I'll sleep when I'm dead..

That's pretty much my normal mode of operation. I generally operate on about 5 hours of sleep tops. See I work 10 hours shifts that run from 6am to 430pm. I have about a 45 minute drive to work. That means if I push it, I have to be up by 5am to be out the door in 15 minutes. Now if I followed the 8 hours of sleep thing.. I would have to be in bed by 9pm. By the time I get home from work, go to the gym, do dinner and games with the boys, its already 8pm. If I went to bed at 9.. I would feel like I didn't have any time. So I end up staying up til 1130 or 12.. sometimes later even.

People tell me I'm crazy, but it's what I do. I did some research on sleep and most credible sites say that an average adult needs 7-8 hours, but that it can vary by person. I am also finding that contrary to what a lot of people say, your body CAN build up what they call sleep-debt. It can catch up to you. If you are interested.. check Here and Here. Both articles talk about sleep debt and that your body will try to balance that out.

Most days I do just fine, but things do catch up to me on occasion. On Wednesday, Gabe was sleeping over at a friends so it was just Brandon and I. We made some dinner and decided to play some Rock Band together. As we were working out way through an 8 song set with him on drums and me on guitar, I realized I had just failed out. Brandon saves me.. I start playing again and a minute later, I fail out again. I realized that I had actually fallen asleep.... while playing RB! I figured that was a pretty good sign that I needed to go to bed early that night.

We managed to finish out the last song and I spent a short time talking to my girlfriend who was feeling under the weather and was tired too and we made it an early night. I went to bed at 830 and got up at 530 the next morning. 9 hours of sleep and I felt pretty good. I think the traveling, time changes and general business of being back in the thick of things after 11 days off had finally caught up with me.

I thought about things, and decided the world would be a much happier and relaxed place if we could all just follow what our bodies were telling us. Not tired yet? Stay up a while. Not ready to get up at 430am.. sleep til you are not tired anymore. How much happier would you be if you could just get up when you were done sleeping? No alarm clocks. No "be at work by 6am" nonsense.

I realize there would be rediculous logistic problems if everyone did that. But the question is.. would it be worth it? Would you be frustrated and want things to go back to the way they were when everyone went off clocks and you had to be places at certain times, but could count on the grocery store to be open from 6am to midnight? Me.. I'm just not sure. I think I could deal with intermittent service availibility if it meant I could sleep when and where I felt like it and didn't have to use an alarm clock. Sure there would be times when I wanted to go to the store and I'd be pissed that no one was there, but I would get over it when I could go to bed at 2am, get up at 10am and roll into work at 11.

Maybe I will just sell all I own and move to Jamaica and fish enough to live off of and be a beach bum the rest of the time. Of course there are some annoying things like the fact that I don't really like to eat fish or even like fishing for that matter. Those pesky hurricanes down there. My enjoyment of regular bathing and high speed internet. And air conditioning. Sweet, glorious air conditioning.

/Sigh....alarm clock it is. I will say this though.. the guy that decided it was ok for someone to be up at 430am needs a swift kick to the junk. Then, as he is bent over double clutching said junk, maybe a follow-up shovel to the cranium! That would make me feel better about being up when its still dark out.

This song gives me a mellow beach day vibe.. and so I share it with you today on a nice relaxing Friday.