Friday, April 9, 2010

No Worms For Me, Thanks.

Thing 1 had a bus trip to Toronto for her art class today, and that meant a 6:45 a.m. drop off at school by her mother. (They went to see the King Tut exhibit....I'm not quite sure what that had to do with her art class, especially as she had art last semester, but who am I kidding, I'd jump at the chance to skip school and go to Toronto on the flimsiest of excuses too.)

I love going to Toronto; it's about 2 hours away from here. Close enough to make it easy to get to, and far enough that it's a big treat to go. There is always loads of things to see and do, including the art gallery and Royal Ontario Museum and the Bata Shoe Museum, which is way, WAY more interesting than you are probably thinking right now. (When I asked if Thing 1 went there, Thing 2 thought it was called the "Bad-Ass Shoe Museum", which I think it should be called from now on.)

Thing 1 said that the teacher introduced the bus driver to them all by saying "this is our driver, and he is sterile", or at least that's what Thing 1 thought she heard. Turns out his name was "Darryl". The teacher was not making any statements whatsoever as to his fertility.

Bringing Thing 1 to the school so early meant that I was up and starting on my day about an hour earlier than usual. I LOVE getting up early, especially on a day off work. I wonder why I hardly ever do it. (I guess I like sleeping in more.) Seriously, I felt like Wonder Woman when I had dropped off Thing 1, gone for a run, had a shower, woken up Thing 2 AND had a cup of coffee, all by the time I normally would get up. It felt like I had accomplished all kinds of things and I still had a whole day ahead of me. It helped mightily that I don't work on Fridays, and had nothing pressing to do, and knew that a nap was in the plan for the day. I think getting up early and then having a nap later in the day may very well be the secret plan to a full and happy life. It is certainly seems to work for Toby.

When my dad was working on his PhD, he regularly got up at 5 a.m. and went down to his study to write. He said he could get more done between 5 and 7 than almost the whole rest of the day. I'd love to do that, except it meant that he went to bed at 8:30 some nights, often before sundown. That part I'm not so sure I'd like.

Big Liver Girl gets up and runs at 5:30 every morning, which I admire and completely reject as sane in equal parts. Her running partner, Erin, has fourteen children, all under the age of 7, which she home-schools, so I get that if that woman wants to have any time to herself whatsoever, her only hope is to get up before anyone else and hope they never catch on.

I might try making a point of getting up earlier than usual on my days off, just to feel like a superhero once a week. I know Toby will approve of the nap thing.

3 comments:

Erin said...

The days I get up nice and early are waaaay better days than the ones that I sleep in a bit. But I just don't seem to be able to gather enough self discipline to do it every day.
I so agree that it feels awesome when I've got the laundry in, supper all figured out, the house tidy and muffins in the oven all before 9 am. Wicked -- now if only I could do it more.
PS - Love the honourable mention.

Wendy said...

As I increasingly find the stress level ramping up in my house with teenagers coming and going at all hours in the night, I am thinking of abandoning nightime altogether in order to fully treasure my mornings.

I think its why baking was invented.

Suzanne from the Salon said...

Found your blog - and I love it!. .mmmm, I'm thinking about how to turn this into a book now. .