I have started to fall into a routine. I'm not that kind of person. At all. I feel like a retiree. In a way I guess I am, temporarily. I hope.
If all goes well and I sleep through the night I should wake up somewhere between 6 and 6:45 am. I sleep in the spare bedroom now, on a mattress laying directly on the floor. A former roommate left this, a couple shelves and a 45" flat screen TV that in two years I've never even bothered to turn on to see if it works. I never even tried this bed until a couple weeks ago. I prefer my own bed, firm with a boxspring and frame. The one in the spare room is the type you sink into. With sleeping through the night becoming quite difficult since the lockdown, quarantine, or whatever you call it, I need something that is difficult to toss and turn around on.
Today I woke up at the usual time, no alarm, got dressed and went to the front door to get my morning paper. I get the New York Times delivered daily now, starting last Sunday. I go back and forth between this and online news. I use a stove-top percolator to brew a pot of coffee. For breakfast, it's usually eggs, toast and a vegetable.
Around 10 am I start reading books. If it's nice enough I read on my porch. I just finished Mutiny on the Bounty. Yesterday I started reading the Illuminatus! Trilogy by Robert Anton Wilson and Robert Shea for the third time. I don't normally read books twice, let alone a third time, but it's been about 20 years. I still have a beat-up paperback version I bought in the 90s that I read the first two times, plus a later hardcover version that I'm reading right now. I also have the original 70s paperbacks when the three novels were published separately. Weirdly, Part One is the first pressing, Part Two is the second pressing, and part Three is the third pressing.
Around noon, I usually make a sandwich for lunch.
I've been trying to fit in a bike ride in the afternoon, depending on the weather. I try to do 33 km (20 miles) a day. This can easily use up 2 hours of the day. When I get home, I make a salad then read some more.
I've been restricting alcohol to one bottle of wine a day, waiting until dinner, which I eat sometime between 7 and 8. This usually is a few vegetables fried up and added to pasta or rice and beans. I pick out a movie to watch with dinner. It has to be a new movie each night. I don't want to fall into a rut of embracing the familiar movies I've seen a million times. Last night I watched The Girl with All the Gifts. Yes, I've been on a post-apocalyptic zombie plague movie kick lately. It's the only thing that seems to keep my attention.
After the movie, I want to get to sleep in about an hour or so. I take 5mg melatonin and 1000 mg of valerian root. I have a buzz on by this point and put on something familiar, usually an old comedy or a TV show I've already seen. Yesterday it was episode 5 from the first season of Mad Men. I like to distract myself at this point by playing Civilization on my computer. I conquer the world with a different leader each night.
I'm in bed sometime between 11 and midnight. If I'm lucky I remember the weird dreams and forget the nightmares.
This is not the life I normally lead. Routine is something I despise. I want random fun and just meandering around town. I haven't worked in weeks. I would normally be traveling to other cities to explore. Time has seemed to stop. Everything is stagnant. In the past, I switched up my whole life when things started to feel this way. Now I am boxed in. I don't know how long I can take it, yet I feel the routine is somehow helping. Maybe if the days are the same, three months can feel like a week. It's all the same now. I need change for the sake of change, but I hope things get better, not worse.