Midnight Oil

Last night I got home after Youth Fellowship and fell to puttering around on my computer. Puttered and puttered, and somehow before I knew it, it was one in the morning. I staggered off to bed. Yes, at one in the morning.

I'm trying to think when the last time was that I stayed up past midnight. Not weeks. More like months.

Contrary to popular rumor (and I don't know quite how this rumor got started, but it has widespread currency) I am not always in bed by nine. Yes, sometimes. Or sometimes by ten or eleven. Or even eleven thirty. However, in these latter days I have very much gotten out of the habit of staying up past midnight. I think such rumors may be helped along by the fact that I am not a fan of bright lights, and if I'm sitting at my computer in the evening, the glow of the screen may well be the only light in the house. Or I may have one table lamp on in the living room— like most of the lights in the house, I've long since equipped that lamp with a couple of 25 watt bulbs— which, given the big front porch in front of the living room, is not very much in evidence as "lights on" to someone driving past down the road.

To bed last night around one. And then, my sleeping habits being what they are, I woke up this morning by not much past five. Which is about as late as I ever sleep no matter when I go to bed. So here I am, expecting to function today on only about four hours of sleep. Oh well. Today's my day off anyhow.

Seems it was so much simpler back in my college years. Then, I often stayed up past midnight. Till two in the morning, or sometimes even later. And it never slowed me down the next day. I guess that works better when you're young than when you're coming up on fifty.