The 4 to 8.

Been 20 odd years now that my central nervous system still wakes me up to either mess crank or stand the 0345-0630ish watch topside on the Boatswain's Mate of the Watch roster, running the topside lookout rotation.
It could be some windy meep, no matter where you were, and that same wind would produce waves too, and between them, it might keep a poor lookout's meep awake till the sun came up.
That and my tendency to roam around and meep with my watch teams to keep them honest. They were the eyes, ears, and helm, after all.
I've watched guys come in off lookout into the pilothouse covered in ice crystals.I've pulled them inside the glass enclosure as we all watched the waves break the full meeping length of the main deck to smash vertically and blue over the pilothouse glass,("yep, that was a fish in that water I just saw....good God,....") the height , at which in port ,was around 40 maybe 50 feet from the waters edge, while this big slow gray box of steel bobbed and lumbered up mountains of water in this oscillating, hellish , reluctant way, and the wheel could meeping dog you, wanting to pull you into the trough and roll you over.
I had decided that the gulf of Tehuantepec was a stretch of water named for the Mayan god of Bad Seas and Bad Cookin. We bleached some chicken bones and kept them in a cup by the chart table, so when people came around to ask where we were on the map, we could toss the bones down, scratch our chins, then point to our actual position on the chart.
And the good days on that watch weren't bad. Often some nice cook would bring up homemade cinnamon rolls early, the breeze was warm long before sunrise, and we would be talking meep to keep awake.
"Axe the Boatswains Mate of the Watch do he know what time it is?"
"Dude, my dad was an English teacher. You're going to have to talk so I can understand you." "Man meep you Bob, I want off watch. " " Why, so you can rush off to a whole day of working followed by the watch after work?
meepin stand there, man. You come up late all the time."
"Yeah, but I'm hungry man,......."
"And the ships store stocks meep tons of goodies that you can eat on watch. You ain't got no noodles? You're a bad boy scout ...........
You do remember the Boy Scouts motto, even if you've never participated, surely
(blank stare)........Be Prepared? "
"Man, the only thing I want to be prepared is that meepin omelet I aint eatin right now,........."

Meathead set fire to my toolbox, wandering around dazed out on Ambien yesterday on the 4 to 8. Yesterday was one of those nights that I was able to really sleep.

He would have been terrified of me at that point if he'd been in there, but he found some fake- spice- weed meep to smoke, and likely took his prescribed dose of the sleep aid.
My first thought at the smell of smoke wasn't much, because he was walking around already, and I thought he was frying up bacon, and going off to be productive, as the courts order. Then it was that wrong smell, of scorching vinyl paper, and synthetics, and I was immediately on my feet running into the basement, where I found the kid standing there staring at my still smoking toolbox, looking completely gone.Kid has a history of sleepwalking, and had been walking around.
Is it out? Yes.
Are you hurt? No.
Is anything in the house destroyed? No.
You done doing whatever it was? Yes.
I rode my bicycle 47 miles to burn that incident out of me.

He goes away to jail Tuesday, and I'm really sure its going to be for a long time, but before that, he wants to kill me via heart attack/ stroke, I swear.
He snuck out on court curfew, then back in the front door, which he left unlocked for himself, and when he came in, he was in a mask and top hat , I though it was a home invasion,and had I been bout a half second slower on my wits, or faster on my toes, I would have gutted him, because I was awake and terrified someone was coming right in, and I always have this Buck knife on me, even in my swim trunks, but the meeping Michael Myers mask and Cat in the Hat top hat was a special kind of nightmare material. Again last night, I dreamed he was lying in my hands, telling me he loved me as he bled out, and the ambulance wasn't responding fast enough.
You know what I'd give to be at sea right now?