Rant #3,114: Sleepy Joe

Yes, it is very early in the morning that I am writing this.

It looks like it is one of those nights that I can’t sleep, although I actually did do some sleeping earlier this evening.

I think I fell asleep at about 8:15 p.m. while watching WWE Raw with my son.

Watching professional wrestling always relaxes me, to the point that I generally fall asleep right in the middle of the TV shows.

Watching these shows is almost like taking a fast-working sleeping pill, and although I enjoy watching these shows, I invariably conk out while doing so.

Anyway, I fell sleep watching the show at about 8:15 p.m. or so, and I then woke up at about 9:45 p.m. and after I wished my son a good night, I went straight for my bed, joining my wife in dreamland.

But then I woke up at about 11:15 p.m., went to the bathroom for a minute, and crawled back into bed.

But sleep simply didn’t last for me, and I have been up since a little after 1 a.m.

And in the middle of trying to sleep, I remembered something that I had forgotten—I forgot to wish an old friend of mine “Happy Birthday” via email on his big day on April 15.

It just dawned on me while sleeping that I didn’t do this, and yes, I since have done this, right before I started writing this Blog entry, and I apologized to him, but so many things are on my mind that his birthday just wasn’t in my thoughts when it should have been.

I think that that is part of my sleeping problem … I do a lot of thinking while I am sleeping, not that I do it purposely, but I think that my mind is so busy during the day that at night, while I am supposedly relaxing, I simply cannot turn it off and give myself a rest.

It shouldn’t be this way, but like what happened today—when I woke up slightly past 1 a.m. and felt like I was done sleeping and ready to go for the day—I simply can’t get back to sleep.

What usually happens in this situation is that I do some writing—like I am doing now—and within an hour and a half or two hours, I poop myself out and crawl back into the bed and finally fall asleep again.

I have never been much of a sleeper—even as a little kid I wasn’t the greatest sleeper according to my mother—so while I wouldn’t say I have “battled” this problem my entire life—I really wouldn’t use that specific word—I have learned to live with this, I guess.

Lately at least, I have been sleeping fairly well, so I look at this situation right now as simply a blip or a yip, just one day out of many that I slept well, but not today, or tonight, or this morning, whatever you want to call it.

I do have to admit that I have had some very vivid dreams lately--one of which I described to you last week—but at least I was asleep when I had these dreams, or nightmares, or whatever you want to call them.

Whatever sleep I had this night did not have any dreams that I remember, so tonight is just one of those nights, what can I say?

I actually had a pretty bland day yesterday.

I had a little work to do, but nothing like what I went through the previous week.

I do believe, if I remember correctly, that I took a nap early in the afternoon for about a half hour or so, and that probably fouled up my nighttime sleeping, I do believe.

Sleep is good, but too much sleep probably isn’t.

There have been many studies done on just how much sleep one needs to get by and stay healthy, and these studies say that old fogeys like me should be getting at least eight hours sleep a night.

I certainly won’t get that tonight, and even if I go to bed a little later than now and do fall asleep, it will amount to broken sleep, so I am not sleeping consecutive hours of sleep.

So even if I somehow get to eight hours of total sleep, it has been interrupted sleep, which I never see discussed in any study on sleep that I have heard of.

Is interrupted sleep better than no sleep at all?

Who knows.

All I know is that it is right now 2:22 a.m., and I am sitting here writing this Blog entry that I normally begin writing after 6:30 a.m., so I am more than four hours early in what I am doing.

Heck, on Monday I finished writing my Blog entry at 7:06 am., so talk about being early--

Does “the early bird catch the worm” in this instance?

I have absolutely no idea, but this worm here simply isn’t asleep when he is supposed to be, and I really do have to get back into that bed and try to sleep, sleep, sleep.

Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz … .