A Spider Amongst the Saints

A Restless Weekend

The quest for sufficient sleep is one goal that defines my weekends; the pall of nocturnal insomnia hangs over my weekday nights and threatens my efficiency and productivity at work.

Just as I was considering a lie-in on Sunday, I had a date in mind a week hence, when I was scheduled to read the second lesson in church. Just to be sure, I checked the rota, and it was for today.

I have gained more confidence to read publicly, with my voice regaining some timbre for short periods of time.

A Fright by Email

However, it was another email that gave me the fright. We were being invited to a "Celebration of Gratitude", which read rather like a "Celebration of Life", a confusion between a demise and a departure; we were seeing off a lady who had a long-standing relationship with the church, as she moved to a home in Cumbria.

The sender, an Englishman, should have known better, having received a note from someone who speaks English as a foreign language, and obviously, once we read the content of the email, we were better informed.

After I had read the lesson, with a slight hiccup where I corrected myself, saying "through" instead of "though", the service progressed to the serving of communion.

The Uninvited Guest

Then a creepy-crawly came down the aisle, its body about a centimetre square and its legs at least seven centimetres each; a spider unlike any you see at home.

People attending church for the fear of God were soon gripped by arachnophobia.

A man of the cloth boldly lifted his feet off the floor and onto the seats, obviously not to harm the spider, or perhaps he was one of the ilk of Little Miss Muffet, who is famed for the eponymous nursery rhyme.

Calm Restored

Then a lady of the sterner kind, with the cojones that men pretend they possess, picked up the spider with a piece of tissue paper, dropped it, but scooped it up again and relocated it outside to the church gardens.

Calm and peace settled on that side of the congregation, as we deigned not to point fingers at the affrighted.

The celebration after the service was a generous buffet, with applause from us all, bidding her godspeed and new friendships at the home by the sea.

A Google NotebookLM AI Podcast on this blog

Thought Picnic: Rest, Sobriety, and Social Sacrifice

Treasuring Rest and Sobriety

There are two things I treasure: the opportunity for rest and keeping my sobriety. I get my sleep whenever I can, except when it is interrupted by obligation or responsibility—work or other necessities.

This means that even when I do not get sufficient rest during the week, which is usually the case due to what is essentially nighttime insomnia, I make up for the shortfall at the weekend. I will have a good lie-in on Saturday, not getting out of bed for most of the morning if I can help it, and sometimes I do give my Sunday to rest over religious commitment.

It is strange that some who are aware of these irregular sleeping patterns still seem totally oblivious to this knowledge in some self-serving way. I suppose that is to be expected.

A Teetotaller With Exceptions

On sobriety, I would consider myself generally a teetotaller, though not to the point of total abstinence. I do like wine. My work experience in a brewery laboratory at the age of 15 quite literally put me off beer, lager, cider, and ale.

It is not for religious belief that I rarely consume alcohol; rather, I have seen how drink loosens the tongue, prompting people to speak more candidly. These are thoughts they once had the wherewithal to keep unspoken. Moments of indiscretion or regrettable garrulousness accommodate the emptying of the bottle into the belly.

One core principle I keep more than ever is never to drink alone and mostly to drink only with meals. This makes drinking a social activity and forestalls the advent of hangovers. I probably drink with the utmost moderation; my experiences with light-headedness have come from prescribed medication rather than from losing control, paying homage to Bacchus.

The Darker Side of Drink

Walking up through the Gay Village near where I live, many a doorway is fouled by vomit. At night, you behold the sight of people barely able to stand on their own two feet, so inebriated to the point of incapacity.

The whole thing is quite scary to me: the thought that a portion of your sensibilities is lost to a void of nothingness, your memory failing to recall any recent event.

Then imagine a sober man keeping the fully drunk company, subjected to the inanities that make you question your own sanity. As much as it is part of socialising and being a social animal, you do you; I do me. Some sacrifices are necessary to make the world go round.

A Google NotebookLM AI Audio Overview Discussion of this blog

One is hardly sleeping enough

Another remedy to try

A hot bath with Epsom salts and English mustard comes from the yet unwritten book of Brian' s remedies. He has similar ideas that I have sniffed at which might even work, but I am always a sceptic first until persuaded.

Beyond that, he has recommended chamomile tea; his advice is an earworm. However, when I think of chamomile, I think of a lotion, and the last time I applied it to soothe my skin was during an episode of shingles in June 2009.

Obviously, I need to find something to deal with insomnia; in fact, sleep seems to arrive at any time rather than at designated times for that activity. I use my weekends to catch up on all the sleep I could not get during the week.

Keeping awake doing

While I do not feel the same level of fatigue I had during and for the few months after radiotherapy, there is still a lot of tiredness that hits you in the middle of the day, no matter how much you try to stimulate yourself. With the lack of caffeine, you just depend on nature to stay alert and focused.

Then, in my waking hours deep into the witching hour, I cannot idle about; I just completed five difficult Sudoku puzzles, as if that would tire out my brain. Besides, nocturia is an issue too; whenever I get some sleep, I wake up to pass water, usually four times during the night. I have hit the litre mark a few times this week, and I do not drink as much water as Brian insists I should.

