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I’m wide awake in my bed and I can hear the distant ticking of the clock situated a few feet above the nightlight in my hallway.
I think about what fresh hell awaits me at work and then my mind drifts to fly fishing in Missoula, Montana. I don’t even particularly like fly fishing, but I watched A River Runs Through It some six or seven days ago and the memory of that phenomenal movie is still in the back of my brain.
The urge to check and see how much time I have left to sleep before I need to get in the shower is overwhelming. It’s an itch that I need to scratch even though I know if I do scratch it the scab will come off and I’ll have opened a whole can of worms for myself.
After what feels like an eternity I finally give in and press the home button on my iPhone. It’s 5:15 a.m. and I’ve only got about thirty minutes before my alarm will sound. I groan, curse the Gods for not birthing me into an elite family on the east coast and try to get back to sleep.
As of last year, it’s become increasingly difficult for me to truly stay asleep throughout the course of an entire night. I chalk it up to old age and garden variety anxiety, and in my time as a pseudo insomniac, I’ve learned one universal truth: whatever you do, do not look at what time it is.
I’ve seen countless memes, tweets, and Facebook statuses about how awesome it is to roll over, check your phone, and see that you have another two hours to sleep before you wake up and drag your sorry ass to work. This is not the move, my friends.
I know that in the moment it seems like a good idea. Some peace of mind about how much time you have left to get some shut-eye is, in theory, a comforting tactic. But do you know what happens when that tactic backfires on you and you see that you only have fifteen minutes of sleep left before you need to get up? Anxiety. Anxiety is what happens.
You’ll roll around for the next fourteen minutes, and on the fifteenth when your obnoxious alarm goes off you’ll grumble, moan, and then hit snooze for nine more minutes which will inevitably leave you late for work.
Or conversely, let’s say you’re coming back from a quick piss in the bathroom. In the middle of the night when no one knows I’m awake, I’ll sit down to pee. This allows me to leave the light off in the bathroom and I’d just be straight up lying to you if I said that I don’t enjoy the hell out of a good sit-down piss. Call me a nancy boy. Call me whatever you’d like, actually. It’s comfortable and we all know it.
So here’s what happens when you come back from that delightful pee break and just take a quick glance at your iPhone. First things first: the light from the phone blinds the living hell out of you, and then you’re going to see that your friend sent you a funny meme on Instagram.
Next thing you know, you’re wide awake and bushy tailed, knee deep in the explore page and looking for a suitable meme to send back to your friend.
Even if you did have three or fours of sleep left before you had to get up, you’re going to spend at least thirty minutes absentmindedly scrolling. You’re better off not knowing. Ignorance, in the case of sleep and the time on the clock, is bliss.
Much like staying out after midnight, the only thing that will come of you checking the time in the middle of the night is trouble with a capital T.
Just don’t do it, okay? Leave that phone on the bedside table where it belongs and shut your eyes. All you’re doing by checking the clock is adding to the misery of the next day. .
Image via Youtube
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jduda@grandex.co
Knowing Duda sits down to pee surprises me less than traffic at 8am.
Anyone who says they don’t enjoy a good sit down piss is for sure lying
You ever just do the lay down piss and forget about the consequences because what’s the point of getting up everyday just to work hard in order to lose money and valuable time lol
Nah, sit down pees are weird. I don’t get how guys can do it, I even stand up to pee after dropping heat.
Are you a serial killer? Everyone knows 1 comes before 2, both numerically and in the toilet.
I know what you’re doing. You want me to try and hold a poo while peeing so I shit my pants. Nice try, Satan, but not today.
good god man what is wrong with you
McCoy!!!!!!!
Also, get yourself a good clock radio or something. That way you can always know what time it is without having to turn on the sun that is the phone screen and there’s no distraction. I have a hard time sleeping if I can’t roll over and see what time it is at a glance. And no shame in the late-night sitdown piss to avoid turning the light on, we’ve all been there.
I have this uncanny ability to wake up in the middle of the night and know exactly what time it is. Like within three minutes of the actual time. For the same reason I haven’t had to wake to an alarm clock since I was in high school.
And I always thought just having x ray vision would be a cool superpower…
If I wake up to pee in the middle of the night I try to keep my eyes half closed in some weird attempt to basically make myself sleep walk. Not sure if it works but I’m no scientist.
Holy shit I do the same thing. I feel like if I fully open my eyes, I won’t be able to go back to sleep. Oh to have the logic of a 7 yr old.
The sit down pee sounds like a genius move. I’m surprised Duda wakes up at 5:45.
It all makes sense now, Duda is slowly transitioning into Tyler Durden.
The anxiety one gets from checking the clock, while inadvertently waking in the early morning hours on a weekday, creates a negative feedback loop representative of what hell must be like.
It’s hard to do a sitdown piss when you’re a hardo tho
Or when you’ve got a hardo going
Exactly what I meant
Do you not have a clock? My boss gets to work at 4 am every day, I keep my phone on silent and just use a clock for my alarm to avoid the emails. Also I’m that person who has to have their alarm across the room or I turn it off in my sleep.