i did it for a year, in my mid 20’s. working 60 hours a week in a grocery warehouse, i made good money for not having a college degree. and i had no problem sleeping during the day back then. i used to live in an apartment at the time, and there was a bar next door, so me and my roommate would walk to the bar and listen to music on my days off, i think that was the last time i’ve been to a bar, which was more than 10 years ago.
i wouldn’t do it again, as i can’t sleep during the day and don’t want to drive at night, but it was mostly a good experience, except i was so stressed from working so much.
I used to work nights with my old next door neighbour at London Gatwick airport doing sign fitting when it was less busy.
Didn’t really bother me much. We were always in well lit areas with no outside windows in the terminal, so you wouldn’t know it was night time apart from the lack of passengers.
I once did snowplowing. From like 9pm till 9am then slept for 8 hours and did another 12 hour shift, then slept again then another 6hrs.
Plowing was fun and pretty easy
Worked graveyard as a security guard when I was 19. I guarded what we call here, “industrial parks”. This was 1980, the start of "Silicon Valley in California which later in the nineties became the center of the electronics and technological boom of the world, where start-up companies were creating millionaire’s every week.
Industrial parks were kind of “strip malls” for electronics. Where orchards and fields were torn down and huge buildings were erected.
My job was to guard these areas while they were still being built and to stop potential thief’s from stealing lumber. I didn’t do it long, I think I was there for about a month and half before I quit. I hated it, I was out in the middle of nowhere guarding these huge sites and it stressed me out so I just got in the back seat of my car and slept, lol. I think it was my last job before the hospital.
Later in about 2006, I worked graveyard for 8 months stocking shelves at Target. Almost got in trouble with the law for filing a false Workman’s Comp claim. They wanted me to go up to San Francisco to be interviewed by lawyers and other Workman Comp officials on a 6 man board to see if I was guilty. But just days before the meeting the lady in charge called it off and the charges were dropped. I think the penalty for filing a false claim was a $100,000 and two years in prison.
There’s a good movie about a guy who works at night, it’s called Nightcrawler. It’s either on netflix or amazon prime. Personally, I had one job that started at 5am and I had to be up by 3am.
I did security at a boat Marina for a little bit. It was really boring. I would drive around on a golf cart at night so I wouldn’t get bit by mosquitos. This is before I got sick.
Then I worked in a corner store from 5PM to 5 AM - 4 days straight. I had fun there until the place got robbed. Then the owner disrespected me and I quit on him after 10 months working there. I was functioning very well and had just quit taking my medications. Eventually I relapsed.
I did a permanent afternoon shift which was like 3pm to 11pm. It was great. Back then I got like a 20% shift allowance and it paid well. My life was rather odd as every second day I’d go to sleep at daybreak which was really weird. Still. I enjoyed it.