I’VE been driving to work in the dead of night for 15 years in Canberra.

My alarm goes off at 2.45am every weekday. I usually hit the road by 3.30, driving from Tuggeranong to Mitchell.

There are a few things I’ve learnt from that experience:

• While most people are asleep, many of those who aren’t are working and pretty much everyone on the job at 3.30am is sleep deprived and unlikely to have a sense of humour.

• If you need to iron a shirt, do it the night before because there’s nothing worse than ironing at 3am.

• Coffee tastes four times better before sunrise.

• Although McDonalds Drive-thru may well be open, some staff members may be unconscious.

• Service station pie warmers are to be avoided at that time of the day.

• In winter, if you leave home at 3.30, you’re usually too early to get ice on the windscreen.

• Kmart Belconnen really does stay open for 24 hours a day.

• Kangaroos and foxes are more active when the moon is full.

• Even though it’s stupid o’clock, if you slip through a red light, there will be a police car somewhere in the shadows.

I’ve learnt also that there are, astoundingly, four times as many cars on the road on a Friday morning as there are on any other weekday. I’m assuming it’s people driving home after partying at licensed venues till the wee hours. But I don’t understand, according to my listeners, why the converse is true of the Friday morning peak hour.

Could it possibly be so that the same people who party all night on Thursday night  – the ones who pass me on the way home – are having Friday off? Is it public servants flexing off to create long weekends? If you know the answer to this mystery, let me know.

Mark Parton is the breakfast announcer on 2CC