I am very tired.
I start work earlier than most people (7am) and consequently I tend to wake up earlier than most people (5.45am typically). I also have a 14 month old toddler who likes to wake up in the middle of the night and hit me over the head with an iPhone.
I also lead a busy life. Writing that sentence sits uneasily with me, because the subtext of ‘busy’ is always ‘I live a fuller life than you’ or ‘I’m important’. It’s arrogant and I hate it but what I mean by ‘busy’ is that my life is full of stuff.
I wake up early. I go to work. I finish work at 4. I rush to the daycare centre to pick up my son by 5. I take him to the park. I get home at 5.45 where I feed, bath and read his bedtime stories in time for my wife coming home at around 6.30. We sing a song and my wife puts him to sleep while I get dressed to go climbing, which I typically do for 2 hours.
I usually get home around 9.30pm. I eat dinner. I check my email, sometimes do a bit of work, then I clean the kitchen. At that point it is usually around 10.30pm and I have to be awake in 7 hours. Even if I went to bed at that precise moment I still wouldn’t be getting the recommended 8 hours of sleep, and even if I did, that sleep would be interrupted by the afore-mentioned son hitting me over the head with my mobile phone thing.
I guess what I’m saying is this: I am currently playing Dark Souls II instead of sleeping. This is my actual binary choice: sleep or Dark Souls II. What’s it going to be?
For the past two or three nights I’ve been choosing Dark Souls II and it’s not going so well.
I’m buggered. My body is aching from a combination of constant, physically demanding exercise and lack of proper recovery time. I look like shit. People are actually commenting on this. I’m having difficulty engaging in normal conversation with regular human beings and for some screwed up reason I have a really irritated sore right eyeball. Or is it my left eyeball. Fuck it, they both hurt to varying different degrees.
My wife is also a little bit angry with me. Not a lot, but at least a little.
A problem: my son is in the middle of squeezing a goddamn tooth through the flesh of his actual gums, so he’s been a little bit fussy recently. Last night I made the worst, half arsed attempt at settling him back to sleep at around 11pm. Usually I can get my son to sleep pretty easily – I have a bomb-ass technique – but last night my heart just wasn’t in it.
I walked out at 11.10pm. “Nah, not happening. It’s your turn”.
My wife, in reply, only half joking.
“Obviously your game is more important.”
Apply water to burned area.
Usually this kind of passive aggressive condemnation is enough to have me launching into action like a defensive jack-in-the-box. Not this time. I slumped into the couch, controller in hand. Back to the grind. Dark Souls has cast a spell on me and with that spell comes a dulled, muted ability to completely ignore the subtleties of marital communication.
I crawled into bed an hour and half later. 12.40. I had to get up in five hours time. At some point, in the middle of the morning, I remember being hit over the head with a phone. Was it my wife or my son – I was too tired to tell.
I’ll be updating with new Dark Souls II Diary posts throughout the month! I’m looking forward to playing through the game with all of you by my side. Stay tuned!
Comments
28 responses to “The Dark Souls II Diaries: I Am Very Tired”
Jeez Mark, that sounds like a recipe for disaster.
Don’t make a habit of it.
Ja, seriously. Even taking Dark Souls out of the equation, when do you see your wife?
I’d rather halve the climbing and double the wifing time.
You need a break and you know it.
So why do you keep on doing this?
If you know that you need a break, what is that you want? Some sort of trigger? It’s past bed time, I mean that time. Screw the excuses and triggers. Take a friggen break.
Get some sleep.
Reading this has made me want to sleep lol
Do they pay you danger money Mark?
Damn, I enjoy reading Mark writing about Dark Souls 2 but not at the expense of marital bliss! I didn’t know my entertainment came at such a cost hehe.
Note to self…. if you start to look like this change something.
Change something Mark….. quickly….. or Dark Souls might be all you get to play with….
So, I guess you’re enjoying the game?
As a games journalist, I’m sure you could squeeze in a few more hours, playing at work. Perhaps instead of catching up on your morning emails. Or while munching on that box of Shapes that you bought as a substitute for a decent and nutritious lunch. Whatever you do, don’t play so long as to forget to pick up your son from daycare. That would be … a bad idea. For all involved.
That sucks, sorry to hear it! I would recommend you put your health and family before your work, but it’s not what I do so I can’t judge. People who don’t have kids and don’t have jobs that extend outside of the usual 9-5 don’t often understand what ‘busy’ means.
When I say “I’m busy”, I often intend and embrace the subtext and arrogance of having a life full of stuff, because to do otherwise would be to give in to resentment.
3 young kids, constantly sick (9 months out of last year was sickness central!), 12-15 hours work each day, often 6 days a week. 5-6 hours sleep each night. Going on for years now.
YAY! HOORAY FOR BEING BUSY! 😀
fuck being busyYou need your wife and son, you need your sleep too
So there’s a decision to be made.
Dark Souls or your job
The choice is simple, I mean who needs money, right.
In fairness it is part of his job, but yeh get sum rest dude.
Sleep is for the weak! At least for a while anyway… You’ll get sick because your immune system is down from lack of sleep, then you can have a couple of full days (sick days) playing it on the couch. Your kid will probably get the bug too though, so gg.
Solution: Teach 14 month old to play Dark Souls.
#Iamnotaparent
Hey everyone! I’m fine!
I think the general lesson is that something has to give. I can’t climb, have a kid, have a demanding job, and play games for three hours every single day.
There seems only 1 logical answer to this. Get a divorce, quit your job and game all the time…Fuck life.
But seriously I can relate to your struggle of you time (to an extent) management, and I applaud your persistence at trying to do it all. But hey, weekend!
I was kind of enjoying the trend of this is Mark’s cry for help/ we need to save him. That aside, a refreshing and honestly put down on paper read, as always
Oh Mark.
You probably got less sleep than I did, and I just had an afternoon nap to make up for my tiredness after one day. If you want to keep those glorious abs of yours you should take a snooze cruise.
http://img2-1.timeinc.net/ew/dynamic/imgs/101130/Vanilla-Sky-Cruise_400.jpg
That wasn’t what I was thinking, but that’s a much better idea.
Get well soon Mark!
Couldn’t you ditch the climbing for gaming instead on some nights?
You playing in the off line mode @markserrels ?
Yeah, no choice with the servers not up until… today I think?
According to @shane the servers are up for 360 now.
I played online at about 11am this morning, no worries. Didn’t get summoned or invaded, but got to watch a LOT of bloodstains and vote for a LOT of weird comments.
Cool, I thought i would hold off as its my first playthrough a Dark Souls game. Didn’t want to miss out on anything.
I think what Mr. Serrels needs is a holiday from work and spend this time playing DARKSOULS2!
Does the climbing have to be every day? I often get anxious trying to fit absolutely everything into every day but now I’ve started to try and schedule things out more so I can give each activity more time. So, maybe alternate climb-days and gaming days?
Mark, I believe you have the curse of the undead. You can either continue on this hopeless quest to rid yourself of the curse by beating the game, or lose yourself and go hollow.
Or you know, you could get some sleep.
Lets see if we can help get Mark to sleep. We all know yawns are contagious…
*YAAAAAAAAWWWWWWWNNNN*