Caffeine

I was so tired when I got home the night before last that I made a promise to myself that I would go to bed early. At ten o’clock I realized early wasn’t going to happen with everything I still had left to do, so I said, “I can still get to bed on time.”

At eleven o’clock I was still sitting on the couch watching shows I’ve seen a thousand times with a pile of dirty dishes in the sink. Thirty minutes later I turned the TV off and dragged myself into the kitchen. I stared at the dishes for a good ten minutes before I decided I was too tired to mess with it. So, before going to bed I got a pot of coffee set to brew at 6:30.

When I got to my bedroom I couldn’t help but notice that my wife had cleaned the entertainment center and that my Super Nintendo was all shiny and new looking. “I’ll just play for fifteen minutes,” I told myself.

At two thirty I turned Legend of Zelda off and crawled into bed. Half a second later the alarm went off. I crawled out of bed and slunk down the stairs to the coffee pot. I poured a nice tall cup of coffee into my travel mug. Then I tossed a Coke into the freezer to chill for the trip to work.

After feeding the kids I spent five minutes trying to decide if I should shave. Then I stood in the closet for another five minutes wondering if my eyes were ever going to focus. Then I realized I was ten minutes late.

I flew downstairs, grabbed my travel mug and my bag and hit the door.

It never fails that when you are running late traffic goes to crap. Today was no different. A three car crash on a two lane road meant that I was barely going to make the bus. I pulled into the bus stop at 7:59. The last bus leaves promptly at 8.

I grabbed my coffee and my brief case and ran for the bus. Out of the corner of my eye I could see my coffee splashing a bit, but I didn’t have time to think about it. As I got to the side of the bus it started to pull away. Luckily for me someone on board must have seen me and told the driver to stop.

I stepped on the bus at 8:01. I fished in my pocket for my ticket. I couldn’t find it. I checked all of my pockets. It wasn’t there and I was fairly certain I didn’t have any cash. I opened my wallet and found a $5.00 bill. Bus fare is $4.00, but they won’t give you change. Still, I put the $5 in and as soon as the machine started to take it I saw my ticket crammed down in the folds of my wallet. “Oh yeah,” I thought, “I put it there so I wouldn’t forget where it was.”

I was a little mad at myself for using my $5.00. That was the money I had planned to use at work for an emergency cola, if my coffee and Coke failed to wake me up. But I had my coffee in my lap and my Coke in my bag.

Wait a minute! I rummaged through my bag, well knowing what the results would be. I had left the house in such a rush I left the Coke in the freezer. Frustrated, I went to take a calming sip of coffee, but when the cup hit my lips nothing came out. I tipped the bottom all the way up, but no hot, yummy coffee. I opened the lid and it was empty. I guess while I ran to catch the bus the entire contents had splashed out. I looked down and saw that my khaki pants were now spotted with brown from the knees down.

As you can imagine, a day with four hours of sleep and no caffeine passes by like a year. Meetings compound this sensation. The only positive thing I could think of for my predicament is that I was not struck by the mad desire to pee in the middle of the meeting. After an hour I realized that this was probably a bad thing after all, so I pretended I needed to pee and got up to use the bathroom.

The day never ended and part of my soul remains trapped there. Somehow the rest of me managed to escape.

When I got home last night the kids were hounding me to make pancakes for dinner, which was fine with me because pancakes are easy and I was sleep walking. I opened the freezer to get the pancake mix (I keep it there so the bugs won’t get in it), and I discovered my Coke that I had forgotten. My freezer looked like liquid fireworks had frozen mid explosion. The Coke can was shredded and most of what had exploded out had found some way to jump into the pancake mix.

My wife led me crying to the car where she took us all out for fast food. I had a large coffee. By the time I got home I had so much energy that I figured I could play some more Super Nintendo then do the dishes then clean the freezer. But the Nintendo should come first, of course.

This morning I woke up in front of the Nintendo blinking that my game was over. And someone had peed right in my lap.