Here’s a supposedly interesting thing I’m sure you don’t really want to know: I slept until 1pm today. I’ve been awake for 90 minutes. It’s Monday.
Working in the service industry for so long, I’ve met many young grasshoppers in my time and tried to give them the benefit of my experience. I started out 10 years ago (sigh) and I’ve made pretty much every mistake it’s possible to make while working in bars and restaurants in two different continents. I’m still only 29, but I’m in a position where I’m able to take a 19 year old kid aside and give them an idea of a way to work in ‘the industry’ without losing their minds. The problem is when I break my own rules and start repeating my mistakes.
Rule one of working late nights: DON’T SLEEP PAST MIDDAY. All other rules are irrelevant. If you don’t follow rule 1 you’ll burn out within 6 months. You just can’t do it. I’ve tried every kind of sleep schedule, and talked to hundreds of people that work late nights, and I gotta tell you - you can’t sleep until the afternoon, no matter what time you got home last night. There have been nights where I’ve finished at 6am and I’ve dragged my ass out of bed at 11.30am, because once you go past that midday mark it sparks a chain reaction that screws you up for DAYS. Seriously.
I’m working again today at 4pm. That means I’ve had three hours of conciousness before I go back to work. That sucks because you can’t really get in a non-work headspace. One thing that keeps you sane while working in a restaurant: feeling like you have a life outside of the building. Even if it’s just for a few hours every day. I’ve seen a lack of outside time destroy servers and chefs, managers and bussers. We all need to feel like we got something else going on. No matter how much you love being at work. The most unhappy I’ve ever been at work is when I went days where I’d work late, sleep later and then come straight back into work. We all need some time out. That means getting up earlier. If I’d been following my own rules I’d have gotten up by 10.30am.
Today I had breakfast at 1.30pm and I won’t have anything more to eat before I start my shift. At 5pm I’ll be STARVING. I’ll eat dinner around 9pm. I’ll finish work at 1am, and I won’t be tired, but I’ll be hungry. I won’t eat anything to try and get to sleep. The human body generally gets sleepy again 14 hours after it wakes up. By that reckoning, I’ll get tired around 5am. Then I’ll be tempted to sleep late, and the cycle will repeat itself again.
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