I haven’t used an alarm clock to get up for work in a little over 13 years now. Back when I went in to an office daily, I was a big snooze-alarmer. I would hit that snooze button 2, 3 times for 9 minutes a pop. I’d heard the warnings about how you shouldn’t use a snooze, if you want to sleep later then you should just set your alarm for later instead of getting such disjointed sleep as is provided by a snooze button. I knew this, and yet, I couldn’t stop doing it.
These days, I use an alarm, but this time it’s to be up in time to make my kids’ lunches, make breakfast and make sure my son gets off to school in a reasonable time frame. It’s not my alarm, actually, it’s Zach’s, but it works for both of us. This time around, though, there is no time to waste hitting a snooze button. I know my time is limited and I have to get up and moving quickly in order to get him out on time, so there is no time to be wasted hitting the snooze. (Not that there is one, anyway. Zach’s alarm is on his phone. Or is there? It’s on his side of the bed so I don’t see it… but I digress.)
Each morning, whether it’s a weekday or a weekend, I open my eyes very slowly and look at the ceiling to see what time it is. Yes, my ceiling, because my alarm clock projects its red numbers at the ceiling. It’s really cool, although being myopic, it may take an extra few seconds to clearly make out the numbers, even though they are fairly large (and sometimes I misread, which on the rare occasion has made me sit up and stare hard at the numbers in panic).
They’re red numbers, which typically I don’t like. In the past I have actually chosen my alarm clock based on number color alone. I had a clock once that was a white cube and had green numbers which I found soothing. I don’t care for the red numbers, but the projection thing was just so cool that I felt I could overlook the numbers’ color.
On the weekend, I try my very hardest not to get out of bed before 9 am. I don’t know why that’s the magic number. I mean, I will get up to go to the bathroom, but even if that happens at say, 8:30 or 8:45, I will get up, go, and then get back into bed for a while, because IT’S THE WEEKEND AND I AM NOT GETTING UP EARLY, DAMMIT. Not having kids involved in sports this usually works out for me.
Today was a snow day, so the alarm was turned off. Well actually, it wasn’t, as Zach still had to work from home, but I could stay in bed anyway. Tomorrow is another snow day due to the blizzard-like conditions, so again, his alarm will go off at some point (I tried to convince him that the normal time is not necessary), but no matter what, I will be staying in bed until 9… or maybe 9:15. Nowhere to go and only bad weather to do it in says that I get to stay in bed until pretty much whenever I want.
During the summer, the alarm gets turned off again and I get to sleep late for weeks on end. It will be a rude awakening in September, literally, when it’s back-to-school time and my son starting junior high means I will be getting up even earlier. That may finally convince me to do what I keep wanting to do but never quite get around to… go back to bed after the kids go to school. I mean, I need my sleep.
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