How do you tell time?

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

Just had an interesting discussion with a co-worker. She gets in to work at 7:30 am; I get in at 9:00 am. She takes her lunch at 11:30 am; I take mine at 1:00 pm. So when she was making her lunch at 11:45 am, I was making my second cup of morning tea, and she remarked about it, and we discussed.

DURING THE WEEK:

When I wake up at 7:30 am, it is morning. When I arrive at work at 9:00 am, I have the appropriate morning meal, breakfast (consisting of a Tastykake KoffeeKake Junior and a cup of tea).

It remains morning until 12:00 pm, at which time it becomes afternoon (taking “after” and “noon” literally). At this point it is appropriate to partake of lunch-type items, including an iced tea instead of hot tea. I take lunch at 1:00 pm, later than my other 9:00-arriving co-workers, because it makes the afternoon go faster for me.

I leave work at 5:00 pm, and when I arrive home it is night (there really isn’t an “evening” in my perceptions, except when I get home and it is still somewhat light outside, giving the illusion of something between afternoon and night). During my night activities, which includes dinner anywhere from 6:00 - 8:00 pm, it is still night, no matter how late it gets; 1:00 am is not “early morning the next day,” it is “night the same day.” It remains night until I go to bed, even if that is at 6:00 am the following morning (by the clock’s reckoning).

ON THE WEEKENDS/DAYS OFF/VACATION:

Given the opportunity, regardless of the time I went to bed the previous night, I enjoy sleeping. A lot. Without waking up I can sleep until 3:00 pm on a Saturday or Sunday.

Given this, when I wake up, regardless of the time on the clock, it is morning. Accompanying morning is my breakfast meal, even as my mother is beginning to prepare dinner.

Afternoon is a little sketchy, since my morning can quickly become night, as defined by “when the sun goes down.” I usually just skip afternoons entirely on weekends, unless I have plans with someone (after breakfast, before nightfall), at which time I’d consider that time interval to be afternoon. If I have no such plans, it would be disingenious of me not to allow morning to last its normal lifespan, so by the time I start to feel morning is over and afternoon should start, the sun has gone down, so night begins and afternoon gets shafted that day.

The only problem this causes is meals, which are much more staggered on the weekends. I eat breakfast, and then make sure I eat some other substantial meal during night (which I call “dinner”). However, I rarely eat past midnight (although I will sometime snack on a milk product, such as chocolate milk [Quik or Ovaltine] and a cake-type product, such as donuts), so even if I stay up until 4:00 am, I could be starving when I go to bed, but it does not seem proper to me to eat a meal so late; therefore, lunch is usually skipped on weekends.

I know I’m weird, you don’t need to tell me that.

Esprix

Ask the Gay Guy! (or, if you prefer the Jesusfied version, Asketh the damn Priest Guy!)

“Never assume a malicious intent when stupidity will explain just as well.”

{This space reserved for a Genuine WallyM7 Sig™}

2

Thats funny, its basically the same with me, only difference being I get to the office at 8am instead of 9am.

Th tea thing is funny too because a lady in my dept. makes Iced tea daily for everyone and I always wait until “afternoon” to switch from coffee to tea…
Guess I’m weird too!

-SS :smiley:

Lazy bastards always make it easier for the lazier bastards to get special treatment for being useless…how else do you explain American law?

3

Put me in the 7:30 club.

Monday-Friday: I usually don’t have breakfast, except for coffee- in which I put the same amount of sugar & cream as you might find in half a dozen eclairs.

For me, lunch defines the changeover from morning to afternoon. I usually eat it later than most (around 12:30-1:00) because that helps the remaining 2½ hours of my work day fly by. So if I wake up at 5am, and my lunch hour ends at 2pm, my morning is effectively nine hours & four cups of coffee long.

Evening officially begins when I arrive home, around 4:45pm. It’s no where near dark yet, and I can’t call it afternoon because afternoon hours are spent at work (“Good afternoon, may I place you on hold?”, etc.).

Night begins as soon as I realize that bedtime is imminent- somewhere around 9:30, and it remains night time until it’s morning (q.v.) again.

Weekends & holidays: I probably will have breakfast, which serves as a proxy for lunch. Afternoon therefore begins as soon as breakfast is over & the dishes are washed (once, the dishwasher was broken & morning persisted for about seventeen days).

Then it’s afternoon all during the course of my chores or activities. It becomes evening as soon as I run out of steam and have to go inside, put my feet up & make dinner. I am careful not to shower at this point unless I am really offensive, because that might throw me into faux-morning mode.

For evening & night, see Monday-Friday above.

4

I used to be like you until I had kids. Somewhere around 3:00 or 4:00 am when you’ve been up all night with a fussy, sick baby you realize that your night is completely shot and if you are going to get any sleep it will have to be naps during the morning and afternoon. You then decide you better eat breakfast now so that your stomach doesn’t wake you up while the baby is sleeping, if the baby ever sleeps again. If this goes on for more than a day then, who gives a shit if it’s day, night, morning, evening, afternoon. Just knock me out and wake me when the baby’s well.

Then there are the other things about parenting that force me to use society’s definitions. The pediatricians office always wants to know, “Morning? Or afternoon?” for appointments. They want to know when symptoms started too and how long they lasted. Soccer practice and brownie meetings are evening. School lets out in the afternoon. They have lunch in the morning (usually about the same time we’re finishing breakfast here at home).

