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This post is a little off the beaten track, but this is I’ve Tried That and I am trying something new. But first, I have a confession.

I hate winter.

I don’t do winter. The cold. The snow. The constant gray skies. Gah, I want no parts of it. So much so, that I spent an entire day last month planning to move to Australia for the next few months. I looked into plane tickets, dual citizenship and even picked out some nice looking real estate near a beach.

Pipe dreams of course, but man do I hate winter. It doesn’t help that I live in Pittsburgh either. It snows often and the overcast is relentless. I wish I could hibernate to be quite honest.

The mornings are the worst. My bed is fitted with a heated mattress cover and an incredibly heavy down comforter. It’s my own little cocoon that I try to spend as much time in as possible. As you can imagine, getting out of bed each morning is quite the struggle and I wanted a solution.

A few weeks ago I was reading an article on light therapy and how you can use certain lights to simulate sunlight and improve your mood. These lights are widely used to help treat Seasonal Affective Disorder and help regulate sleeping patterns. The article had briefly mentioned “wake up lights” and how they can be effective in helping people wake up in the morning.

Basically, there are alarm clocks which feature bright lights to help ease the wake-up process. The alarm clocks gradually get brighter as they near your set alarm time effectively simulating a sunrise. Your alarm goes off and you wake up to a fully lit bedroom and an energized body.

This piqued my interest since I refuse to do winter and I set out to try one of these wake-up lights. If there’s a light out there that could help me deal with winter mornings, I am going to use it.

Enter the Philips HF3470 Wake-up Light

I started shopping around, comparing different models, and reading customer reviews. The model I ultimately settled on is a Philips HF3470 Wake-up Light.

It is an alarm clock. You set a time for an alarm to go off; however, about 30 minutes before the alarm sounds, the light kicks on and gradually gets brighter. It reaches its full brightness just as your alarm sounds. You have three options to wake up to: music, chirping birds, or a more traditional, albeit less annoying, alarm tone. Your body is subconsciously adjusting to “rising sun” providing you with a much better wake up experience.

I chose this model largely due to the reviews and the price. One feature that really stood out was the user replaceable light bulb. A lot of other models required you to send the alarm clock in to replace the bulb if it ever burnt out. That sounded completely unacceptable. It’s changing a light bulb for crying out loud. I shouldn’t have to send the alarm clock away to change a bulb. The fact that I could service this model myself sealed the deal for me.

I placed my order and said goodbye to my old alarm clock. That night, I went to bed skeptical, but woke up energized. It was quite amazing. I didn’t have to struggle to get out of bed or bargain with the clock for more time. The birds chirped, I woke up to a completely lit room, and I sat up ready to go.

It’s just such a better and more pleasant way to wake up each morning. My typical morning used to consist of a god awful high-pitched beeping to scare the hell out of me in hopes of waking up. This usually followed by at least 45 minutes of pressing the snooze button and hearing the siren go off every five minutes. After I finally convinced myself to get out of bed, I’d plod my way over to the coffee pot and contemplate going back to sleep for a few more hours. It was a struggle each and every morning.

Now my wake up process is awesome. I wake up to a fully light room and birds chirping. My eyes pop right open and I’m able to get out of bed without having to feign sleep for nearly an hour. I still make my way to the coffee pot, but with a spring in my step and a song in my heart.

Okay, that’s a bit much.

But in all honesty, I feel much more awake when I use the wake-up light and have a much more positive mood throughout the day. You know that super heavy eyelid feeling you get each morning? Well, I haven’t felt that at all since using the wake-up light.

Winter mornings have finally become bearable.

The biggest downside is the price. I spent $90 on my Philips Wake up Light. That’s a tad expensive for an alarm clock. However, this is going to be something that I use on a daily basis for years to come. It helps me wake up better each morning, helps me focus on work easier, and has generally improved my mood. For me, it is well worth the price. I would gladly buy it again and am completely satisfied with my purchase.

If you’re like me and struggle with the mornings, I highly recommend trying out the Philips HF3470 Wake-Up Light. You can check it out at Amazon.com by clicking here. It comes with a 45-day money-back guarantee. If you try it and don’t see any results, return it! I started seeing results after my first night with it. This baby isn’t going anywhere. It might not be Australia for the winter, but it sure does help.

Right now, I’m sipping my coffee, writing this post, and anxiously awaiting the arrival of 14 family members. These past few month have been a whirlwind of meetings, flowers, cake tastings, and appointments, but it’s all coming to an end in a few days because…

I’m Getting Married on Saturday!

I have a wonderful best friend who I’ll be proud to call my wife (that word is going to take some getting used to) in just a few days. We met six years ago in college and have been together ever since. I’m very blessed to have found someone so supportive. She is truly awesome.

