h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

What's the bloody point in going to sleep before midnight? All it means is I wake up at bloody 5am for no bloody good reason

Good morning

It's not even 7 o'clock yet and I've been up for almost two hours Even though I've had almost six hours kip (which for me is a good night's sleep), my body thinks I haven't because I woke up so early, and it's making me feel all bleary-eyed and tired

I hate the dawn. Always have done. Humans are meant to wake up *after* the sun has risen.

I recently read somewhere that humans true circadian rhythms have been trashed since the industrial revolution and the invention of electric lighting.

Apparently our natural sleep cycles were never meant to be "a solid 8 hours sleep at night". Rather, we might sleep for 3-4 hours, then get up in the middle of the night for an hour or so, then back to sleep for a few more hours, then up in the morning and have a nice healthy nap in the heat of the day.

My typical pattern is:

Sun-Mon: 4.5 hours fitful sleep. Wake at 0515
Mon-Tue: 5 hours fitful. Wake at 0515
Tue-Wed: 5.5 waking up only about 3-4 times briefly (a "good" night) Wake at 0515
Wed-Thu: Same as above, maybe 6 hours. Wake at 0515
Fri: Pass out around 0300 wake up around crack of noon.
Sat: With luck, I go to sleep at midnight, and wake up around 1100 hardly stirring all night. This is when I try to make up for the previous week.
Sun: See Fri.

Repeat.

This can't be healthy.

The British have done many unpleasant things in the course of human history, sometimes to ourselves and our own culture, often to others, but as far as I'm concerned the worst thing we ever foisted upon the world is the industrial revolution and everything that came out of it including (but by no means limited to) factories, bosses, industrialisation, the middle class, the working week and the opportunity for capitalism to flourish and control the world.

I'm embarrassed.

I've heard about this first sleep/second sleep idea. I believe Samuel Pepys mentioned it in his diary, and I suppose any culture that practices the siesta still sort of does it, although with a much longer gap between the sleeps. Cultures in most European countries don't get much in the way of 'heat of the day', except for a brief period in the summer, but even though I'm from one of those cultures the post-lunch dip is often felt, and a nap around that time can be just what the body needs.

I seem to find it impossible to sleep more than four hours very ofetn hence I'm useually utterly drained Whatever time I go to bed, no matter how tired I am, I'm useually still awake two hours later, having not managed to fall asleep... then I eventualy* do, but sleep so lightly I@m useually aware of everything that is goign on, say hearing things in the street etc... Slep last night, very lightly for about an hour, between 3 and 4, then got up to visit the bathroom... then was still awake at 6, slept maybe 2 hours, and was awake by 8 listening to the news Feel so tired now, yet I know I'd not sleep if I tried The few occasions I sleep like 6 or 7 hours, pretty-much straight through; I feel worse Having constant light polution here, and a constant dawn chorus all night through (due to the lighting outside consfusing the birdies I guess), doesn't help I guess...

I fixed the light pollution problem in my bedroom ages ago when I occasionally had to work graveyard shifts at Mission Control. I hung a couple of serapes (Mexican blanket/poncho) over my windows. Works a charm. They double over the curtain rod and are lightproof except just a bit that leaks around the edges. Without them, I'd probably have a tougher time sleeping late on the weekends.

During my years of working half the week on nights and half on days I did four things before I went to bed at... anything between 3am and 7am:

1. Put the answering machine in a drawer and cover it with a couple of t-shirts. It was an old one with two regular cassettes - one each for the outgoing and incoming messages, and it made a loud noise when it picked up a call.
2. Turn off the ringer on the phone.
3. Put in earplugs
4. Put on an eyeshade.

Heavy curtains are a given in most British homes.

I might have to start wearing earplugs again. My downstairs neighbour seems to have their heater going 24/7 when it's cold and a/c going 24/7 when it's warm. Yes, warm, not even hot. That might be what woke me up this morning - the windows in these apartments keep out virtually no sound whatsoever, and the (old and noisy) a/c unit is directly below the bedroom window.

My curtains are pretty rubbish really... But even with knocking out the light, I'd still get the constant dawn chorus all night though, from the poor confused lickle birdies who're bathed in light 24/7 Noise up here can be a problem too, asides the birdies, though its better now than it used to be; Even with total scilence and no light that doesn't always make the slightest differnce adn I'll still not sleep

I went to bed a little later last night, but not by much, and woke up at 6am this morning. Not ideal but far more preferable to 5am, and it means I got just about six hours sleep.

