Forty Winks

It’s that time of the afternoon when your eyelids begin to close involuntarily and you resist stupor with every fiber of your being, not because you want to but because you have to.

Of course, you’ve tried everything. You’ve pushed lunch back by an hour; you steer clear of curd rice; you blink very rapidly; you call your brother to gossip; you check the Web; you stand up and stretch; you take restroom breaks; heck, you even sit on the toilet and lay your head on your knees. You’re so desperate, you’ll do anything to stop your face from crashing onto the keyboard.

The dark space under your desk looks mighty inviting. You can reposition some of those computer cables, spread a charpoy and curl yourself into a fetal position. Hell, if they allowed you, you’d happily drool on those useless reports and cookie crumbs that litter your desk.

Instead, you suppress yawn after yawn and watch the clock, willing it to move faster, so you can go home, get a good night’s rest and go through the same motions the next day.