The Born Loser by Art and Chip Sansom for December 18, 2022

Poor Uncle Ted—hardly fair!

Early to bed, early to rise, makes Uncle Ted have to get up and take a squirt more often.

I also go to bed at 9:00 and 10:45 and 1 am and 2:30 and 4;30 and get up at 6:00. I also get all my walking in between naps that way.

My SIL had to wake up at 5:30 for school and then work. He now works from home and automatically get up at 5:30 drives my daughter nuts.

Not me! I may have had to get up early all my life, but now I’m retired and I can stay up as late as I d*mn well please!

Yup. I go to bed at roughly the same time and get up at roughly the same time.

I was always a 6am wake up with no alarm, now I’m a 10am with an alarm

I find myself staying awake for 24 or more hours but when I do sleep it’s for 12 or more hours

Decent people sleep until noon and see sunrise from the night before.

Bona fide question here, do kids still have a school day tomorrow when Christmas like this year falls on the Sunday? As you can tell I don’t have any kids or grand kids, and it is actually a half century since I went to elementary school. If I remember we got out of school for the holidays on the Wednesday, and even for these next 3 days the teacher didn’t feel like teaching anything. She actually pulled up the piano into the room and we just sang carols all school day long or when she got tired singing she ordered some Christmas movies on film (we didn’t have video tape back then.) such as Rudolf the Red Nosed Reindeer, or Mary and Joseph films about being in a horse’s stable and 3 Wise Men riding camels coming by to visit.

I worked radio, so my shift could start or end anytime in 24 hours.

I have friends that go to bed around 8 PM, just after two episodes of MASH. But, by then I’m just starting my music practicing, or on Friday, my second hour of news programming. And I practically never get to bed before midnight. When working I’d start sleeping at 11:45 PM.

It doesn’t matter what time I go to bed my internal body clock wakes me up at 6 am DST every morning and 5 am standard time the rest of the year.

Amen, retired for 11+ years and I still go to bed at 8 and wake up at 4 no matter what – UG!

I’m usually in bed by about 9:00-9:15 and read until my meds kick in and I drift off, usually that happens in 15-20 minutes.

Sadly true. I have been retired since 1998. My working years were spent on Midnight shift, 11pm to 7:30am. I loved working that shift because unlike day shift workers I was able to actually do things during the day without having to take time off from work. Switching from being awake all night and going to bed at about 3pm to going to bed at about midnight and waking up at about 8am, took years. Now I am asleep by 10pm most nights and wide awake by 4 or 5am. Even when I stay up until midnight or later, I am still wide awake no later than 5am.

I remember getting ready for bed around eleven and got up for school at five… never understood why since the bus didn’t came till about six thirty or something like that. I may not have a job, but I am still expected to get out of bed to help around the house, sigh.

I’ve been getting up at 3 AM for decades. I don’t think retirement will be kind to me.

Yup, word that

Born, raised on farm and retired military. Never used a clock. Never late. 76 now and still up at 5 in morning after 5 hours sleep. Still rolling. Just a lot slower. A lot slower.

Sleep habits are hard to break…..ZZZZZZZZZZZZ!

This is so funny, I go to bed at nine every night as well.

I recall as a youth being disappointed that when I turned 8 bedtime did not go from 7 to 8. Mind at the time we had no electricity and there was not much to do anyway.

I am a night owl and go to bed late (or early if you want to be technical). I used to hate waking up at 6-7:00 AM and welcomed the weekends gladly. I kept saying when I retired I would be able to sleep in but I have the same problem as uncle Ted. Old habits die hard.

Me too! Sigh.

Uncle Ted is letting his nephew know it’s OK to go to bed early, for both a child and a grown adult. I also remember feeling like a “child” when being forced to go to bed before I was even a little tired or sleepy, and when I finally said no more of that, I stayed up most nights until 2a or later. I just never got sleepy. With a lot of work, I have learned to sleep at night. My child and I used to read in the evenings, separate books, and she would fall asleep. I would wake her up sometimes and ask her how she did that. She has always been a great sleeper, but still doesn’t forgive me for making her come home by midnight on weekends. She didn’t tell me where she was going or really who she was with, so I put an early time on her. She was a good kid, which is why I allowed it, but just made her come home at a reasonable time. I can’t wait to see how lax she is with her own children on curfews. I really, really can’t wait.

In retirement I’ve heard that restfulness will sneak up on you at odd hours, day or night.

Yes, circadian rhythms! I have nothing to add to the discussion. It’s not every day one can toss that term into conversation, so I took advantage of it.

yep

yep

He’s got it right again. I can go to bed anytime I want and I now choose 9:00 except on those days when I get up at 4:00 am to go teach, then I choose 8:00-8:30….

I was able to adapt when I retired, now instead of going to be bed at 9 I go to bed at 8:30, but I don’t get up until 7:30 in the morning. Not counting the times I get up every 2 hours or so during the night.

Well Uncle Ted, you just took care of one of Wilberforce’s childhood delusions.

Back in the late 80’s I worked third shift in a 24 hour department store (11pm to 7:30am) for about 5 years. I got so use to the hours that even now I can stay up all night if I don’t keep a close eye on the time.

Isn’t freedom wonderful?

when i was a company drone i’d regularly get to bed by at least 2 or 3 (a.m.) and catch up on sleep during meetings. moving to the countryside, where folks regularly come calling at 6 a.m., or earlier, and are surprised if you’re still in bed, was a big disruptor. once i started getting up early in self-defense i could never go back to my night owl ways again…

My body was conditioned to wake up at 4am and haven’t been able to break it going on 13 years now

I try to squeeze in a few hours sleep between naps

after a six pack in the evening it’s up at 2,3,4,5 for a wiz

Golden Oldie:

Kid 1: My parents don’t know anything about raising children.

Kid 2: Why do you say that?

Kid 1: Well, they make me go to sleep when I’m wide awake, and they make me get up when I’m awfully sleepy.