10:37 pm

“zzzzzzzz….”

I’m trying to go to bed right now, but some guy is doing construction on our street using a circular saw and a hammer. Why did he wait until 10:30 pm to begin construction work? Did this guy seriously say to himself, “I really need to build this chicken coop, but I think I’ll wait until the sun goes down to start”? Maybe it’s a surprise for his wife, who is asleep and also deaf? Or maybe he took Ambien and is actually sleep-constructing a chicken coop?   These days, I try to give people who do something obnoxious the benefit of the doubt by assuming it’s the result of a rare, bizarre side-effect of America’s most popular sleep medicine. He’ll wake up tomorrow sprawled amidst a pile of lumber and bent nails, the circular saw still buzzing in his hand and think to himself: “Well thank God I didn’t sleep-drive. Shit is so dangerous.” Plus he’ll have a beautiful chicken coop, which will be a nice surprise because when do you ever get a prize for waking up other than another shit day? Then all he’ll need to do is wait for tomorrow night when he can sleep-buy some chickens and sleep-make a delicious omelet with their eggs (which they laid, believe it or not, while sleeping). These things have occurred separately before, but it’s the combination of all three together that will make it really special for him once he finally wakes up in a few weeks.