Sunday, May 11, 2008

Lazy Sunday, Sleep

I spent the better part of yesterday doing some landscaping. The wife and I built some raised beds in front, which almost killed me. I had planned doing some mulch-spreading today, but it is raining. The wife, Cooper, and Babe are gone. My truck is full of wet mulch and really shouldn't be driven. I really have nothing to do. So today is a Lazy Sunday. It basically drives me crazy. Due to my industrious nature, and my many responsibilities (job, house, daughter, doomsday device research), I never really get to relax. I have so much to do in a small amount of time that most of my relaxing is planned, or during sleep.

That brings me to an interesting topic: sleep. I remember when I got alot of it. The first time I paid attention to sleep was probably high school. I probably went to sleep from on average at 9:30 on weeknights. I would wake up around 7, so that was about 9.5 hours a night. I also was a competitive weight lifter back then (aka powerlifter), and I think the workouts would make me want to sleep more. I didn't really put that together until much later, so I am unsure if that is why I slept so much. College was a sleep fest as well. Classes, friends, grades, were all second to proper sleepage.

Summer of my Sophomore year I took Calculus 3 (The Return of Newton). It was an early class, that I actually had to go to to get good grades in. I started drinking coffee at that time. That was basically the beginning of me getting much less sleep. But, it didn't last long, because when the fall semester started, I started back to my old ways of only attending post-10:00 classes. What a terrible way to start the day, at 10:00.

Really, I started getting much less sleep when I started my first real job as a teacher. I simply worked so hard that I had to put in a lot of long days and weekends and I could not find the time to sleep. I also drank a lot of coffee. Grad-school also showed me how much I can get done if I put in long hours. When our daughter came things went from bad to worse.

These days I probably average 7 hours and am unaffected if I get 6. the amount of times I have broken that rule this year can probably be counted on one hand. I worked so hard yesterday moving all that dirt that I'd thought I would sleep until 10:30 in the morning. I woke up today at 6:00 when my wife left for work and could not get back to sleep. There is no amount of activity or prior lack of sleep that would make me sleep 9 hours. I ran a mini marathon about 2 weeks ago and I did not take a nap that day or get extra sleep that night.

I tried napping today due to overall weakness and fatigue and just laid there. Sometimes I will be so sleepy that I am 100% sure I will fall asleep. And when I go to take a nap, I just lay there.

I think my problem is my mentality toward sleep. I basically view it as a chore, and something that detracts from the things I could be doing with my time. When I lay down for a nap, or in the morning when the sun is out, I think about all the things I should be doing, and I cannot rest.

I guess my point is, that I think it is remarkable how my sleeping habits have changed over the years. I have went from 9 to 7 hours, on average. That doesn't seem like alot, but 2 hours a day is alot of extra time. ( almost 10% of your day) I have also noticed that it takes me much less time to fall asleep now, which is great (even if I think about the murderers coming to get me). It used to take me probably 30-60 minutes to fall asleep, but now I am out in less than 5 minutes. That seems drastic but it is true. I am pretty sure that is because I only lay down to sleep when I am truly sleepy, and do not oversleep anymore.

Anyone else out there have opinions about sleep?

What a boring blog. I should have told you the story of how I became a Sea Captain for the day.

Comments:
yes, sea captain for a day would have been a little more exciting :) i love naps! i always have and always will! sleeping is God's gift to us and I love it!
 
those are very interesting theories, but they are all wrong. its an age thing.

plus the monsters in your closet.
 
This comment has been removed by the author.
 
You are right, that blog was so boring that I didn't even read it all.

In unrelated news, I saw this pic of some ebay feedback on digg and it reminded me of you.
 
And here is some more from that guy...
 
Sleep for me is all about dreaming. Can you believe we spend 33% of our life sleeping. I can't believe how little we know about it with it being such a big part of our lives. I am going to sleep.

I liked the blog.
 
Reading this almost put me to sleep until I read the grammatical error and the automatic cringing abruptly returned me to consciousness
 
thanks to those of you who left postive or indifferent feedback.

bean, I'll try to make my blogs as stimulating as how to make grilled cheese tacos and pictures of my fish tank. i mean, fich tank.

anonymous, I mean paul, I corrected the single spelling mistake.
 
it wasnt me. i thought it was you. im not that witty.
 
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