“I get five, six hours of sleep, max,” he says.
“That’s nothing,” she says. “I get four. On a good night.”
“I only need three,” another girl says. “Even on the weekends.”
“I pull all-nighters at least twice a week,” another guy says. “And some days all I need is a nap in my office after lunch. If I even take lunch.”
When did it become all the rage to brag about a lack of sleep? When did it turn into a competition? When did sleep become the new diet?
“I only had a bowl of cereal this morning and a small hamburger patty, no bun, for lunch. For dinner, it’ll be popcorn (94% fat-free).”
“I think I had a baked potato, plain, somewhere around noon, and the olive from my partner’s martini during the late meeting. Dinner, if I even have it, will probably be a salad.”
“Oh my god. I haven’t eaten since Tuesday. Except for Swedish fish. Does that count?”
What’s next? What other basic human need are people going to strive to deprive themselves of, and then feel self-righteous to brag about? Shelter?
“I had a great pre-war two-bedroom with a dining alcove on Central Park West, but now I live in Midtown in a studio apartment the size of an Old Navy dressing room.”
“Really? I had a cozy one-bedroom with a working fireplace in Gramercy Park, but now I crouch in the ill-lit, rat-infested hallway of my ex-boyfriend’s condemned Chinatown tenement!”
“I’m moving out of my Tribeca loft with private keyed elevator, exposed brick walls, random-width plank floors, walk-in closets, and stainless steel kitchen, into the ladies lounge at Saks —”
“Ooooh, nice!”
“— I mean the ladies room in Washington Square Park.”
Charming.
Who’s the winner, losers?