I've felt so tired, again all day... so tried nap... and of course coudln't sleep... got to about 11, PM, about an hour ago, and finally felt more awake than I have all day now its midnight... starting to feel a bit* sleepy again... maybe try for sleep sometime after 1, which should if I'm lucky see me asleep by about 3 I'm sure I used to be able to sleep, I just seem to have forgotten how... and yes, I have tried sleeping after more... physically active days (even after, say doing lots of walking etc), and no... that doesn't particularly seem to make any differnce Its probably all the side affects of using computers... and all the governments brain reading radiation affecting out brain wave patturns, or soemthing they put in the water... or the government induced paranoia caused by their messing with our food or... soemthing

In the last week or two, I've adopted a new technique that has helped me fall asleep faster and go back to sleep easier than I have since I was a kid. I'm rather surprised it's working so well, because I've tried similar but more intense methods many times before to various degrees of success. What I'm doing now is just an overly simple and basic meditation technique I heard some fellow mention on TV. The guy was pimping his new book (Dan Harris, Ten Percent Happier) on either The Daily Show or Colbert, and when asked to sum up the point of his book in one sentence he described this simple meditation technique to shut up your inner monologue. Just notice your breathing, whether in your nose, lungs or diaphragm, just notice it, focus on it and let it clear your mind of that stupid voice in your head that won't shut up. That voice in my head is an evil entity who sometimes undermines me, sometimes he obsesses about trivial or important things with equal verve, sometimes he just keeps singing advertising jingles or annoying, cloying pop songs. I've tried shutting this bastard up before. I've tried counting in prime numbers. I've tried tapping my foot (often to prime numbers), I've tried concentrating on relaxing my body in 7 steps with controlled breathing, basically self hypnosis. Sometimes it's worked, sometimes not. But for some inexplicable reason this simple instruction has been working for me. Heck, this morning, I woke up 15 minutes before the alarm clock. Normally, I'd just get up rather than toss and turn for those 15 minutes, but I actually managed to go deeply asleep in maybe around 2-3 minutes. I never fall asleep that fast on purpose.

I don't think this technique is special, or would necessarily be effective for others. I just think I gave my self permission to let it work. I do expect it to stop working at some point, likely soon. But maybe not. Maybe I've just obsessed about insomnia and let that voice be the boss when I didn't need to.

Whatever, I'll take it while I can.

I may have to try that or soemthing very simular... strange thing is, when awake, during the day, I can quite easily (most of the time), set myself into a kinda deep medative like state, within seemingly little effort... yet at night... that inner voice... that stupid inner voice... rumbling along about utter nonsense, stufff I want to do, order I want to do boring stuff in, stuff I've not done... again and again, round and round in my head, like a giant going round thing... but, the few times I've tried to purposefully get into soemthing like a medatitive state, before bed, that just blows away, the moment I try get into bed, and go to sleep... like my subconscious doesn't want me to sleep... or just wants to run though the otter rubbish stuff that fills my head for hours on getting into bed... I know I take a long while to fall asleep, even William's commented on it, and I'm kinda half evnsious just how quickly he can drop off to sleep, at night

My mother and sister both made my dad and I envious. They could both fall asleep within seconds of their heads hitting the pillow.

My mother can sleep through thunderstorms easily and even slept through and industrial explosion that shook our house with a shockwave from 10 miles away.

I must say that I can sleep through much more noise than I once could. I credit going to motorcycle rallies and getting really .

Things are settling back into their usual pattern - I turned out the light at about half past midnight last night and woke up at about 6.30am.

One thing I've noticed in the past year or so - I'm finding it much harder to read in bed these days. It could be that I'm just not reading the right books - I haven't actually bought a new book for a while so I'm going through books I've already read, but that never used to be much of an issue. I have plenty of books I don't mind re-reading. But these days I'd rather drift off listening to the wireless. Which could be what helps my insomnia because I want to listen to speech radio, and four nights a week that means the BBC World Service, which mostly means news, and news these days seems designed solely for the purpose of making people depressed or angry. 'Worry porn' I heard someone call it. Not what you want just before going to sleep.

I read in bed quite a lot. I'm not sure why, because it never really works! There is usually one of two possible outcomes: first is I fall asleep after about a page and don't get any further on with the book, and it makes it hard to get back into it. The second is I get completely engrossed, fight sleep in order to keep reading, and eventually nod off just 3-4 hours before I have to get up.

I should probably change that habit - it's not a great partnership either for my reading or my sleep!

Seemed to sleep lots and lots last night... but didn't exactly leave me feeling like I had slept that much/long so maybe just not deep enough sleep...

to many noises round here, all night long... quiet but there, and so much electrical hum in the area round here, and, indeed in the house... at least I now know I've definately not got tinitus... unless, I'm in bed, at night, when I have, but only* in this house ; must* be some electrical noise I'm hearing, really high pitched... Mind, at least the not tinitus is useually drowned out by the constant sound of the fans, at the shops downstairs at the back... (on refridgeration?), or the PC fans downstairs ... or just the lighting in the house, which I can seem to hear too and that's before proper* external noises, like traffic and trains and plains and people, and bikes, and ocean liners.
(yeh, the ocean liners confuse me, we're no where near the sea, and there isn't a port here, just a ickle little river... ) well... sounds like ocean liner to me, anyhow, though now I think about it, not heard that in ages...
Then, again, There was a clown outside the other night though, with a clown car... making the clown car noise... which was kinda creapy...

I read just about every night. I'm currently working my way through the Game of Thrones books, but interspersed by other books, which is sometimes difficult. The paperbacks are heavy and thick which makes it a bit uncomfortable afer a whilee.

Sometimes I fall asleep after a page or two - sometimes i keep reading but I go a page or two and realise I haven't taken anything in.

And now it's been warm lately so I have been too warm. Plus I'm now at the stage where night-sweats are a pain in the neck so I never get an unbroken night.