The History of 4:00 A.M, Lukewarm Coffee, & Tecmo Super Bowl

There was a time in my life that 4:00 a.m. never existed. In fact, 4:00 a.m. has had several different meanings throughout my life.

The reason behind this 4:00 a.m. talk is that was when my alarm sounded on Saturday morning. Actually, it was 4:30 a.m. but I like a nice round number. The itinerary for the day was get to the station at 5:30 to do the news, sports, etc. Following those duties, I would head north to Andalusia to catch the United/Rock Island softball game, then head down to watch the first game of the Monmouth-Roseville baseball season opener against Geneseo, then head over to Bushnell to take in a game or two of the Route 41 series.

That was the plan, anyway. When the alarm awoke me suddenly, the first item on my agenda was when I would get to go back to sleep. Alas, after a morning jolt of lukewarm coffee that tasted more like warm hot chocolate, than coffee, my mind was ready to tackle the day. Just a note, I have had terrible luck with my Saturday morning coffee, when I make my almost-daily stop to the Ayerco station in Macomb. Getting coffee from that place is like playing Russian Roulette, but for some reason I am set in my ways (and it's the closest gas station that's not too terribly out of my way).

As for the history of 4:00 a.m. it may have been in the 4th or 5th grade, when the hour was first discovered. Before then, I probably thought that time stopped at midnight. Somewhere in the basement of a friend's house for a birthday sleepover, on a sugar high of Mountain Dew and Nintendo's Tecmo Super Bowl. And now I digress.

Tecmo Super Bowl is the greatest video game of all-time. Admittedly, I am a sports video game guy, and never really touched any other genre through the Nintendo, Sega Genesis, Nintendo 64, Playstation, Playstation 3, etc. days. I also never became a video game junkie, and haven't owned a console in almost five years.

For the kids out there, if you have never played Tecmo Super Bowl, please do so. First off, for my generation, it is much more different than the spoiled XBOX Live generation who is used to real-life graphics. Tecmo Super Bowl paved the way for the Madden dynasty in the football video game genre.

Everyone knows that the Los Angeles Raiders are the king's of the game. Bo Jackson, and kids, search Youtube for Tecmo Bo Jackson and you'll see, could run 99 yards, then go backwards, and then run 99 yards again for a touchdown. No lie, it's been done, believe me. On defense, it's crucial to have a quick Outside Linebacker. There are a few on the game, but the thunder to Bo Jackson's lightning is none other than current Fox Sunday analyst Howie Long. The key to this OLB position is where they lineup on the extra-point kicks, and the fast ones can block those one-pointers. Remember, this game predates the two-point conversion.

But kiddies, as we fought over who could be the Raiders in our Tecmo Tournaments over Christmas break in grade school, I had the insight to let my friends be the Raiders two and three times over....if they gave me a quarter for 25 sour patch kids from the penny candy store. The penny candy store closed when I was in 6th grade, and it was the saddest day ever for kids in Annawan.

That penny candy deal was because I knew that the Kansas City Chiefs were the poor man's L.A. Raiders. The second best, and fastest running back was Christian Okoye, who had the speed, and the power to burst through would-be-tacklers, and score at will. On the defensive side, Derrick Thomas, at the OLB, may be even better than Howie Long.

Of course, it didn't take long for the other kids in the neighborhood to discover this, so the penny candy-for-Raiders trade didn't last too long. Another Tecmo note, you had to feel sorry for the Chicago Bears superfans that just had to be their favorite team. The running back duo of Neal Anderson and Brad Muster just didn't get the job done.

I am sure that my introduction to 4:00 a.m. was in one of my friend's basement screaming after another Christian Okoye touchdown run, while slamming another Mountain Dew, and finishing off a bag of sour patch kids.

Later in life, the college years, 4:00 a.m. meant something completely different. Gone were the days of staying up until that hour on a sugar high, now it became the hour when you just go to bed. Whether it being staying up all night playing poker, or having a good time, it was 4:00 a.m. that became the new bedtime.

In my timeline of 4:00 a.m. I had to deal with a very difficult obstacle during these college years. One year, I was out until 4:00 a.m. and then suddenly, with my first job in radio, I had to turn right around and wake up at 4:00 a.m. to make the half hour drive to the radio station and read the news and sports in the morning.

At that time, I thought I would never, ever, ever get up that early. I would complain about having to work at 7:00 a.m. while in high school at the grocery store. Little did I know, I would be more and more accustomed to working at this stage of the morning, and frankly, I would like getting up that early.