You might be surprised to learn that I don't own Batman. I don't even own Alfred, more's the pity.
Only getting home at around four or five o'clock in the morning, it is hardly a surprise that Master Bruce sleeps in until ten-thirty. Unless it has been an especially trying night, I wake him up at ten-thirty – eleven o'clock would be positively bohemian and totally irresponsible of him if he is to properly attend meetings and such.
Therefore, every morning, I open the curtains, place the breakfast tray by his bedside and embark upon my daily attempts to awake the young man.
You see, Master Bruce has the most horrific snoring that I have encountered in my life. And like all snorers, he is exceptionally difficult to wake when what he wants to do is sleep. Everyone seems to believe that he would wake up at a pin drop, alert and ready for lycra-clad action. This is patently untrue. It is my fervent belief that if he hadn't been forcibly awake already, Master Bruce would have slept through the cataclysm that lead to that No-Man's Land debacle.
It only takes a matter of seconds for him to go from half-conscious brooding to being in a deep state of slumber, snoring like chainsaw being revved through a megaphone.
It is understandable, though. Master Bruce has had well over thirty years to perfect his infernal snoring. Running a multi-billion dollar business nearly every day and obsessively protecting Gotham every night means that he is undoubtedly always tired to the bone when he finally retires to his bed. He has, to my infallible knowledge in these matters, also never slept with a woman – which in turn means that he has never had a lady relentlessly poke him in the middle of the night in order to stop him snoring.
Don't misinterpret my words, though. I'm sure that he has made love to numerous women. But Master Bruce never has been the kind of man trusting enough to go to sleep with them afterwards (a state of affairs that I shall discuss with the young man soon enough).
Therefore, every morning as I endeavour to rouse him from his slumber, I am driven to use evermore increasing inventive and extreme methods. Some work best on certain special occasions, whereas others are foolproof last resorts (like the air horn). Many of them can be considered quite cruel really. For instance, I noticed in the paper this morning that the Egyptian wing of the Gotham Museum was broken into but nothing stolen…
"Master Bruce, a Mistress Selina is on the phone..."
"WHA! WHERE! Kitty?"
Ah, the simple pleasures.