My family and friends tend to forget this.

Right now it is 9 a.m. Thursday for me and 11 p.m. Wednesday for you. I have been awake since 3:45 a.m. when my daughter called. She did not think that I would be asleep. “Mom, I knew you would be up,” she said.

If only she knew I had been speaking with her brother and sister on calls between midnight and 1:30 a.m. They also “knew” I would be up.

I have a great telephone system that allows me to have a California phone number that rings in Israel.

Therefore it is a local number for family and friends to call me here, and local for me to call anywhere in the U.S., all for only $30/month. There is no excuse for people not to keep in contact with me since I moved here.

My daughter and I spoke for about an hour, and then I tried to go back to sleep. No success!

At approximately 5 a.m., the garbage trucks were out and about picking up refuse from the giant trash bins at my apartment building. They come three times a week. If my daughter hadn’t called, I would have been awakened by them.

Now About That Park

By 6 a.m., I could hear all the trucks and equipment from the construction crew across the street. The acceptable “noise” hours for building here is between 6 a.m. and 10 p.m. Now I hear the street cleaners and gardeners.

I also live adjacent to a little park. The children laugh, cry, shout, and are continuously making sounds during the day and early evening hours. I expect them to enjoy their play in the park. But at night, the park is where the teenagers in the area congregate after midnight and their voices are loud and clear. They laugh and shout and do not seem to care that people are trying to sleep.

I often miss the restrictions on loud noise before and after certain hours in California.

Because of the 10-hour time difference, I always must calculate the appropriate time to contact people in the States. Math has not been one of my better subjects.

Depends on Your Location

It can be frustrating at times when I need to speak to a “live” person and get a recording that says to call during certain office hours that always seem to be in the middle of the night here.

It is even more disturbing when telemarketers call me on my California number during what would be legitimate hours if I were actually in California. Here, they just tend to interrupt my sleep.

I often find myself dozing while at the computer. I guess I just must get used to the fact that I am going to be a zombie. I never needed much sleep when I was young. But now…

L'hitraot. Shachar