Patterns and habits

Ever notice how you'll do something -- anything -- for a certain period of time, often a very long period, and then you realize you HAVEN'T done it in a good long time? But there was no set date when you decided you'd stop...it just kinda happened. And it's only after a few weeks that this dawns on you. And I DO mean stupid little things, the mundane patterns or habits of daily life. Like, in my case, watching FRASIER every single night at 12:30am, followed by either FRASIER again or THE GOLDEN GIRLS. Of course, even if I wanted to, I can't watch FRASIER twice on Ch. 11 anymore because the geniuses at the, um, CW Network have decided to replace it with...are you honestly fucking ready?...ACCORDING TO JIM. Sad on so many levels. I feel compelled to add that when I say "watch," I mean it's "on" while i'm generally doing other things. Yes, I feel the constant need to stress that I rarely JUST sit there staring at a television. But back to my patterns. I used to take the garbage or recyclables out at ungodly late hours...anytime between 1 and 4am. I realized last night -- when I took bottles out at about 12:30am -- that I now find it taxing to make a special trip outside at that hour. But when did I stop? And why? I also realized, though, that I usually combined such garbage trips with sitting on the front steps, and I KINDA missed that, but even that's grown a tad old. But give it time...I'm sure i'll be back on the porch late at night once it gets refreshingly brisk. It's tempting to call this all a very stupid topic to blog about. But if we all just jiggled around the daily minutae of our lives, think how much more, dare I say, INVIGORATING things could be! Why DO you do the things that you do, and the way that you do them, every day? Most likely, it just HAPPENED. There's no big reason. I love habits and patterns, but i'm increasingly aware of how much fun -- and how easy -- it is to slide out of certain ones.