Fewer Hours Of Daylight

It’s a wonder that people living nearer the Arctic Circle can get up of a morning in winter. Iceland, Northern Scandinavia and I presume parts of Canada end up with fewer hours of daylight than we do in the UK, and yet I still struggle to drag myself out of bed when the sun’s still asleep. Heck, I only manage to get a sense of what time it is thanks the radio-playing iPad on maximum volume under my pillow, shouting into one ear to remind me that my daily routine is calling and staying in bed is forbidden in the adult kingdom.

Funnily enough, I can stay up to all hours of the night without feeling drained, thanks to artificial lighting and interactive entertainment. I’m trying not to, because I know that only serves to make me want to rest more during the night, because duh. But even the most disciplined among us can tell themselves they’re “having an early night tonight” before playing twenty-six more levels on Candy Crush with regurgitated episodes of old sitcoms on Netflix in the background. It’s just human nature.

In the absence of being allowed to hibernate – like most other mammals are allowed to (is this a violation of my rights as a biological organism?) – I’m finding daily energy levels to be lower than usual and the appeal of watching old movies while wrapped in some form of blanket is pulling at me stronger than ever before. And it literally seems to have just happened since the turn of December, which is ridiculous – the sun doesn’t have a human calendar. That’s why it didn’t blow up when the Ancient Mayans thought it would. It didn’t get the memo about that, I doubt it suddenly decided to stay in bed with an advent calendar.

Anyway, rambly nonsense as per usual, but that’s what this is for, right? For my tired old brain to spill some words out once a week and leave the resulting mess for future historians to mop up. My poor, tired old brain.

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A thinking bluesy guitar riff opens this one and never really leaves it, giving the song an almost never-ending quality without overstaying its welcome. The vocals are just about vague and distant enough to slide into the background and not challenge your brain too much. At least, that’s how I hear it.

I’m surprised (and yet simultaneously not-surprised) by the video, which comes across as the product of something in between Terry Gilliam’s work for Monty Python and someone using Windows Movie Maker for the first time. It feels as though a lot of thought went into this, and yet, not a lot of thought at all.

Alien Stadium – This One’s For The Humans