Wednesday, February 2, 2011

Mornings, pt 2

My post yesterday about the difficulty of getting up in the morning, naturally combined with the disorganized blur of preparation I experienced, have led me to analyze the overlooked complexities of the morning routine. At least mine.

My ordinary routine goes something like this; I wake up, lay in bed a few minutes, then get out, stretch, and dress for a work out. I exercise, cool down, and shower. Afterward, I apply any sort of necessary bathroom products (e.g. deodorant), and dress myself for the day at hand, carefully selecting which piece of attire would be most appropriate for the circumstances. I pack my lunch from a carefully balanced and portioned meal group, and double check my bag to make sure everything I need is present. I cook a full breakfast, take care of my pet dog, and then brush my teeth and do a final quick inspection in the mirror before heading out the door.

Boring. Yes. But predictable and calcuable. I try to achieve every possible minute of sleep I can, so I allot a specific amount of minutes for each activity and set my alarm accordingly, making sure I leave precisely on time. My “OH SHIT” alarm (mentioned in the previous post) is for cutting my workout and shower in half, and speeding through the rest of my daily activities.

And then there are the days when the “OH SHIT” alarm fails, few and far between, but dangerous and met with a whirlwind of desperation. On those days, my routine goes something like this (though my memory often fails me in such a panicked state): lay peacefully, then suddenly realize what time it is. Yank on whatever clothing is nearest the futon and take the stairs down two at a time. Throw some food in the dog bowl, scoop nearby items that look consumable into a lunchbox, grab something I can eat in the car, then snatch my bag and pray that most of my shit’s in there.

I should work the two meticulously planned and spontaneously flurried routines into one, natural, unrushed, unforced yet smoothly moving mechanism that not only carries every necessary morning function in one efficient package, but also grants me extra time to sleep.

Who am I kidding? Mornings are always going to suck.

10 comments:

  1. haha good post, but tbh most of my morning routines are the 'oh shit' ones where I sleep in. Wish I could get a better routine sorted, would make life easier.

    http://randomthingsmitch.blogspot.com/

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  2. I completely agree, my friend. Mornings always do suck

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  3. i know what you're saying. i had to get up this morning despite classes being canceled to do my lab anyways :(

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  4. It's so hard for me to get up, ugh I hate it!

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  5. my mornings always start with the second scenario but at least i had intentions of the first hopefully that counts for something.

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  6. I always forget my belt, or my keys, or my money. Dude, I always left my home mad.

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  7. Am I a morning person or not? I've never really thought about it.

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  8. I think all morning people are actually lying.
    But in all seriousness, I agree with you, I'm the same. A happy medium is very hard to find.

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  9. Waking up in the morning being so hard is one of the reasons I pursued teaching as a profession. It sounds kind of silly, but I knew having some boring meaningless job wouldn't motivate me enough to get out of bed, and it'd be horrible every day. However, if I knew kids were counting on me, that'd motivate me to get moving!
    That's the theory anyways.

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