Living the dream — at 2:31 a.m.

Why am I typing this sentence at 2:31 a.m. local time?


I think the impetus is a combination of nostalgia and pride. I'm 27 years old and married, with an early-rising Crazy Toddler (CT), and the last thing I want to do is admit that staying up all night while watching reruns of "SportsCenter" and making fun of local newscasts is getting more and more difficult.


Part of me desperately clings to the Dr. Pepper-aided all-nighters of yesteryear. The other part of me yearns for early-bird dinners and a 9 p.m. bedtime. Maybe even a baked apple for dessert, washed down with a can on Ensure.


Is it inappropriate to blame CT for the rapid decline of my inner night owl? Regardless of whether I fall asleep watching a "Murder She Wrote" rerun at 7:30 p.m. or listening to podcasts at 3 a.m., wake-up time doesn't change. CT gets me up around 6:30 a.m. every day — a schedule that fails to account for my sleepiness.


That said, it's 2:53 a.m. and I'm still typing away. The countdown continues. 3 hours and 37 minutes until I have to get up again. For those of you scoring at home, that's roughly one Yankees-Red Sox game, one half of a Keith Olbermann diatribe and a little more than one viewing of "Titanic." 


Yet I continue to tap, tap, tap. I'm living the dream — if the dream can be defined as drinking five full glasses of Dr. Pepper at a big family function, then returning home to a fresh and empty blog page and the second half of "Father of the Bride II" on TBS. (It's not a good movie, which makes it a great source of 3:04 a.m. background noise/light.)


In a few hours I'll once again be fetching CT's breakfast and addressing the poop issue, but for now, just allow me this one slice of my collegiate glory — Dr. Pepper stupor and all.