Ask Mr. Smartypants

Today, I expose my dirty little secret, or rather dirty little secret No. 2,193, knowing many of you share this shame.

Thanks to working nights, an inability to force our daughter to sleep in her own room and very different snoozing and viewing habits for myself and my wife, I live in a sparsely furnished dorm room.

And thanks to Charter cable, I have reached the end of my badly frayed rope.

When Quinn was born, I was working two jobs, mild-mannered reporter by day, world's angriest waiter by night. When I got home at 1 a.m., Quinn would be in bed with Angela. I would pick her up and, when Angela stirred, say, "The baby is restless, I'll take her downstairs."

We would watch ESPN or a movie together for a couple of hours, each of us enjoying our respective bottles, then I would put her back in bed with Angela and catch a few hours' sleep in the guest room. Quinn was the size of a baking potato and I was the size of Idaho, so I did not want to risk "mashing the spud."

We would redecorate Quinn's room every few months, and she would say, "Mommy, that's beautiful," then refuse to sleep in it. In four different homes, Quinn managed to own five separate beds situated in seven rooms, all the while spending pretty much every night "in the big bed."

Quinn would say, "I love mommy, and I get scared when I sleep alone." This meant, "I am addicted to television like it's heroin and there is not one in my room. If you want me to go eight hours without TV, think rehab."

At one point, when I was working only days, we did move Quinn into her room for about a month. This was long enough to trade the comfy bed I slept in to my mother-in-law for a futon, at which point I went back on nights, Quinn went back to Angela, and I was suddenly sleeping on a futon.

When we finally got Quinn into her bed for good (with the lights on, the protection of 117 stuffed animals and, possibly, cloves of garlic), Angela and I had become incompatible. I get home at 1 a.m. and like to watch "The Daily Show" and "The Colbert Report," but turn the TV off and go to bed as soon as I get sleepy.

Angela wakes up when I switch the TV to Comedy Central, then wants to keep it tuned to "CSI: Miami" all night long. I don't sleep well with the TV on, and David Caruso gives me a fierce set of the jeebies.

Additionally, Angela and I do not think romance is enhanced by living in close quarters or hearing each other's sleep noises. We believe real passion springs from separate bathrooms, alone time, adequate rest, scented candles, extinguished lights and bargaining.

So I sleep on a rock-hard futon in a room equipped with a 13-inch Sylvania and a scarred night table. It's like the room the guys in "Shawshank Redemption" live in when they get out of jail, but it provides cable, and solitude, which is what men really need.

But 25-year-old TVs only get so many channels. Mine gets 60. Charter moved Comedy Central to 67 this week.

So there it is, my secret life. I'm now just an exhausted man on a futon weeping bitterly at an ancient TV that no longer receives Jon Stewart.

Honestly, it's enough to make a guy break down and sleep with his wife.