Jason and the Snooze Button

What time do you wake up in the morning? From what I understand, most people struggle out from under the blanket between 5 and 7 a.m. This of course depends on a person's job and family life - i.e. an extended commute, getting the husband or wife up for work, preparing breakfast and getting the kids to school - either at the bus stop or dropping them off, or those who work the graveyard shift. My wake up time is probably a rare one. 3:00 a.m.

Although I've been with the company close to six years, this January will mark three that I've been in my current morning drive news anchor position. Before being promoted from field reporter and weekend anchor, I was NEVER a morning person. In fact, I wouldn't officially wake up till the evening in those ol' days. Joking of course. Ya know what I mean. Vampire Jason they called me. College life kept me awake at crazy hours. Covering council meetings and local night events for our radio station news network would also put me to bed around the time that I wake up now. My how things have changed.

The shift starts officially at 4 a.m. with my first newscast at 5, and thankfully I live close to the station. Before turning in for the night, I go through the process of setting four separate alarms on my iPhone. You can see the screen cap of my actual alarm roster on this page. I work in the type of career that you can't be late for - timing is everything - oversleeping can't happen. My head usually hits the pillow anywhere between 7:30 and 8 p.m. nightly, sometime with exceptions.

To an outsider, my wake up would probably be comical. The first alarm goes off. I wake up. I turn it off and go back to bed for five more minutes. At 3:05 a.m., the second clock goes off. I repeat the same process. It's usually the third or fourth alarm at 3:10 or 3:15 that does the trick. At this point, my wife is telling me to get up. Some days are easier than others. I find Monday morning's are the hardest. Wednesday and Thursday are easier. Friday is the easiest. And then on Saturday and Sunday, I can't sleep past 6:00 a.m. When people say "ah, you're up so early weekends." I explain how great it is to "sleep in."

I bring this up because this morning it was cold. Bitterly cold. In my hometown, the temperature hit 19 degrees. The inside temp was around 68. When those clocks rang as usual, way before the rooster even gets up, I kept resetting the phone and crawling back under the comfy covers. Why is it always so difficult to wake up on colder mornings? With the Christmas tree up in the living room it's even harder to leave the warm confines of the house. Thank goodness the heat works at the station.

Maybe one of these days I will share my work nightmares, most of which involve me oversleeping and missing work altogether.

Rise and shine!