3:39 AM. My left wrist itches like crazy. Hurry up, Zyrtec!

Some tiny, invisible terrorist decided my sleep was optional tonight. Ironically, its evil little act led to the production of several good, personally significant deeds. You know, the kind that only happen when you’re too tired to overthink and too awake to ignore the pull.

Twenty-four hours ago, the Open Code Orchestra was just a half-formed concept, another impulse idea floating around in the aether of my mind. Now, thanks to an overnight fever dream triggered by whatever creature decided to feast on my wrist, it’s real.

What Gets Built During Late-Night Creative Sessions

When you can’t sleep, you build. Here’s what emerged from my 3 AM productivity burst:

  • Patreon page setup: Complete with paid subscription tiers that actually make sense
  • New Stripe business account: Because apparently I’m launching this thing
  • Practice Log project optimization: README.md and LICENSE files that don’t embarrass me
  • New subdomain creation: oco.benchantech.com with its own GitHub Pages repository
  • Content rewrite: Previous post polished with 3 AM clarity
  • Bug bite treatment: Finally took an antihistamine
  • This blog post: Documenting the whole creative cascade (in French and Spanish, this means waterfall)

The Open Code Orchestra went from concept to infrastructure in the span of an itch-induced insomnia session. There’s something poetic about that: how the smallest disruptions can trigger the largest creative cascades.

Capturing Creative Inspiration When It Strikes

This reminds me that creative inspiration really comes in unexpected spurts, and it’s crucial to seize the moment. You can’t schedule breakthrough moments for business hours. They arrive at 3:39 AM via bug bite, or during a random conversation, or while you’re supposed to be doing something else entirely.

YY would absolutely agree, if he were awake—apparently, narrative lenses don’t react to bug bites the same way.

But here’s what I’ve learned about building creative projects: The infrastructure you build during these fever-dream sessions often outlasts the inspiration itself. Tomorrow, when the itch is gone and I’m properly de-histamined, the Open Code Orchestra will still be there. The Patreon subscription tiers will still make sense. The GitHub repository will still be live.

The bug bite will heal. The work will remain. Thank goodness for that.

Sometimes the smallest interruptions create the biggest creative breakthroughs. Or maybe I just needed an excuse to finally launch what I’d been planning. Either way, the Open Code Orchestra is now live, and my wrist has finally stopped itching.