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Friday, June 6, 2014

The air hurts me, let's watch Doug Stanhope

You ever get that itching, paranoid feeling that the universe is dreadfully but also deliberately wrong, and that Carl Sagan was a face of Satan, here to instill a sense of awe in us, because our bathos would be even funnier to whatever it is that created death if we were actually happy and excited to be swallowed in a limitless hell?

That would make Neil Degrasse Tyson a sort of Satanist Jesus, I guess. And since my usual response to the above feeling is to look for some new stand-up comedy (if I'm not hunting to see if there's a South Park episode I somehow haven't seen), I hereby promise eternal fandom to the first comic that comes up with a really good bit about the Neil and Carl show.

Also, does anyone know any dependable insomnia cures besides blackout drinking? I'm old.

10 comments:

  1. Best bet in my experience is to put away all stimuli half an hour before hitting the sack, books, tv, iPhone, laptops etc banished.

    Also if you share a bed, it may be a good idea to try sleeping on your own one or two nights a week, as there can be unconscious stress from fear of disturbing the other person.

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  2. Try over the counter melatonin, perhaps 5 mg to start, see how your system reacts. Helped me when stationed up by North Pole during periods of 24-hour sunlight when one's body stops producing it due to no darkness.

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  3. Thanks guys! We already sleep separately because of mutual insomnia/thrashing. Valerian worked for about a week and then quit. Melantonin works sometimes, others not. I should cut out the stimuli, though. I've been trying to listen to asmr videos to get to sleep, but even if you turn the computer away from you there's still the glow...

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  4. As an anxiety sufferer, insomnia has been the bane of my existence. But I've put several components of good "sleep hygiene" into practice, and god damn if it isn't working.
    Here we go! Give up the caffeine (yes, even the ass-crack-o'-dawn cup of brew). Give up the booze (helps you fall asleep, but ensures it's shitty quality). Physically exert yourself, majorly, daily. In addition, do a calming yoga routine, guided meditation, and/or progressive muscle relaxation session (plenty on YouTube) in the evening before bed. Yeah, ASMR can also help along those lines (gotta love all those wonderful content creators... what a special group of ppl.)
    Also, make sure natural light hits the back of your eyeballs for some decent period of time every day. That's extremely important for maintaining your circadian rhythm. If you're someone who gets to work before sunrise, toils in a windowless dungeon-style structure all the sun long, and then lurches back home after dark, you must find a way to expose your eyeballs to sunlight. Find an excuse, and break the hell out of your holding pen for awhile.
    Turn the lights down long before (as in a couple of hours) you plan to try to go to sleep. This triggers melatonin production. Also, (I know this is a "duh", but) when you start to feel sleepy, no questions asked, just get yourself to a bed ASAP. This is because your body is saying, "OK, now's the time". Don't ignore it. If you do, you'll find that when you finally want to go to bed, your bod will say, "nuh uh, suckaaaa". So... even if you need to work late on an assignment or something, you must purely blow it off, and listen to your bod. Work will be there in the morning. A certain herb which will go unmentioned could also be quite helpful.
    Nighty nite!
    -vegAN

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    Replies
    1. By a certain herb, do you mean kratom? I just found this lovely secret herb... I've been sleeping like a BABY!

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  5. Have you tried reading The Road to Reality by K. P. Yohannan?

    -Blanco

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  6. Valerian is the traditional herbal remedy for nightly insomnia. Like all folk medicine, it works well enough; however, after tasting the extract, you would probably rather go sleepless.

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  7. Blanco: COME OVER HERE AND SAY THAT!

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  8. Mean-Spirited: Yeah, it tastes horrible, but if you wash it down with the blood of a virgin it clears your palate AND keeps you young.

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  9. Pushups, crunches, vigorous walking. Sometimes I can drink coffee an hour before bed and sleep like a baby, other times I wake up and can't go back to sleep. But exercise does help.

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