Day 25 -- California makes me sleepy

I live in Ohio, which happens to lie in the Eastern time zone.  I have to work with someone who happens to live in California.  You would think, "No problem.  The internets make all things possible."  That's what I thought.  I was wrong.

Perhaps it's the nature of my work.  Sometimes when you do web work, you get in a habit of doing it on the off hours.  Most days I update websites before nine or after seven, so not to interfere with regular business hours.  I never thought that those in California would also try to avoid high traffic times.  But in their case, they have a three hour lag.

Doing business with someone in Pacific time takes grit, determination and a slide rule.  You can't talk to them in the morning, because 9:00 AM Eastern time equates to 6:00 AM Pacific time, and people don't like coming into the office in the butt crack of dawn.  You might as well sleep in and play video games until lunch.  They ain't coming in until noon. And they're crabby until 2:00 or 3:00 PM.

But they have no problem calling you to work on something at 7:00 PM, right when you're sitting down for a fine dinner of chili and six dollar wine.  Hey, it's only 4:00 PM in the land of sun and mudslides, what are you trying to do?  Spend quality time with your kids?  Get to work, you schmuck!  That's because time code etiquette only work in reverse.  We can do subtraction in time, but addition would blow our minds.

So when you're a web guy and you have to wait for another web guy on the west coast, you're talking about working on stuff between midnight and 2:30 in the morning.  You don't think about that, though, when you start your day.  Time zone math sneaks up on you like a ninja, only pouncing right when you start to pack it in for the night.  "Well, I'm done...CRAP!"

The next day you still have to get up at your usual time, because you don't live in California.  With three or four hours of sleep, the child wakes you up to go to school or something lame like that.  You hoist yourself up, and shuffle to the coffee pot like it's your only hope for salvation.  Unfortunately you forget the cup and the coffee runs over the edge of the counter and fills your slippers with scalding hot liquid.  Better be home from the hospital by dinner, because California doesn't care.

Moral of the story:  time zones ruin feet.