Sleep Police

Instead of watching Letterman last night, I watched Conan's last show, followed by part of Craig Ferguson's program. When I woke up a few hours later, I was wide awake. But instead of getting up and doing something constructive, like cleaning my house or choosing quotations and photos for this blog, I decided to torture myself for several hours, futilely attempting to fall asleep again. Therefore, I decided to watch television; I got to choose from a different infomercial on every channel or C-SPAN. I chose the latter, and I watched it for hours. Finally, sleep happened. As a result, I got up very late. In hindsight, I wish I had gotten out of bed and done something useful. Not that it really mattered. After all, today is Saturday, and I have nowhere I need to go, except maybe to the mailbox. But even that is not happening today, since I saw an abandoned SUV on the side of the icy road here. So, why did I feel compelled to force myself to stay in bed and try to sleep, even though my insomnia had kicked-in? I suppose I feel I should be asleep in bed in the middle of the night, as if there is some unwritten law. As if the Sleep Police are going to knock on my door and give me a ticket if I do not comply. "But Officer, I did use the 'sleep' button on my TV remote. Honest, I did, but...."