Of course you are all excited about the big holiday coming up and are wondering how to celebrate it.

That's why I'm here with this suggestion: Go to sleep.

We speak, of course of National Napping Day, which, as it happens, falls this year on March 12, the day after Daylight Savings Time steals a precious hour of rack time so that the whole country will be sleep-deprived, cranky and generally unproductive.

OK, so it won't be that much different from any other Monday, but it's just going to seem worse.

National Napping Day was the dream (snork!) of Bill and Camille Anthony, who published "The Art of Napping at Work" in 1999 and organized the first national observance of Napping Day. According to a story about their efforts in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, a few businesses celebrate with company-wide nap breaks that include a free lunch, soothing music and sleep masks. Employees are encouraged to bring mats, lounges and pillows to work, and everyone celebrates "nap time" in the early afternoon, but the observance hasn't spread far and wide, Bill Anthony says.

"It's obvious to me that well-rested workers perform better and more safely on the job. There is less stress, less fatigue, but I guess it's not so obvious to most employers," he says.

Well, no. According to the Wall Street Journal, employers are getting to be pretty insistent that workers stay awake at work. "Power napping" had a brief vogue in the 1990s, but with a sluggish economy, firms are much less tolerant of people nodding off at their desks. (If you're not busy it would seem to be the perfect time to catch a few Z's, particularly during staff meetings, but executives can be so short-sighted.)

The Journal even says that some workers face discipline if they start snoozing. So it takes some creativity to catch up on your beauty rest. For example, a Pennsylvania advertising executive had fallen asleep at her desk, her face propped in her hands, when she heard her boss's voice at her side. Before raising her head, she murmured a quick, "Amen," turned to greet him and escaped a reprimand.

It's worth reminding executives to wake up (snork!) to the fact that a well-rested employee is not only a more productive employee but a healthier one. The most recent medical study on the benefits of napping came out of Harvard Medical School and Athens Medical School just last month. Researchers found that siestas lower stress, which helps prevent cardiovascular disease.

So instead of offering corporate gym memberships and threatening employees with dismissal if they are caught sneaking a smoke, companies could just let sleeping dogs lie, so to speak.

But pro-nappers are up against the Protestant work ethic. One of the Harvard researchers noted: "Here, if a person naps, people say, 'You lazy slob.' There they say, 'Did you have a good nap?' So there's going to be a difference how much naps help."

It's enough to tire you out.

TOM REILLY is a Sun Chronicle news editor He can be reached at 508-236-0332 or at treilly@thesunchronicle.com. But try not to wake him.