We are going on a honeymoon to Hawaii for two weeks on Monday. We’ll be visiting the islands of Maui and Kauai. I absolutely cannot wait to sink my feet in the sand, kick back, and have absolutely nothing to do but relax and enjoy those soothing ocean sounds.

As you may have guessed, my email response time is going to be awfully slow these next few weeks. I hope you understand that I will be limiting my laptop use as much as possible while honeymooning in Hawaii. I will get to the email, but it may take a few extra days to do so.

The lovely Halina has written a couple of extra posts for the next two weeks. I’ll be away, but I’ve Tried That will still update as usual.

Okay, I think that’s it! Wish me luck!

-Steve

Are mall kiosk salespeople like Internet sharketers? I think so.

I had just left Dillard’s and was headed back to Victoria’s Secret to pick up my wife. No, really. That’s where she was. But before you get any big ideas about what she was shopping for, think of this: my daughter was with her. So yeah. I guarantee they weren’t shopping for Valentine’s Day gifts for me. (At least I hope not, because…the horror!)

All I wanted to do was get from point A to point B. Shopping for shoes in the mall was bad enough. I kind of prefer Target where all the shoes are right smack in the middle of the store, and there are only six varieties so I don’t get confused. So I’m walking with my new shoes minding my own business when this slick (read: young, cute) sales girl smiled at me and said, “May I?”

I had to stop. I mean, she smiled at me. Cute young girls haven’t smiled at me since pre-marriage days. Excluding my four-year-old. She’s cute and young, but it’s not the same, you know?

So I stopped (that was my first mistake) and let this girl tut-tut over my dry hands. There was no question about it: they were dry. And such a shame, too, good looking guy like me, she says. Next thing I know, she’s buffing my thumbnail with some kind of buffer thingy. I don’t know what it was. It was blue. And it left my thumbnail shiny.

Meanwhile, she learned that I am a writer, that I am married and have children, that I had just bought shoes, that I was at the mall for dinner with my wife and daughter, and that I had not yet bought her a Valentine’s day present.

I mean I’m so not a chatty person. That’s more than my coworkers know about me! I swear, if she had asked me for my social security number and my deepest hopes and dreams, I would have given them to her.

See, the thing is, I’m not even sure how it really happened. One minute we were just friends and the next I was a customer and had spent $40 I didn’t plan to spend on stuff my wife already has sitting on the dresser. Cuticle oil (WTF?) and some kind of lotion. She might have called it “butter” or something. Oh yeah, and salt from the Dead Sea. For scrubbing into your skin. To make it soft.

It was just so fast. And she seemed so sincere and I thought she really liked me and I believed her when she said that the softness on my hands would last for a week and the shine on my nail would last for three. I mean, why would she lie? We bonded, I tell you!

So what do you think? Are there any parallels? Discuss.

Ahh, summertime! Watermelon, cherries, peaches, apricots, diarrhea. Long days at the lake, backyard grilling. And of course, the 4th of July-the only holiday to break up summer monotony between Memorial Day and Labor Day. Here are three things I’ve tried and recommend to you to enrich your July 4th experience.

1. Read the Declaration of Independence. In it, Thomas Jefferson lays out for all the world to see the colonists’ gripes with King George III that made them want to pick up their toys and go home. The guy was always drinking the beer in the fridge, but never bought beer, apparently. He laughed at his own jokes, and was always leaving the damn toilet seat up (according to Betsy Ross). But more importantly, Jefferson crystallized the vision for a new age and a new way of looking at ourselves as humans:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed…

Read it. Get inspired.

Luke and Maya, prior to today’s cotton candy dose.

2. Eat some cotton candy. The stuff is vile. I mean, can you believe we liked that junk as kids? I need to take an insulin shot just thinking about it! I used to smash it into little balls and chew it. The thought of it hurts my teeth. It seemed to last longer that way, but then I had sticky hands and no way to clean them. Licking them didn’t work so well cause my tongue was sticky and my hands tasted like a subway hand rail. I was a sickly child. But eat some anyway because it will prepare you for number 3.

3. Go see fireworks with a child. If you’re like me, you figure, “I’ve seen one fireworks show, I’ve seen them all.” And that’s probably true…unless you watch it through the eyes of a child. Preferably one between 1.5 and 8 years old. You’ll have more fun watching them than you’ve had at a fireworks show for a long time (not counting that one year you took a joint along). I remember taking our first daughter, Dani, to the fireworks one 4th of July when she was 2. It was 10:00, past her bedtime, and she lay quietly in the stroller not quite asleep. The show started and we tipped her back so she wouldn’t have to hold her head up, and I watched the fireworks reflected in her eyes. No “oohs” or “ahhs” from her, just quiet absorption. I have it, the secret to immortality: it’s the capacity for wonder that keeps us young. Lose it, and we’re toast.

Happy 4th, y’all. Happy Birthday, Idealism.