On starting early.

You wake up and look at the clock and see it's really early. What's the earliest you're willing to interpret as time to get up as opposed to feeling that you really must get back to sleep? Maybe you factor in how long you've just slept. It seems to make sense to say if I've slept at least 5 hours, no time is too early. But, personally, I'd always drawn a line at 4 a.m. Today, though, I got up at 3. That seemed ridiculous, but I was utterly awake. It annoyed me at first, because I had one key project I needed to finish today, and I was afraid of hitting the wall. As it turned out, I was focusing really clearly on the project in those pre-dawn hours, made a breakthrough I couldn't even think of yesterday, and got the whole thing done by 7 a.m.

So that just goes to show... something... But what?

That found time is especially productive? That the pre-dawn hours have some magic? That a whole day can be cleared for some use other than the one you had planned if you only get up earlier? That ambiguities between day and night should be resolved in favor of day?

Or are you thinking how you hate morning people?

The accomplished task was finishing the syllabus for my Religion and the Constitution class, which begins next Tuesday. Yes, we do start late here. Labor Day weekend is big in Wisconsin, which, you may not know, regards itself as a resort state. But the students are already coming back for the pre-semester activities. Yesterday was the first day that the law school was full of students again, which really is a very nice feeling. Another thing that makes me feel great every fall is the UW Marching Band practicing off in the distance, which I can hear from my house. Not at the moment, however, of course. It's still early.

Small additional task done: culling the blogroll. I took some defunct blogs off the list. Some of these were among my very favorite blogs, but I don't want to send readers over to inactive blogs. Don't take it personally! Let me know if you gear up again.