of it as her time when she could do what she wanted after we had gone to bed for the evening. As she grew older, the 3am became closer to, say, one am. Once she moved into the Shannex facility prior to her death, and was no longer living in the family home, she probably kept more "normal" hours.

When I was working every day, I would go to bed around 11, and got up between 5:30 and six. Hit the road by 7-ish to be at work by 8 or slightly earlier. I had always thought that people with office jobs worked a strict 9 to 5, but official government hours were 8:30 to 4:30. Since I was on what was called a modified work week, I had to put in an extra half hour a day to get the third Friday off. But this starting work at 8 or so went back to when I was in university and working summers at the university library for the late George Halliwell and Paulette Mosher. Even then, I thought it was odd to work at such an early hour. After university I began working for a private company, once again, I was at work by 8 or so. We had to average 8 billable hours every work day. With an hour for lunch, that meant working 8-5. 

People always thought I was a morning person, but it was just something I got used to. Even towards the end of my illustrious career in 2019, when my sleep apnea was getting worse and worse and worse, and I would doze off at work and awaken with a start, I was almost always at work by 7:30 or so. I would have to take naps in the evening and oftentimes sleep Saturday afternoons away to stock up enough energy to confront another work week, but once again, those early hours were something I had grown accustomed to.

Now, with the CPAP machine, I still require sleep but I feel well rested when I do get up. And the pattern of staying up until 2 or 3 or 4  in the morning is not something that causes me any particular issue as long as I can get the hours of sleep on the back end. 

The more I think about it, the more I am convincing myself that this is the new norm for me. I think I can come to like it.

The government decided to open schools in Halifax, starting on Thursday. That means the mad rush on my street will commence by 7:45 or so. Entitled parents will park on the street, block driveways, park in driveways, do whatever they want, in order to inconvenience those of us who live here. I do not understand their entitlement. They are supposed to drop off their kids at the main entrance, which this is not. I am content that the school year will be over in a few weeks. 

I often have to remind myself that I must accept the things I cannot change. I try to do that, but people like the above challenge my resolve. I am sure you understand.

I think I will turn in. Distilled water, here I come!

See you tomorrow.

Bevboy


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