I’m curious to know what sort of things keep people up at night or what keeps them from sleeping in the morning? I, personally, have what I like to call “insongnia” because at 6am, on most mornings, a switch goes on in my head and it starts to fill up with lyrics and melodies. Maybe something Rob and I are working on, maybe something that’s been on my mind, but all of a sudden, it’s there and I can’t stop it and I can’t silence it until I get it out. Sometimes, it’s not ready yet, and I’ll just stay in bed and keep mulling it over until the answer hits me, and other times it’s fully-formed and I’ll go right for my digital recorder and get it down quickly before it vanishes. But it doesn’t end there…as those of you with similar afflictions (gifts?) know, we carry our idea around with us and let it gestate. So, after I’ve quietly wheezed something into my digital recorder with mock lyrics that I know will have to be changed, my insongnia usually finds voice in a songwriting journal or, in most cases, in the shower…Yes, the shower is my songwriting sanctuary, where for some reason everything seems to come together. I don’t know why, but something about the water and the steam helps me block out the world and just let my right brain and my left brain meet up and riff on an idea until it is truly mature and ready to be born (despite my pro-environment stance, I have to say I am quite guilty of overextending my showers just so I can work on songs! No finger-pointing from the peanut gallery, please, I know some of you do the same thing and I am not alone in this behavior…It is the best, and you all know it, so just ‘fess up). But, of course, the journey doesn’t end there, a lengthy shower can often lead to a verse or two and even a chorus, so, of course I can’t stop myself at that point. I keep developing the chorus as I boil the water for my morning soft-boiled egg, and more verses come to me as I dispose of the peel from my daily banana, and, if the song isn’t done by then, it will travel with me right on to the subway, where I will continue hum it quietly to myself all the way to work, courtesy of in-ear headphones, which magnify the sound in your own head and can make humming on the train, a very possible, and even pleasurable experience…The point is, I look at this behavior as a bit obsessive, but for me it’s something that (I think?) keeps me sane, otherwise all this stuff would just be stuck inside me, probably driving me even more crazy, I would guess? So, I want to know… do any of you share this with me? Ideas, that get your brain going and don’t let go of it until they’ve been exorcised? I want to know it’s not just me at 6am every morning, who can’t sleep because the thought train is burning at 100 miles an hour through his head. I want to know who else will admit to banging out an idea so hard that it feels like it has totally possessed you and held you captive for hours and sometimes even days on end? There’s got to be at least one or two of you out there who go through it, so be honest, be blunt…, but most of all, get it out!