Mornings are a blur

Each morning I go through a routine. I boot up the computer, get myself a cup of coffee, stagger back to the computer, and vainly try to unblur the images by rubbing the lenses of my glasses with my T-shirt. It doesn't help... because the blur is caused by the eyes, not the eyeglasses. Eventually, though, they clear well enough to do the following:

1. Complete one game of Freecell.
2. Complete one Jigsaw Puzzle.

After that, I am, pretty much on my own.

I do these things because they help clear the cobwebs from my brain. It's a bit like the stretching and scratching most of us (probably all of us) do upon waking. We stretch to  wake up the muscles and maybe to reassure ourselves that our conscious brains have regained nominal control of our bodies.

After the first few things, I am somewhat ready to take on my day. Two days a week, that means playing golf within a couple of hours of falling out of bed. On Wednesday, my tee time is later in the morning (after 9:30) so I can wake up naturally and have plenty of time to prepare.

If I have time (which I do on all but Mondays and Fridays) and the blurriness has dissipated, I move on to the important things... the Crossword Puzzles. I try to do these as quickly as possible. For that reason, I choose the fairly easy ones like I used to find in the daily newspaper. Since I did not, and do not, subscribe to the New York Times these puzzles take less than 15 minutes to complete. I started out doing them in "regular" mode where the character appears in bright red when it is incorrect. But I have moved on to "master" mode where no such hints are provided. This is more like the newspaper puzzles.

I think these things are important for the brain. They may not be but I think that. Many sources say that we should exercise the brain much as we exercise our muscles. I no longer look at them as exercises but as a "loosening up" process.

I don't know about you but my brain is sluggish, slow to react, after sleep. It has always been so. I am one of those who take time to get moving after waking. Some people have no problem hopping out of bed, cheerful and ready to take on the day. 

I hate those people. 

Maybe "hate" is a poor word to use but "mildly dislike" seems inadequate.