Every day, it’s the same thing.

The alarm goes off at 5:30. Kris hits snooze.

The alarm goes off at 5:39. Kris pulls herself awake and heads downstairs for a shower. I pull of my C-PAP mask, roll over, grab my laptop, and then set it on my belly. While Kris is getting ready, I’m doing my morning stats.

Each day, I log the same numbers from Get Rich Slowly. I have a spreadsheet containing traffic, subscriber, link, and revenue information. It’s a little anal-retentive perhaps, but it’s probably no surprise to most of you. I also process e-mail and then check to be sure there are no fires to be put out. (Believe it or not, sometimes there are.)

At about 6:05, I put away the laptop, grab some clothes, and tromp downstairs. I brush my teeth, etc. as Kris gets out of the shower. At 6:10, I get into the tub and begin to soak. I don’t have as long as I’d like (and in the winter, I never get as warm as I want) — I need to be out of the house at 6:25, which means I need to be out of the tube at 6:20.

Some days — like today — Kris throws a monkey wrench into things. Some days — like today — she begins to talk to me about work. At 6:18.

Kris is a good storyteller, and I like to hear about all her little friends, but her stories are not short. In fact, they’re always quite long. I’d rather she told them to me in the evening, as we’re eating dinner. “I’m tired when I come home,” she said tonight when I mentioned this.

I understand. But when she starts telling me stories about work at 6:18 am, my heart sinks. I want to be a good husband and listen, but I also don’t want to be late for work. If I’m on time every day during a pay period, I get a $50 bonus. If I’m not, I don’t. And when Kris begins to tell a story at 6:18, I know it’s going to be a near thing.

Things get even worse when she slips into lethargy mode. She’ll go through periods where she hits the snooze button twice. Or when she won’t get into the shower until 6:04. When I come down to take my turn, she’ll have only just begun.

When this sort of thing begins to happen on a regular basis, I practice social engineering. Before she gets home from work, I go through the house and set back every clock by three minutes. (I can’t set them back any further or it’s too obvious. Though not as obvious as writing a blog entry about it.) This usually helps mitigate the problem, though it never quite solves it.

Ah, the strange dynamics of the husband-wife relationship.