I use the definition of midnight to sunrise as early (or wee hours of the) morning, sunrise to noon as morning, noon to dinner time as afternoon, dinner time to kids’ bedtime as evening (this will vary from household to household), and kids’ bedtime to midnight as night. It saves me from having to look at the clock so much.

5

Thanks! Nice to know I’m not the only one.

Of course, I also wear a pocket watch that hangs off my belt instead of a wristwatch… :smiley:

Esprix

Ask the Gay Guy! (or, if you prefer the Jesusfied version, Asketh the damn Priest Guy!)

“Never assume a malicious intent when stupidity will explain just as well.”

{This space reserved for a Genuine WallyM7 Sig™}

6

I work really early through the week, so my mornings are usually really long as in I get up at 5 a.m and morning lasts ubtil 12:00 noon.
Afternoon lasts until suppertime which on a weekday is 5 or 6, the same time periods are used on the weekend but supper may not be until 8 or 9.
After supper is evening. Evening lasts until it is almost time for bed for my daughter which is around 9 p.m., then it becomes night.
Night seems to be the hours that if I was going to a bar, I would be at the bar, which is 10p.m. until I get home around 3 a.m. After that it becomes early morning.

Thanks for the smile this morning.
How do you feel about doing someone you don’t know?

Please, please, please (on my knees) please, please ~~ originally posted by GolfWidow

7

My schedule is odd, so my categories are equally odd.

Right now, and for most of the last two years, I have classes starting at 8:00 in the morning. When that block of classes is over, I consider it “afternoon”, whether it’s 10:00 or 12:00. I generally have the afternoons free to study.

Some days we don’t have class, or, more frequently, I just stay home and study instead. (This is pretty common this year.) On those days, I get up around 9:00 or 9:30, and usually just start working without getting cleaned up. I think of it as “morning” until I take a shower, which might be at 11:00 or 3:00.

In either case, “evening” is pretty clearly demarcated by the episode of “The Simpsons” that comes on at 5:00. I felt the same way when it used to be on at 6:00 and 6:30. For a few months, it was on at 11:00 PM instead; I was totally thrown out of whack.

“Night” is when it gets dark, period. I am a night person–I can always get more studying and other work done at night than at any other time. (Looking back, this sounds like all I do is study. Damn straight.) As such, I am the one person on the planet who hates daylight savings time. I can’t get anything done in the “evening”–that’s for “The Simpsons”, cooking dinner, relaxing, etc. I don’t want to get going again until it gets dark, and by the end of the year, that isn’t until 9:30!

Of course, next year I begin rotations, which means full days and a lot of full nights. I don’t mind–as set into my time structure as I am, I can get out of it fairly easily.

By the way, I have NO PATIENCE for people who like to point out after midnight that it’s a different day. I talk about something I did earlier that day; “You mean yesterday,” the anal prick says. No, I mean today, ya jerk. It isn’t a new day until I’ve slept. (When I lived in the dorm, we actually had this established as a dorm rule, since we had a slew of such smart-asses.)

Dr. J

“Seriously, baby, I can prescribe anything I want!” -Dr. Nick Riviera

8

My clock is in the form of a very cuddly and cute two-year-old named Bowen. Instead of saying “cuckoo” or “bbbbbrrrrringggg” to wake me up or tell me what meal to make, Bowen alerts me with a very indignant “MOMMY!” or equivalent noise. My day is measured not in hours, but in what I have to do next.

I know that it is about three or four a.m. when this sleepy thing climbs out of his bed and into mine, softly calling for Mommy.

I know that it is about seven or eight a.m. when this very well-rested thing tugs and my arm and employs his own built-in snooze button. It is different from regular alarm clocks, in that his snooze intervals are only about nine seconds, rather than nine minutes. He starts softly and progressively gets louder. “Mommy…Mommmmyyy…MOMMY! C’mon bekfist!”

I finally start becoming aware of what time it is without his reminders after I’ve had about five cigarettes and a can of Coke. Generally, it’s only been a half hour since I woke up.

I know that it is between 12 p.m. and 1 p.m. when he starts climbing the kitchen cupboards or trying to open the refrigerator. The noontime sound is not “Mommy”. It becomes, “Wan’ cooookieee.” At this point, I make him lunch, which, more often than not, does not contain cookies.

Time drags on from that point till dinnertime. During that period, I try to get him to take a nap. I know it has become futile when I notice that the west side of the house has brightened up, and the rest of the house is completely dark. Then, it’s time for dinner, or “suppy” as it’s known in our house. Suppy doesn’t contain cookies, either, but sssssnack! does.

Bathtime happens immediately after Suppy and Sssssnack! because he’s generally covered in whatever it was that used to be on his plate.

Then it’s bedtime. Bedtime generally takes between 90 and 120 minutes, depending on whether or not he actually took a nap. The less nap, the more time it takes for him to actually go to sleep. (Yes, you read that right.)

My bedtime happens around 2 or 3 a.m., when I’ve gotten too tired to keep my eyes open much longer.

I need structure.

My Excruciatingly Commonplace Homepage: FireMoon

9

Yeesh, after these posts, I am sooooooo looking forward to having kids… :rolleyes: :smiley:

And it’s nice to know I’m not the only one that believes the day is not over until you go to bed, regardless if it’s well into the early hours of the next morning.

Esprix

Ask the Gay Guy! (or, if you prefer the Jesusfied version, Asketh the damn Priest Guy!)

“Never assume a malicious intent when stupidity will explain just as well.”

{This space reserved for a Genuine WallyM7 Sig™}