I’m not sure what I was dreaming about last night, but I swear I was only asleep for 20 minutes when I woke up in a pile of drool. Whatever I was dreaming about was good enough to cause me to drool like a human Niagara Falls. Flipped my pillow over and fell back asleep. Near as I can tell that was it for drooling, just those twenty minutes – I didn’t actually check the time could have been longer.
I feel like I’m going old school again with my sleep habits thanks to SleepPhones.
When I was in high school I started falling asleep with a hat covering my eyes. It was a long sky blue knitted hat, and I pulled it down over my eyes to sleep. I loved it. I’m not sure where the hat is now, but that was it. Pull the hat down and I could fall sleep.
It was the start of me basically making a sleep routine for myself.
It evolved over time. To falling asleep with music on. That comes from old neurosis about hearing people talk as I lay in bed. I used to think I was hearing TV or voices while I was trying to sleep late at night, but when I would get up and search the house I wouldn’t find a TV on, or radio on, or anyone awake. When I’d lay back down I’d hear it again. I’m pretty sure my mind was playing tricks on me. Either that or someone was awake and didn’t want to be caught. Either way it led to me sleeping with a radio on. Come to think of it, this may predate my long blue hat.
In college I started sleeping with a pillow over my eyes. I called it Special Pillow. It was an old beat up down pillow. Almost nothing left to it. Older than any pillow had a right to be. But it was light enough, and malleable enough to just lay over the top of my head and block out any light in the room.
Special Pillow died a horrible death two years ago. It was basically disintegrating into nothing. Which considering how old it was, probably was a good thing. But it left me with nothing to put over my eyes or head.
Earlier this year I discovered SleepPhones. When Sam and I moved in together I had to start phasing out my sleep routine. I always fell asleep to Futurama. I’d put it on my laptop and pass out. It was at the point where if it was a dark room, and Futurama was on, I was falling asleep. I trained my body well to recognize that. But Sam needs quiet and darkness. A video on a laptop doesn’t work for that. I had gotten into the habit of putting headphones on and falling asleep to watching Futurama on Netflix through my phone. Headphones aren’t that comfortable to sleep in. But it was a good compromise. (Not the only one, I also sleep with my own sheet, as Sam wraps herself in blankets at night. We each have our own covers essentially.)
SleepPhones are amazing though. Essentially a light weight head band with small, thin headphones built in as ear pads rather than bulky ear buds or phones. And I can pull it down over my eyes. Old school style. I love it.
And the new couch proves comfy.
I woke up at 4 am and I struggled to get back to sleep.
I tried my usual trick…. put an episode of Futurama on my phone, turn it over, and fall asleep listening to it. Futurama has been my go to sleeping method for years. Almost never fails me. I’ve gone from falling asleep watching an episode, turn just hearing an episode and falling asleep. Sam struggles to fall asleep to noise or people talking…. I kind of need it. Sam needs dark, I can fall asleep with whatever. So our compromise is that I put Futurama on my my phone, flip the phone over so its dark still, and wear headphone while falling asleep. It’s sounds elaborate typed out, but its not. Sam never really complained about the light or noise, I just know she gets to sleep faster without it.
But while I fell alseep great last night. I woke up at 4 am and couldn’t get back to work with Futurama on my phone. So I tried sleeping trick number two: move locations. I went out to the living room to lay back down and try to fall asleep. It worked. It worked perfectly. Within minutes of laying down I got back to sleep.
I put that on new couch and his amazingness.
Of course I had a weird dream that I woke up at 7:59 and it was still dark outside. It was really vivid too. In my dream my alarms didn’t go off, and I kept checking my phone and it kept saying 7:59. It was dark outside and my alarms had never gone off. In my dream I grabbed Sam’s computer off the coffee table and it too said 7:59 (strange because Sam’s computer is on the coffee table this morning).
I blame that dream on the Scotchy Scotch Scotch I ate last night.
Sam bought me a pint of it and I may have eaten the whole pint in one sitting. It was fantastic and I couldn’t resist.
When I actually did wake up it was 5:36 am, 4 minutes before my alarm. Which still sucks, but at least I won’t be late for work.
I think I slept last night with a tight 
closed fist.
Not that I’m positive it was all night long, but I woke up with the fingers on my left hand hurting and needing to be cracked. Just stiff. I know I woke up once during the night and straightened my hand out. I don’t know how long it was in a fist, but half asleep I felt how stiff my fingers were and straightened them. Even now they are still sore. Just my left hand though.
Strangely though on my bike rides I have the same thing happen. My fingers feeling stiff after being wrapped around the handle bars for 30 – 40 mile rides. Lately I try to keep my fingers open more that closed and that seems to be helping. The handle bars on the new bike are slightly thicker than the handle bars on my old bike and I think that leaves my fingers in an awkward spot, slightly more open than they normally would be closed around something.
Maybe I’m just getting old…. older that is.
I am not normally a fan of the snooze button.
That’s not exactly true. I set two alarms instead of using a snooze button. One for 5:30am and one for 5:50am. Nothing in between. If I don’t get up at 5:30 then I sleep until 5:50. And I never get up at 5:30. But that’s a sneaky 20 minutes. I use it to trick my brain into thinking every weekday I’m going to be up at 5:30, and those 20 minutes are special and it only gets them on occasion.
This morning I tried to add another ten minutes into the situation. When the second alarm went off at 5:50am I set an alarm for 6:00 so I could sleep a little longer. My brain apparently didn’t appreciate this attempt at more sleep. I ended up laying awake for 7 minutes until I decided to just get out of bed.
I think my brain is in on the trick of setting two alarms.
When I first broke my collar bone and had surgery on it I could not sleep on that side, or either side during recovery. I slept sitting up on the couch and drooled all over myself. It was pretty bad, but apparently if I fall asleep sitting up I drool a lot.
Now and days I sleep on my side regularly. Its just how I fall asleep. And surprising I fall asleep a majority of nights on titanium collar bone side. I stretch my arm out under two pillows and pass right out. After I had finished the ‘healing process’ I still had to sleep on non-titanium side for years, I just couldn’t comfortable fall asleep on the side I had broken. So it is nice that I’ve passed that part.
Yesterday I woke up really sore in my shoulder on titanium side. I was stretching all day long to try and loosen it up. I feel asleep (or tried to) laying flat on my back with a pillow over the top of my head. It was bad, but I rolled in my sleep to my side, and woke up just as sore this morning.
Until I broke my collar bone I never payed attention to how I slept. I just put a pillow or hat down over my eyes and passed out. It seems bizarre that something I’m getting particular about how I sleep as I get older.
Eh. Go Life I suppose.
