Early to rise.

Monday night, I was sorting the set of writing assignments from my grammar/style class (Editing Assignment #2). The sorting meant putting the papers for Tuesday's student conferences into one pile, those for Wednesday in another, those for Thursday and those for Friday into two more piles. Then I carefully lay the piles atop one another crosswise.

This process is what I call "grading." Or more precisely, "pre-grading." It was too exhausting to actually "grade." So I said to the historian (say it with me now): "I'm going to get up early tomorrow morning to grade."

And then I said (wait for it:): "So I'm going to go to bed early."

Cue me at midnight, having been in bed for nearly an hour. Am I asleep? No.

Note to self: "go to bed early" is a meaningless phrase (clause? you tell me, Grammar Police, similar to the Karma Police, but with a less beautiful melody to their theme song). Any "go to bed" before midnight is pointless.

Anyhow. Cut now to 5:45 a.m. I am dreaming some beautiful/lousy dream (which? you tell me, Dream Police, I can't remember). I hit the snooze button on my cell phone. Five minutes later, I hit it again, then say these immortal words: "Oh right. I want to get up."

At 7 a.m. I am at work. I am sitting in the student center with my stack of nine papers (that's today's crop). I am listening to Rostropovich playing the Bach Cello Suites and I am reading papers and I am--get this--enjoying myself. Quite a bit. At 7 a.m. Grading.

As of this moment, which is 11:24--that means it's 36 minutes to "go to bed"--I am feeling it, this long day preceded by not enough sleep. But it was a pretty good day. Okay, a full-on good day.

New regimen.

Raise your hand if you think it's unreasonable--improbable--to go to bed at 1 a.m., with a little ancillary chatter before actually falling asleep, and then get up at 7 a.m. to take the dog for a walk and get ready for, y'know, work.

Since school started, it's officially summer's over time, even if the equinox isn't for a few more days, but we have nonetheless been keeping summer hours around here. Why? you may ask. Well, we ask ourselves this same question. Is it because it's still a little hot? because there are 21 year olds playing Beatles Rock Band in the basement? Is it because we're rebelling against our own selves and our better judgement?

(It should be noted for the record, although you probably already guessed it, that that last "rebelling against our own selves" item is only about me and not the historian. Obviously.)

Anyway, on our way into work this morning, we had the following conversation:

Me: We should take Bruiser for his walk at 10 o'clock, not 11 or 11:30. That would probably help us get to bed by midnight instead of 1.

The historian: Right. I should probably just mention it at 10, instead of waiting for you to mention it.

Me: (to myself: Is he implying that I'm the foot-dragger in this situation? IS HE? Because he's probably right. But still!) [pause.] Yeah, probably.

Later today, while we were riding our bikes in the dusk:

Me: 10 o'clock! And none of your foot-dragging.

The historian: I beg your pardon! [not his real words.]

Me: Just kidding. I know I'm the reluctant foot-dragging one.

All foot-dragging aside, we did take Bruiser for his walk at 10 p.m. And we're on track for an early bedtime. Early for us, anyway.

L.A. Report.

This chapter of the Los Angeles Project started in the Moronga Valley, which is west of the San Bernardino Mountains. The reason for this fact is a slightly not well written book that I read in my book group, which was all about the marriage of Raymond Chandler to an older woman, and their peripatetic house-moving, through parts of Los Angeles, Pasadena, La Jolla, and--here's the relevant part--Cathedral City, which is just next door to Palm Springs, which is not too far from the Twenty-Nine Palms Highway, which is where Joshua Tree (the town) and Joshua Tree (the National Park) is, which are all in the Moronga Valley. (Which, also a few years ago, I read a true crime book about a murder that occurred in Twenty-Nine Palms.) All of which led me to figure out if there was a place to stay in Cathedral City or Palm Springs or . . . what's this? a little house right next to Joshua Tree National Park? A little house called Quail Mountain House?



And, the people, this beautiful little place had no television, no internet, no phone. Let me reiterate, and this time with bullet points:

• no television
• no internet
• no phone.

Which, honestly, usually would not be recommending points. But here's a novel fact: both nights we stayed there, I fell asleep at 9:30 p.m.

NINE THIRTY in the evening.

Which I frankly did not think was possible. Literally, as in, I could not go to bed that early unless I was at death's door, and also if I took a Nyquil. At death's door. Woozy and on the verge of death: that was the only way I believed I could fall asleep at nine thirty. I don't think I've fallen asleep like that, at nine thirty, since I was like five years old.

Sorry, it still stuns me.

The better thing was that I woke up with the sun--the desert sun, which is somehow sunnier than all other sun. At six in the morning. And it was glorious.

Here's what four hours of sleep'll get ya.

• can't follow a logical train of thought for more than two, or possibly two-and-a-half, steps.
• shoulder hurts.
• the sun is extra dazzling, possibly blinding.
  
• too tired to go to a movie with college daughter, even though she's leaving.
  
• can do the New York Times crossword puzzle (to be fair, it's the Monday one).
• can't cook.
• the Jazz won (I'm pretty sure that the lack of sleep and the win are connected).
• the way the teams in the Western Conference are packed in like clowns in a clown car seems like a terrible, terrible injustice.
  
• there are things I know I have to do for tomorrow, but I can't figure out what they are.
• slightly irritable.
  
• will totally be in bed by eleven, asleep by eleven fifteen.