Strategies For Night Owls

Everyday I face a formidable challenge. It's unthinkable that anyone should ever have to do this. It's requires herculean effort and extreme sacrifice. You know what I'm talking about, right?

Yes, it's that's dreaded moment when I have to get out of bed!! 
Okay, I'm being a tad melodramatic. But my fellow night owls will know what I'm eluding to. 

What I'm trying to tell you is, I have never been a morning person. This dates back to when I was a child. My brother was always cheerful and happy when he woke up, but I was crotchety and curmudgeonly. Truthfully, I'm not really sure what that word means, I just felt like saying it. 

Curmudgeonly.

Right. Got that out of my system for now. 

Anyway, what was I talking about? Oh yes, mornings. I've never been enamoured with them since childhood. 

All my brother would have to do is glance sideways at me and I would wail "Geeeeet!" and then sulk and simper. Now, my brother was a bit cheeky so he'd keep winding me up. It didn't take much.

"Muuuum!" I moaned, indignant "Mark's LOOKING at me!!"

I mean, how very dare he! Everyone knows you should never commit the cardinal sin of looking at some one first thing in the morning.  Worse still, imagine anybody speaking to you?! Outrageous!  

It now appears that as a seasoned night owl, I have also bred a whole new generation of night owls. We are all night owls in this family. Supposedly owls are wise and intelligent creatures. We know that it's preposterous to be up at stupid o'clock. As the saying goes: ain't nobody got time for that! 

There have been periods of my life when I rose early and actually went to work.  At one point, when I worked at the NRMA call centre,  I started work at 7am. In retrospect I am quite astonished that I did this. Both the call centre job and the getting up early to do it. Shudders. 

There have even been exceedingly rare occasions when I woke up early to exercise. However, my version of 'early' was something like 7am, not at the crack of dawn. Also known as sparrow fart and stupid o'clock. See above. 

Moreover, I've survived (barely) the sleep deprivation of having three children. No wonder I'm always bewildered and tired. 


But there must be some coping strategies for us night owls. Such as: 

• Hook yourself up to an intravenous coffee drip.
• Take nanna naps everyday.
• Quit your job or become a shift worker.
• Have a pea-sized bladder which forces you out of bed each morning to go to the loo before you explode (works for me).
• Have children. Not only will they regularly wake you early, they will intensify the effect of the pea-sized, exploding bladder by jumping on it each morning.
• Become a vampire.
• Become a witch.
• Decide that the old saying 'the early bird catches the worm' is absurd. After all, who wants worms anyway? Worms are gross! 
• Become a Furry. That way you can pretend you're a pet and snooze on and off all day long. 
• Become Batman.

All jokes aside, I have found the nanna nap strategy to be effective lately. Now that my boys are older and can amuse themselves by attempting to kill each other for  certain periods of time, a little afternoon snooze is doable. Preferably they are power naps rather than nanna naps. The ideal outcome is that I wake up feeling refreshed and energised, instead of like a hundred year old woman named Beryl. Sometimes it works, often it doesn't (just call me Beryl). But still, I'm up for the challenge. 

Additionally, some strategies that can also work for me are taking a vitamin B supplement daily, eating well and, conversely, getting regular exercise. The more I laze about the more lazy and lethargic I feel. I do have to force myself to do this but I always feel better afterwards! 

Plus, I can also comfort myself with this article. The article states that these are scientifically proven reasons being a night owl is better, so it must be true. Besides, it was on the Internet so of course it's true, right? So ner! 

So there you have it. Night Owls FTW! 

Linking up for I Must Confess.

Are you a morning, afternoon or evening person?