I’m a morning person. Right now, I’m working my favorite shift, 7 AM-3 PM. However, I got kicked around by what I think was some serious seasonal affective this winter, and it’s only recently that I can easily get up at 6, since the sun is coming up by that time too. I’m finding that I’m way too attuned to light/dark cycles. I am physically incapable of staying up all night. Few people seem to understand this - I am going to be asked to do some night shift work soon, and I really don’t want to because I will probably literally doze off.
Another night owl here! Especially when it comes to cramming for exams - I would rather have stayed up all night to finish studying, rather than trying to go to bed and setting the alarm clock to wake up early the next day. Sadly, I now have a 9-5 job and it’s weird how I am so much more mentally alert at midnight when I go to bed, than 11am in the morning when I am supposed to be squeezing my brains at work 
Just wondering - for those of you who do stay up until 4-5 am … do you still have meals like normal? So it’d be lunch, dinner and supper? Do you eat breakfast stuff for lunch … etc?
On the weeks I’m working, I usually have “breakfast” around 11 am or 12 noon, when I wake up. “Lunch” around 5 or 6, at work, then “dinner” around midnight or so. I have to plan my meals somewhat carefully, because I don’t have a lot of time at work for a meal break.
I find that on my weeks off, my eating schedule is even wackier than my sleep schedule. For some reason, I rarely eat breakfast. I’m very often awake for 4 or 5 hours before I eat anything at all (that puts my first meal around 4 or 5 pm). After that, I just kind of scrounge something up whenever I get peckish. Sometimes I have two meals in a day, sometimes 5 or so. It varies. Sometimes I just live off cookies for a day or two.
I am SO with the OP. And it’s SO nice to know it’s not just me!
Despite a body that wants to go to bed around sometime between 2 am and 6 am, and wants to wake sometime between 10 am and whenever it wants, I have a 9-5 job. My alarm is set for 7:30 … I usually fall out of bed, cursing, at 9, and make it in to work by 10. I then stay till 6 or 7 … so far (9-ish months), my boss doesn’t seem to mind. (Even though one co-worker seems to take to as a personal affront.)
I love the fact that my job is so flexible, but I would so go for a second shift position somewhere else. (But I don’t think that’s likely to happen in this time zone, when the NYSE is open 9:30 to 4:00.)
As for meals, I eat breakfast, lunch, and dinner, in that order, at whatever time I’m hungry for them. When I spend the weekend with my girlfriend (another night owl, thank God!), we’re usually up till four am … and have been known to have breakfast around four pm. it works… shrug
If I have to go out in the real world for school and stuff, I skip breakfast. I eat lunch around 2ish. I eat dinner around 7ish. I get hungry around 1 or 2 am and eat a bowl of cereal before bed.
Just to let you know, even retired people can be nightowls. In fact one of the best things about being retired is the lack of a schedule. If I have to make an appointment it will be in the afternoon, if possible.
A nightowl observation: I know when it is 4 A.M. because that is when the first early bird’s car comes down the road.
I’m a night owl, but I can at least adapt relatively well to a morning schedule if I have to. I can deal with getting up around 8am okay but I don’t like it. If I don’t have to worry about what time I need to get up or anything, my natural cycle seems to be about 3am-10/11am for sleeping. 'Course, that’s when I have a week off. Who knows what would happen if I actually had longer than that to adjust?
All too often, my reminder to go to bed has been the thump of the paper being delivered. Is it really 5 o’ clock already? Or else it’s when the little birdies start their singing…
The funny thing is that I’m not just whining here. I’ve tried to change my ways in the past. I cut out caffeine a long time ago. I’ll vow to go to bed nice and early (when you look at your alarm clock and see the unfamiliar “p.m.” display) for a week. Then I’ll spend an hour or two every night staring at the ceiling. Of course, then Friday night comes and I’m free! No responsiblilities! Oops, it’s 4 a.m. again.
When I’m elected Dictator, no business will transpire before 10 a.m. That’s a good compromise time, right? Not too early, not too late. I think productivity would rise and coffee consumption would drop overall.