Sleepless

Now, if I were writing this up at three in the morning, then it would be perfect for putting my point across. But I suppose that I have to be satisfied with writing this article a little before midnight, because I don't know what time I'll actually be nodding off.

Insomnia, from a figurative point of view, is the inability to attain a state of sleep despite a need for it in the first place. If I were to subscribe to that definition, however, then I most likely wouldn't be an insomniac. Whatever I'm experiencing right now certainly seems like insomnia: It's clear, for example, that I've been dozing off later and later each night, and waking up later and later each morning. Sometimes I even miss lunch.

I wouldn't immediately blame my current state of unemployment for this situation. Part of it, I think, is due to the fact that I've made it a habit to write my blog posts late in the evening when nobody else is using the computer. That, and the lure of the SNES emulator has been pretty difficult to resist. The little stack of paperback books at my bedside might also be a factor for this one.

Of course, the irony of my recent job application is not lost on me, despite the fact that I still don't like my prospects of working a night shift. I haven't received an offer yet, though, and I find it unlikely. They probably knew how I felt about burning the midnight oil the moment I raised an eyebrow.

What's funny is that I think I've attained a state of jobless nirvana. Every morning I stagger around in a perpetual bad hair day, stare into the mirror and put off shaving for another time, gorge a little on Chinese peanuts, and open up the Internet to surf for porn. Well, maybe not porn... but at the rate I'm burning through web sites, I'll probably find myself woefully degenerated to that level again, any day now.

Any day now.

Any day now.

...

I suppose that my pesudo-insomnia might actually serve a purpose in this way: It effectively prevents me from taking a mid-afternoon siesta like many other idle hands do. The problem, of course, is that it leaves me in one of the most unproductive morning states ever experienced.

Sometimes at four in the morning, I stare into the darkness of the ceiling and wonder what it would be like to stay up until the rest of the household awakens. But I don't want to do that, if only because I might actually get used to it. I don't imagine that it's any fun, not being able to get a wink of sleep at all. The hallucinations would probably be entertaining, yes, but it wouldn't be any fun in the long term.

Come to think of it, I might have been wrong before. Maybe my current state of unemployment might actually be responsible for my inability to sleep. Assuming that we sleep when we're tired, a good logical assumption would be that I can't sleep when I'm not doing anything potentially exhausting. Makes sense, doesn't it?

But then again, I can probably just as easily say that I can't sleep because of all the adrenalin in my system after running one of those old SNES games. So, in a way, Link and Zelda are keeping me awake at night.

I don't know. Who does, anyway?

I'm going to stop writing now, and start trying to restore my old sleep cycles. It's a little before midnight as I wrap up this article, and I figure that that gives me about three hours to nod off before I conclude that I've really got it bad. Even if it's not insomnia, it sure as heck feels like insomnia, and it's not exactly the most comfortable of positions when you're constantly trying to think.

Pleasant dreams.