Bookshelf: 'A Reward for Sleepless Nights'

An anthology by six authors. What comes to mind when you hear 'a reward for a sleepless night' may vary from person to person (for example, watching a movie), but the reward in this book is a late-night snack. Since drinking parties disappeared due to COVID, I've started prioritizing sleep, so I don't go out for ramen after drinking anymore. However, I have done that in the past, and when I look back on it, I feel a sense of nostalgia, thinking, 'That was actually pretty good, wasn't it?'

I wrote about ramen because there were two stories about it. 'Eating Back-Fat Ramen Together Late at Night' by Hitsuji Tomoi and 'Incorrect Ramen' by Fumie Kondo. Eating ramen as a late-night snack is 'incorrect' from a health perspective, or perhaps it carries a strong sense of 'guilt,' but including that immoral aspect, it really is delicious. Both of these stories about eating ramen made my heart race at times, but I thought the endings were wonderful.

Not just as a child, but even as an adult, I think my sleep duration is longer than average, and I'm not good at staying up late. Because of that, I don't have many memories of staying up late at night. The only things that come to mind are the one time I pulled an all-nighter in the lab during college, and the one time in junior high when I stayed up later than usual to listen to the radio. I stayed up late because I wanted to listen to B'z. Being awake at a time when I would normally be asleep felt somewhat extraordinary, and I remember feeling like I was all alone in my room.
I didn't stay up late studying for entrance exams either, so I never had any late-night snacks.