I'll Get Up in just a minute

Are you one of those people who wake up in the morning, fresh and sing with joy the beginning of a bright new day?

Well, most of us are not. And frankly, we prefer those of you who could pull the racquet. We are trying to get some 'last minute before tottering off to sleep to get our morning coffee.

Those final minutes in bed are gold.

You know those I mean, the last precious moments, still warm in bed, wide awake and knowing you have to get up. But not immediately. No, just a few minutes more.

For this reason the snooze button on the alarm clock is so popular. People simply do not want to get out of bed in the morning. Especially children. Anyone who has tried to drag out a 9 years, out of bed at 7:30 to prepare a school day is 08:30 AM exactly know what I mean.

But even for adults, overcoming the inertia may be a year ago (and I use that term with its loosest possible meaning) of procrastination insidious.

Fortunately for my family, we have an almost foolproof system to overcome this problem daily. We call our system "The Dogs".

The way it works is that Doug, our larger, main dog, wakes up early at 6:30, sitting at my bedside and put his paw on my back. We call this, "Give the paw."

The process works like this:

Doug:

Me: "Ok Doug, nice guy."

Ten seconds pass.

Doug:

Me: "Okay, Doug. Ok.

Another ten seconds passed.

Doug: ...

Me: "Coming Doug to come."

Fifteen seconds.

Doug:

At this point there is an air of frantic insistence of Doug trampling. The message is clear, or I get to carry it out or suffer the consequences.

Now, Doug is a £ 85 Labrador Retriever, and he is capable of producing some pretty heavy consequences.

Rather than face the prospect of scraping accordingly £ 3 off the drawing room carpet, drag me out of bed to take him out.

A careful reader will remember that I used the term "Dogs" to describe our automatic alarm system.

The careful reader may also assume that there is a second dog involved in this process in the unlikely event that Doug does not produce the desired result.

The careful reader is entirely correct. Zippy, our second dog, is not as subtle and restrained like Doug when it comes to announce its morning needs.

While Doug can sit demurely beside the bed and indicate his wishes with a paw caring, Zippy will go up on the bed, stick his wet nose in my face, ear or eye, whichever is most convenient given and sneezing.

This method has never failed to elicit the desired response. It has some obvious advantages to the method of Doug, although for obvious reasons, I prefer Doug system to Zippy's.

In both cases, we are now ready to begin our day.

The following poem was written after commiserating with another family member who wanted to stay in bed for a couple of those precious minutes this morning.

I'll Get Up in just a minute

Every morning when I wake up slowly
I like staying in bed
Ignoring all thoughts that skip
And clamor in my head.
The everyday actions that must be done
The challenges will keep,
The committees have to run many
All drag me from my sleep.
I try to close your eyes again
And repossess my dreams,
But giving, to achieve the chore
Schemes of life in the face.