Graveyard

The shift, not the place. It’s a weird thing setting the alarm for 11:30 p.m. to be at work just after midnight! It takes some getting used to. Thankfully, it’s a short term, and occasional, “problem” currently.

For the past 7 work days, I’ve been filling in for Robert, who anchors our newscasts for Jackson, Michigan, Macon, Georgia, and Topeka, Kansas. Since I live in the Mountain time zone, and two of those stations are in the Eastern time zone, I have to get in extra early to meet my deadlines for the 6am news. So, the alarm is set for 11:30 p.m. so I can get to work by 12:30 a.m. The first thing that happens when I get up is start the coffee and then take a shower. I’ll have a cup of coffee here and then bring another cup to work. Then the work starts! The best thing is the early AM shift is VERY busy. It is literally reading and writing and writing and reading news stories for about 4 hours straight. The constant deadlines for 3 stations keeps the adrenaline flowing which keeps you awake. Once I get through the bulk of the work, I usually get sleepy. Problem being I normally have some weather forecasts yet to cut for those three stations, plus a few others. What I’ll usually do (like I did this morning) is recline in my chair and take a nap in the newsroom! Usually it’s about 10 minutes. One morning I was tired enough to sleep 20 :-) After my nap, I feel refreshed and I’ll knock out the rest of my work and go home.

By now it’s around 7:30ish. I’m driving opposite of rush hour traffic and when I get to the apartment sometimes I’ll run into people leaving for work as I’m arriving from. It usually takes me about an hour to wind down and get to bed and I’ll sleep anywhere fro 2 – 4 hours. Obviously, the longer the better! By now it’s late morning, or maybe Noon. I’ll get up and have lunch. Sometimes I feel fairly run down the rest of the day and I’ll mostly watch TV or laze around the apartment. Sometimes, I’ll feel more alive and do something! Matine at the movies when it’s cheaper (that is less the case these days), or maybe a nice hike with the trail all to myself! Then sometimes I’ll take a short afternoon nap (in my case, how else!). Depending on the evening, I may go to Wednesday night service, or Tuesday night Bible study, or watch some TV. Once the Sun goes down, I usually start feeling tired. I try to get to bed early enough to get 3-4 hours of sleep before work. Sometimes it’s only 2. That means to bed anywhere from 7:00 to 9:00 p.m.  Then the alarm goes off at 11:30 and do it all over again. It’s funny going to work at Midnight:30. A lot of times I will hear people’s TV’s or see ‘em in the parking lot, still up from the day before!

So, the graveyard shift isn’t all that bad once you get in a rhythm. I do tend to feel more tired more often on that shift, but having afternoon’s off is pretty cool! Still, I’m glad I’m back to “normal” on Monday. Maybe I’ll see a movie this afternoon. Fred Clause or Michael Clayton? We’ll see.