I Wanna Nap…And I Want it NOW!

Okay, so I’m back from my brief vacation visiting the family in Cape Cod. I’m back at work. And I’m more than ready for my nap.

Yep, the upside of vacation is the opportunity to relax, do fun things with people you love, and take afternoon naps. The downside is that when vacation is over, I’m still in “nap mode” and around 2PM I’m jonesing for a little sleepy time.

I really think that school systems that have nap time for kindergarteners have the right idea. Or perhaps that should be “had”? For all I know, they don’t have nap time in kindergarten anymore.

But there is a fundamental question that has never been answered to my satisfaction, which is: Whoever said that nap time should be eliminated once a person hits double-digits? I, for one, believe that there is entirely too big an age gap between toddlers and retirees who get to enjoy the luxury of a little midday snooze. What about the rest of us?!

Frankly, I think companies could reap great benefits from installing “nap rooms.” Employees would be more inclined to work as opposed to surfing the net for a YouTube video to keep them awake and entertained when the 2PM sleepies hit. Probably they’d be less cranky, too. It’d be easy. Purchase a few comfy recliners, distribute pillows and blankies and little timers so employees can’t sleep away the entire afternoon. I mean, I’m perfectly willing to be reasonable – 20 minutes is all I’m asking for.

The only downside I could see to this plan is that it could be perhaps a tiny bit embarrassing to lead a meeting with dried drool on the side of your mouth following a nap break. Or being an HR representative charged with firing a fellow employee with whom you’d just shared naptime. But we’re in the brainstorming phase here so we still have time to work out the kinks.

And just to show you how much I back this idea, I’d be willing to be a test subject to see how much more productive I could be with a 20-minute nap every afternoon. We could do, say, a 15-20 year study to make sure we have enough data to comfortably conclude that naps are necessary for those of us over the legal drinking age but not yet old enough to qualify for senior citizen discounts.

By the time we concluded our research and reported it in the “Naps Digest” scientific journal, I’d be old enough to retire and the findings – for me, anyway - would be moot. Hey, I could live with that.

In the meantime, I’m left with either drinking massive quantities of caffeine or taking a short snooze in my car at lunchtime. The latter solution could be potentially embarrassing should a concerned citizen mistake my slumber for a more pressing health emergency and call the paramedics to revive me.

Not only that, but I’d have to research the definition of “vagrant” to make sure I wasn’t breaking any laws that could get me tossed in the pokey. On the other hand, I’d bet I could grab a nap in there!

Vacations are wonderful things. But I should probably stop indulging in afternoon naps during said vacations. It only teases me when I have to jump back on the employee treadmill.

Ah well. I guess I will console myself that Saturday is fast approaching. I’ll just have to hope that in between loads of laundry and other weekend chores that I can grab a few winks. It may not be 40, but any will do.

*Yawn*… Dang. There I go again…

Tourist Traps. Agree or Disagree?

A friend sent me a link to an article on the 10 world’s worst tourist traps. The link, if you're interested in reading more, is at the bottom of this blog.

However, if you don’t feel like going to yet another link, the 10 worst tourist traps, according to the article, are:

1. Kissing the Blarney Stone
2. Riding in a Venice Gondola
3. The Leaning Tower of Pisa
4. The Empire State Building
5. Niagara Falls
6. Stonehenge
7. Walt Disney World
8. Sears (Willis) Tower
9. Salem Witch Museum
10. Graceland

I have no idea if those were listed in some sort of order of importance, but I must say it was a little disconcerting to realize that I’d been to six of the 10 of them. In my defense, three of them were from when I was a kid and I didn’t have a say in where we went on vacation.

On the other hand, visiting some of these places probably wasn’t all that bad because it was a lot of years ago and (a) they weren’t as “tourist-y” as they are now and (b) there probably weren’t as many people walking the earth, so they weren’t as crowded. Oh, and (c) they were probably way cheaper!

I was astounded to learn that it costs $79 per person per day to get into Disney World. That’s before you buy your kid the first ice cream cone or soft drink or one of those goofy Mouse Ears Hats. Or Goofy Ears Hat. Whatever.

I have some friends who just took their kids to Disney World – there were three adults and four children. That’s…well, I don’t have my calculator handy at the moment, but that’s a lotta money! Paying for food for seven people plus hotel accommodations might necessitate taking out a second mortgage on a person’s home.

I remember when I was a kid and we went to the Empire State building – it was amazing to be 86 stories in the air and looking out over New York City. It was probably more memorable to a kid who grew up in the small town of Alliance, Ohio, where the highest building was probably 4 stories high and elevators were not required. (I jest – I really have no idea what the tallest building in Alliance is. But I don’t really recall encountering too many elevators.)

I will say that I completely concur with the #1 choice – “Kissing the Blarney Stone” in Ireland. I totally hated the Blarney Stone! My dad, sister and I made the trek up the old stone steps to kiss it. I had no idea there was a gap between the wall and the floor. You had to lie down on your back, hold onto metal poles on either side of the wall, tip your head back at an unnatural and uncomfortable angle and kiss the wall behind you while someone held onto you so you didn’t tumble down through the gap backwards and headfirst. Plus, the wall was all wet – whether from the weather or from other folks’ lips – I don’t know, but…bleccchh! All I knew for sure was I didn’t want to get anywhere near that nasty thing! Instead, I did an “air kiss” so my actual lips didn’t touch the actual wall.

I think the guy hanging on to me suggested I give it another try, but I said I was good and I had plenty of “gab” thank you very much. I got up, dusted myself off and thought, if I’d had any idea this was the deal, I would’ve stayed down on the ground with mom. I guess I really should read a tour guide once in a while before heading to some of these places.

I’ve been to the Leaning Tower of Pisa and, yep, it’s leaning. And I think we went to Niagara Falls when I was a kid. I remember a lot of water and a lot of mist. I’ve seen the Sears Tower (now Willis Tower) in Chicago, and, yeah, it’s a tall building. Didn’t go up in it, but looked up at it – does that count?! And I’ve been to Venice, though I didn’t take a gondola ride. We were there in February and it was spitting snow and icy rain – they couldn’t have paid me enough Euros to get in one of those things that day!

I have not been to Stonehenge, but I’ve seen photos. According to the article, you’d probably get a better view looking at pictures since these days they keep tourists pretty far away or something. Nor have I been to the Salem Witch Museum, even though my parents are from Massachusetts. Guess my folks figured they should take us to Plymouth Rock instead for a little Mayflower history, which is a tourist attraction I’d have to add to the list. It’s just a roped-off rock with a little plaque! But at least it’s not overrun with tourists and you can get up close and personal – provided you have an interest in seeing a big rock up close.

The tackiest tourist trap on the list, I suppose, would have to be Graceland. One of these days I might have to go – just to say I’ve been.

And, to the writer of this article for making me feel like one of those unsophisticated tourists who go to all the tacky tourist attractions, I say in my best Elvis impersonation, “Thank you…thank you very much!”


Smarter Travel link: http://www.smartertravel.com/travel-advice/photos/the-world-top-10-worst-tourist-traps.html?id=4669842&source=dealalert&value=2010-04-18+00:00:00&u=3F02EED0B9

(Photo: brosner via Flickr. Type of CC Attribution. http://www.flickr.com/photos/brosner/)