Time is of the essence

From time to time I feel distinctly schizophrenic. This occurs especially in the evening hours, when I start debating with myself on whether I should go to sleep or not. Even if the day has been long and tiring, you can feel quite chipper at some point during the evening, and that is definitely quality time. This is where the Arend of the night gets in conflict with the Arend of the morning - the next morning, that is. Which one of them has the right to this one body? It is mutually exclusive: whenever the late Arend wins out, the early Arend will suffer; but if the early Arend is to have his way, the late Arend has to stop in the middle of a movie, game, book, whatever it is that he is enjoying so thoroughly.

I have read more than once that as you get older, you need less and less sleep. That is not my experience at all, at least after the age of 20 or so. I do not function well on substantially less than 7 hours per night. Only last week there was an article in the paper about newly discovered physical evidence that the brain cleans itself of toxics more efficiently asleep than awake, and we all know that that is certainly what it feels like.

It is an uneven battle, this constant conflict, since the late Arend is effectively in control. So it was yesterday also, when he very stupidly decided to finish the John Grisham novel I picked up at the airport on my way here. Doubly stupid because it was ultimately as empty and meaningless as all of Grisham's books except for a few of the first ones - A Time to Kill is maybe his best, or The Firm. No way this justifies staying awake until 2:00.

As a result I felt slow and sluggish today. I had promised to give a presentation in the Enterprise Systems' group seminar this afternoon, and though that went reasonably well, with the necessary preparation and the aftermath (completely drained, as usual) almost the whole day went up in smoke. This time, dear early Arend, you will have your way.