Nothing gets a rise out of a Midwesterner faster than insinuating that he or she may have slept in.  My mom is from Southern Illinois, and when she was a kid, the last one to show up for breakfast was called the "barn esel."  "Esel" is German for "donkey," which is another word for "ass," which is short for "dumb ass."

So maybe I get this from you, Mom, but I identify with people who are embarrassed by resting. And I'm really secretive about the occasional afternoon nap that I (a morning person, don't forget) take in order to stay awake through cocktail hour.  So if I do have a little mid-day snooze, I tell my kids, "If anyone calls, just tell whoever it is that I'm in the shower." To which my friends say, "Well, just have her call me when she wakes up." 

Anyway, I have a great friend from Columbus, Ohio, named Pat Smith, and honestly, it's fun to get under his skin.  So yesterday, when it was late in the morning, almost noon, I sent him a two-word facebook message that I knew would undo him. It went like this, "you up?"  And, boy, he really blasted me.  He told me how long he'd been working, and what he'd done all day, and he used the term, "for crying out loud." Thanks, Pat, for letting me write about this (he said I could as long as it was funny and made him look industrious and alert).