The Switch in My Brain

It is ironic that I am typing this shortly before 9:00 AM.  I am not yet on.  I have a switch in my brain.  It's on an independent timer.  I don't get to set it. It flips some time between 9:45-10:15 AM each day.  I can function before that (and often do since my alarm goes off shortly after 6:30 AM most days), but something isn't fully there.  I've always been this way.  My children find it amusing and annoying, especially when I cannot process what they're saying.  All I hear is noise instead of words.  I need slow enunciation with eye contact to process.

When the switch finally flips there is a mental and physical change that occurs.  I feel more awake. My muscles perk up.  I stand/sit straighter.  The mental change is harder to detect, but I know when it happens.  There are a lot of safety nets.  Spellcheck is a great friend.  Usually I can find my typos just moments after I make them, but I can't not make them.  It's most noticeable when I'm not at work.  Routine helps, as does sunlight in the summer months.  On Tuesdays and Fridays, when I'm still up in the dark, but don't have to work, I tend to do the crossword puzzle (which I just typed as crossward, even though I could tell I was mistyping almost as I did it).  This leads to all sorts of fun.  On Tuesday (which I just typed as Tuesdau), I misspelled at least 5 words in the crossword puzzle.  These were not words I can't spell.  My mind thought one thing, but different letters came out of the pen.  (I just remembered my breakfast [soup from yesterday] is in the microwave, where it's been sitting for the past 45 minutes since I pressed start.)  This morning's crossword had the clue "place where your radius is".  By the way, the answer is not, as my mind first thought, in your circle.  The answer forearm.  At 11:30 AM that never would have occurred to me.

Oddly enough I do the sudoku better.

I'd better get my soup now before another hour passes.

Shabbat shalom.