insomnia part 7000: 99 reasons.

(1:56 a.m.)

Is it because it is snowing?

Is it because of The List?

Is it because I don't know if I'll ever finish my grading?

Is it because I have no oven and therefore no cookies? and when will I ever?

Is it because of that rejection I got today while I was in church?

Is it because of the Diet Coke I drank with dinner?

Is it because of a corrosive self-doubt?

Is it because of the funny little I-don't-know-what (not to say je ne sais quoi) in my throat?

Is it because tomorrow is Monday?

Is it because there's a wedding in five days?

(to be continued)

In excess of three strikes.

This morning, I arrived at work one hour early for an appointment, spilled my warm beverage on my shirt, did an emergency washup in the restroom that resulted in cold wet shirt syndrome, then spilled my beverage again, this time on the floor, while fetching a fork from the utensil dispenser. Three strikes, I said, maybe even aloud, in the cafeteria, walking away from the spill as if it had nothing to do with me.

But let me start over.

Last night, I got into bed. I assumed my auto-sleep posture (state secret). I closed my eyes. I felt the imminence of sleep, for about twenty minutes, until the Awake Fairy tapped me right on the eyelids and said, fat chance.

I got up and added a bunch more lines to a poem I have started. Dubious lines, if you must know. I researched the source of the Los Angeles river (Bell Creek and Arroyo Calabasas). I wrote until I felt not just sleepy but exhausted. I was seventy-five, eighty percent exhausted. I came back to bed, assumed the posture (state secret), and fell asleep for real.

Five hours later, alarm. Not just the phone going off, my state of mind at what the day was likely to be. Spilled beverage, wet shirt, too early, and another spill. Not to mention hurty eyes and a tiny but naggy headache. I'm not complaining, this is just reportage. This is, like, the science of reportage. It's straight up data, man.

Years from now when they study the data set of today, they will find what any fool could have predicted: compromised productivity. Constant pulse-checking (pulse being a metaphor here--sorry about that, data!). Possible surges of self-pity. Clock-watching. Meeting meeting meeting, all of which were sleep-deprivation compromised.

In the end--by which I mean the end of the day--I came home, traffic seeming extra-sluggish, and fell, it's not too strong a word, into bed for an hour, which gave me exactly enough stamina to eat leftover pasta with pesto, and then laid around all evening, watching bits from Trevor Noah and Ghostbusters.

I'm assuming, in an excess of optimism, that this will be a one time event. That I will wake tomorrow in full possession of my faculties, including the ability to hold on to my beverage and read a schedule. And then I will find my will to live and--let's hope--my will to grade, because the Lord knows I need to. Here's to the Awake Fairy finding her appropriate place on another side of the planet, and the sleep posture (state secret) doing its appointed work.

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The week in review.

Week in review. by lisab

Enough already.

Last night when I could not sleep AGAIN, I thought about this fancy fact:

NOVEMBER USED TO BE NABLOMO (is there supposed to be another syllable there? somehow it seems like there should be one. Oh well.), aka National Blogging Month, where you blog every day and win a prize, or not, but at least you blogged. (Right! NabloPOmo--National Blog Posting Month. The fact that I could not remember that says everything, absolutely everything.)

Perhaps some of you, the people, may remember when that fact used to mean something around here.

Well, I am tired of being a person who doesn't blog anymore. Not blogging is for suckers. Not blogging is symptomatic of the joy that gets sucked out of life because of The Grind, which also, and perhaps not coincidentally, happens to be for suckers. Suckers: I am going to blog again. A lot. Every day from now until the end of the year, even if it's just nothing at all. That's right, you can count on me for daily blogging, often about nothing at all, until the end of the year, December 31. And after that, maybe I will just keep right on blogging, or maybe I will have won a fabulous prize and I will be too awesome to blog anymore. We'll just have to see.

ANYWAY. I happened to be perusing one of my new favorite blogs, hyperbole and a half. And whilst perusing, I happened upon her Twitter feed ("FOLLOW!"). And then, on her Twitter feed, I found another funny (also: salty, so feel free to beware) blog called More is Better. On More is Better's Twitter feed, she has this to say about herself:

"Always cooks with real butter"? That's a pretty good motto. How about this, which More is Better also has to say about herself:

It may have occurred to the more discerning of my readers that "Always cooks with real butter" and "deliciously vulgar" could be MY mottos (also: "More is Better"--I should probably sue More is Better, as I'm quite certain that I'm the original on that one, too). This leads me to think I should be proactive and snag the good mottos, since they seem to be being taken by More is Better at a pretty good clip. Let's get down to it:

"See the potato chips, feel the shine."

"Hand-built by movies."

"Exceedingly Good Shopping."

"Good to the last whine."

"Uh oh, better get housekeeping." or maybe:

"Housekeeping: it's everywhere you wanna be."

"Designed for shoes."

(these slogans brought to you by the Slogan Generator, courtesy of the Surrealist.)

Tomorrow: recipes for cooking what is in my house, because I'm pretty sure the roads will be too snowy to go out. That's right: recipes. Tune in.

You know you want to know this.

My sleep patterns just could not be more riveting:

sleep disorder. from lisab on Vimeo.

Thanks for watching.

The facts about today.

Bruiser woke me at 4 a.m.

Wrote.  Ate a bowl of Kix.

Woke the historian and climbed back in bed at 7.

Awoke three and a half hours later.  

Cleared my head, got dressed, ran some errands.

Found this, this, this and this in the piles of cds everywhere.

Bought lipstick and Sundance tickets.

Wrote some more.

Asked myself this question:  What connects grief and the will?

Read.

Made red lentil soup. Laundered. Waited for the historian to get home. Walked Bruiser.

Tried this and viewed this. (via kottke)

The Jazz beat Indiana.

That is all.

Sleeping and not sleeping.

Having a little bit of an insomnia wave here, wherein for a variety of reasons I find myself unable to drift into sleep and then have to get up and do whatever. Read, check to see if running son has written, surf the internet pointlessly.

Last night, I think the murder mystery novel I was reading was the tipping point into sleeplessness, as it were. It was a pretty good one--Murder is Academic, a novel I picked up at the Bingham Creek library (the superior West Jordan library) because (a) I liked its cover, (b) it was about academia, and (c) it took place in Great Britain--a slightly fictionalized Cambridge, as it happens.

English teachers everywhere will be happy to know that this mystery turns on an incident of plagiarism. There was a red herring case of student plagiarism, but the fatal act consisted of a professor plagiarizing a student. Talk about your turn of the screw.

Luckily, I was able to finish it and put my mind (or the plot, take your pick) to rest. That meant a slightly cranky day with a nap in it. But it's ended well, as I'm now starting a new Inspector Rebus novel--Ian Rankin, Resurrection Men. I'm in hopes that I will be able to leave it alone for a solid seven hours tonight.