With the changing of the clocks last weekend, I came to a startling conclusion.

I don’t do well before 7am.

I think back to traveling and arriving in foreign lands full of jetlag. Show me a bed, but don’t expect me to get up before seven.

Even last year when I made my grand return to Hong Kong, I remember Tom woke up (not so) bright and early, before the street lamps turned off, and wanted to go out exploring. At 6 am.

I begged and pleaded (in Hong Kong of all places!) to let me stay in bed for a little longer. We’d had a few hours of poor sleep, thanks to jetlag and a few tablets of Benadryl. (Can you say reverse effect?) I finally acquiesced at 6:30am.

And outside on Hankow Road we found no cafe or restaurant with open doors. I’d forgotten that Hong Kong is not an early city. Late, yes. Early, not so much.

Around 7:30 am, he spotted a seafood restaurant on Nathan Road that looked open.

If I can’t function that early in Hong Kong, I’m hopeless in the US.

My kids wake up on the early side anyway, so starting Sunday morning, they’ve been ready to go even earlier.

And by the end of the week, I’ll need to wake at 2:30am to chaperone 200 high school band and choir students to New York.

Thank goodness I can sleep on planes.