Who shall say I am not the happy genius of my household?

[With apologies to Jagger-Richards (and, for you poetic trainspotters, William Carlos Williams), sometimes you can and do get what you want.]

In an under-publicized (and, ironically, rather sleepy) ceremony several years ago in Sleepy Hollow, New York, I was officially recognized by a star-studded consortium of industry wags (including Cleveland's own Ron Trzcinski of the Original Mattress Factory) as The National Nabob of Napping (it would have been/should have been International, but for one intractable Boutrous Boutrous-Ghali and those PC-holics of Al Jazeera). Basically, what my National Nabob of Napping status grants me is the final word on all nap-related issues and donnybrooks. I don't mean to toot my own horn here, but I do want the following testimony to carry all its considerable weight.

I just awoke from a nap that was the deepest, soundest, most refreshing nap ever. Ever. I mean, if Nixon had napped a few similar naps in late '72, early '73, Watergate would have been swatted away worse than McGovern, and the man himself would have been able to serve out completely the second term he was duly elected to. I'm not kidding you, during this nap not only did I dream I was kind of overseeing a Joyce Carol Oates reading, but in the dream, literary marm Ms. Oates came across like Julianne Moore in The Big Lebowski. If that isn't a dream that boldy went to places in La La Land no napper has ever dared tread, I don't know what is.

And I am here to declare unequivocally that the prime reason I napped so incredibly well was the Cleveland Indians snuggie blanket throw I received for Christmas two days ago (the one above, sans the blonde). Yes, I now own and proudly don a snuggie, a gaudy Chief Wahoo Tribe snuggie. The universe could burn for all I care now. Though, as I admitted (uttered/muttered, really, for I was very nearly struck dumb) seconds after unwrapping my snuggie (the last gift of the night, appropriately), I have always coveted a snuggie, but never publicly admitted it, out of fear of unlearned criticism. Well, I fear no more, readers.

The thing is truly epic. I might be large and contain multitudes, but I'm not that large. When I put the thing on I feel like a wiccan overlord, the pope of the national pastime, and Brian Wilson circa 1976 all at the same time. The sleeves alone are big enough to house comfortably a family of six in the left and a keg of beer to be snuck into an early season Tribe game in the right, with room for a bucket of BP balls to boot. And warm? Let's just say I go from a Lake Erie ice floe to an equatorial atoll in ten seconds flat. If the thing could pump Guinness and provide me with a daily sudoku, I might never interact with the human species again. And it's the Cleveland Indians! Covet away, neighbors. While all you peons huddle away your winter in layers upon layers of clothes trying to stave off hypothermia, this nabob will be roasty, toasty, and boasty. A The happy genius indeed.

Remembrance of Zzzzz's Past

A good nap is God's way of saying, "Stay out of My hair for a while."
                                                                    --Mark Fenster

I realize it's several weeks late to be compiling and publishing a "decade's top ten" list, but this is no ordinary list that can be compiled hastily or before the decade is actually over and done with. This is my list of the top ten naps I took from 2000-2009. I take my napping quite seriously, to the point that for more than two decades now I have assiduously kept a meticulous nap-log. Be-splattered with drool and stray eye-crumbs though it may be, it is the official record of my precious "me" time. For the past several weeks, as laundry has piled up, I have pored over the log, re-visiting naps great and lousy, making tentative lists, and finally paring down the list from well over 200 possibilities to this, the definitive, annotated list of The Best Naps of the 2000s (in chronological order).

1. January 12, 2000: Even so early in the decade, I had starred this nap as a potential "best of." So soon after Christmas break, I was in need of another free day, so I took a late afternoon nap with my pj's turned inside out, the universal good luck charm of hopeful students (and teachers) everywhere. Sure enough, upon waking the wind was howling and the snow was adrift. At 5:26 a.m. the next morning, I received a phone call: no school, snow day. I owed it all to the nap.
2. November 28, 2000: A nap well-remembered for its dream: for seemingly hours I kept jumping over a restless sheep, as he bahhed in what seemed to me like an ordered sequence. I woke up and drove straight to Best Steak and Gyro and chowwed down.
3. July 19, 2001: Perfect estivation. I didn't break 80 on the golf course that day, but aided by a Guinness at the 19th hole, and a smooth-running fan, I broke several sleep warps. And not a bead of sweat dampened the pillow.
4. February 5, 2003: Breaking a long spell of uneven, unsatisfying naps that in hindsight I either chalk up to 9/11 or the ensuing high opinion polls of George W., this nap, culminated by a waking moan of "Oh my Lord, now that's what I call dozing off!" rejuvenated my faith in siestas.
5. April 9, 2004: What just happened? What time is it? Where am I? Who am I?
6. April 11, 2004: In what is undoubtedly the greatest napping week of my life (4/8, 4/12, and 4/14 all made Top 50), this one, despite the puddle of drool on the pillow, was memorable for providing me, upon waking, with the name of the Little League teammate I had been trying--to the point of madness--to remember for six months.
7. December 2, 2005: I woke up at 5:45 p.m. My arm woke up at 8:03 p.m. Sawing logs? The Gobi was a forest when I fell asleep.
8. May 1, 2007: The Annual Hilda K. Memorial Nap, which I take every year in honor of my childhood babysitter who could never get me to nap, this year was a triumph. I heard spring birds throughout my slumber and woke up so refreshed I did all my spring cleaning in a three-hour burst of energized frenzy.
9. August 8, 2008: Amid mid-90 degree heat and a driveway outside my window being jackhammered apart, I slept like a baby.
10. January 11, 2009: Sometimes in a Cleveland winter, the only motivating force to get you out of bed in the morning is the thought of the nap you'll be taking later that day. This one did not disappoint. Then again, any dream involving bacon, Cheryl Tiegs, and an intimate performance by Sly and the Family Stone would never disappoint.

The Kinks-I Go To Sleep (demo)