To Sleep, Perchance...

Philip Marlowe: Hmm.
General Sternwood: What does that mean?
Philip Marlowe: It means, hmm.
(From "The Big Sleep," Raymond Chandler)

How blessed are some people, whose lives have no fears, no dreads, to whom sleep is a blessing that comes nightly, and brings nothing but sweet dreams.
(From "Dracula," Bram Stoker)

Sleep that knits up the ravelled sleave of care
The death of each day's life, sore labour's bath
Balm of hurt minds, great nature's second course,
Chief nourisher in life's feast.
(From "Macbeth," William Shakespeare)

A good laugh and a long sleep are the best cures in the doctor's book.
~Irish Proverb




Lately, I seem to feel best when I'm sleeping. This is new. Most of the time, I have a hard time getting to sleep and staying asleep, possibly because I often feel like I don't have time to sleep (which is utterly stupid but sometimes I am powerless to combat stupidity). Normally, when I finally do get to sleep, I wake up periodically. If I manage four hours uninterrupted sleep a night, I'm good to go. Right now, however, sleep feels almost like some new-found luxury I'm reveling in. I feel like I'm getting too much -- and yet I can't get enough. I'm not sure how I feel about that. Not guilty; I don't do unnecessary guilt. It does feel strange, though.

I've been taking afternoon naps (and REM sleep in the afternoon is extremely unusual for me), sleeping in on weekends, and I've been in bed before midnight the last several nights. Subconsciously hoping, perhaps, that the sweet oblivion of sleep will help dissipate the rough edges of some recent nastiness that left me feeling pretty icky? Nah; I think that would be too obvious. Floating in the soft, fuzzy cocoon of sleep, there are no worries, no fretting, no anxieties. I'm rarely susceptible to those conditions, but every now and then...

And when I'm sleeping there are ... dreams. They aren't bad ones, either. I can't remember what they are, but if they were bad, they'd wake me up. They don't, which tells me it was good while it lasted.

Sleep is good. Not to be morbid about it, but I suppose it could be practice for the long dirt nap. I don't expect it any time soon, but then sometimes we don't know when it's coming, do we? We'll all take the big, long sleep sooner or later.

I could honest to God put my head down on my desk right now and drift off. I don't know which is worse, this sudden onslaught of pseudo-narcolepsy or the more frequent bouts of insomnia that plague me. I know there's a cause and effect, the law of action and reaction in play. There is surely some way to get both equality and moderation going here. There must be. If only I could get a viable, provable formula worked out...

Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.
~Dylan Thomas

Anyone feel like taking a gander at today's Words Gone Wild?

becomming
ebing said
apprently
thougths
negatism


An elderly couple in their 80s were about to get married.
She said, I want to keep my house.
He said, That's fine with me.
She said, And I want to keep my Cadillac.
He said, That's fine with me.
She said, And I want to have sex 6 times a week.
He said, That's fine with me. Put me down for Fridays.

You Are Not Destined to Rule the World

You are destined for something else... Like inventing a new type of cupcake. You just don't have the stomach for brutality. But watch out - because many people do!

Are You Destined For World Domination?