It will get better

I have made a few adjustments, like taking my pills earlier and resisting the urge to drink late into the evening, but I sometimes have a dry mouth, for which swilling cranberry juice might be too great a luxury if you do not swallow after you taste it. I used to drink sparkling water, but I stopped because fizzy drinks do not help urinary function after radiotherapy.

I hate still water, yet I find myself having a glass or two, but never as much as necessary. What I have avoided all along is medically induced sleep; however, the insomnia is a long- term side effect of radiotherapy. I know sleep will eventually come, but I must find ways to prevent this from ruining a productive day.

Insomnia!

My nightly pause from sleep

For distractions, I have to lose,
And the sleep I need to choose,
My medicaments could be to blame,
Or for another’s claim to fame,
I stir and toss alone in bed,
Not one news story left unread,
A nodding doze with utter dread,
Is not that thing I saw long dead?

The watch gives time that runs awry,
I look at time and want to try,
If slumber comes I need to sleep,
But not one eyelid gives a peep,
Then dawn does break upon my wake,
Now wearily my hand doth take,
The Sandman late though for my sake,
What have I done to keep awake?

Moments of senior and tiresome abandon

The irksome numbers of time

It has been a rather hectic week, by which I mean, I did not notice the difference between 9:15 PM and 19:15 when I booked a restaurant table a few days ago, all the while thinking I had an early time slot until, in conversation with a friend, I noticed my error. I called the restaurant and was able to reschedule for 17:00. I must have been having a senior moment, for time is rarely something I get wrong.

It was a date in honour of a friend, one of my many exes I still have a good friendship with, though I have friends with literally all of those I have had affairs with if they have not withdrawn their friendship. By the time I was through the main course, I was drifting away, shutting down and dozing off.

I was both aware and tired that keeping up with the conversation was not getting any easier and he is hardly a slow talker, even under the influence.

A week of small crazies

It is the little things that have laden the week with apparent lethargy, the weather has taken a turn for mercury descending to zero and visiting a bone-chilling cold to anyone who ventures out, this along with the wind that lowers the temperature even more. My ordeal with the laundry service which started last week Thursday ended on Monday evening.

Calling the matriarch to celebrate her birthday started off nicely before it became distressing for both of us, an issue that needed my intervention beyond the activities once undertaken by an interlocutor, the delegation of responsibility had created an uncomfortably inadvertent and unexpected power dynamic that was difficult for my sensibilities.

At work, there was flux and in the things that demanded an interjection of wonder and surprise, it was not that which was in a particularly positive light. That with developments in South Africa that had me fielding calls and concerns along with the danger of scuppering plans. You do feel you want to lie down.

To listen beyond the hastened

An opportunity came to vent my spleen, I was being listened to for my perspective and view of things without the cloud of familiarity that excused a deeper understanding of things people assume are of no concern because they deem me unflappable. I could be my own greatest enemy, if I am read as people presume, without them asking to be certain of their conclusions.

When I got home, I was ready to crash, and I did take a picture to show I was not alert for serious engagement; it did not suffice, the phone rang, the sound awakened me, their satisfaction in seeing me was another half hour of working myself back to the stupor and sleepiness I thought I had a grasp of when I got home.

Dreamscape: Of friendships, in conflicts and strong voices

The outlay

I cannot remember how long ago the dramatis personae were in the latest dramatic episode of parasomnia where the script is an ad hoc exhibition of wild and vividly imagination occluding and folding time into a present continuous of endless juxtapositions and unlimited human abilities that science fiction will not dare to touch.

My father had gone away when his best friend who passed on last November had come round to ask for the use of his car. I promptly deactivated the security my mother having consented, and the deed was done. In dreams, there are backstories that come to view as memory during the playback of events you cannot place, and this one, I do not remember giving access to the car, yet I was bought into the premise.

The setup

When he returned, he had no knowledge that the car was used until it came up in conversation with his friend. As he is wont to do, he was completely sceptical that the car had been moved at all because there was no record in the odometer or tracking system that the security had been tampered with. That was where fingers were pointed at me by his friend that not only had I bypassed security, but I had also overridden all protective systems, it became a thing of jest that so seriously annoyed my father.

Rather than have a discussion with me about the issue, he took his frustration out on me resorting an instrument of corporal punishment that he handily wielded from our childhood to exert authority and respect. As it was in a public place, I was apparently conversant with customs not to resist or attack, I let him have his way, humiliating me as others watched without intervening even as what I did was at their insistence.

The fightback

Later, he came at me again in private and we got into a struggle, I was having none of it and then I went to bed. Quite overcome with the injustice of it all, I got up and was in a crowded courtyard where my mother was serving food to quite a few people. I attracted her attention asking to talk but gave way to a few desperately hungry and possibly homeless people hoping once their urgent requirement was served, I would be allowed a hearing, but I was altogether ignored.

I adjusted my voice and bellowed, “Can I have an audience?”, at which point, I could no more be ignored and the whole crowd fell silent to listen to what I had to say. I am not much of a public speaker, but I gave it my best shot occasionally losing my voice but recovering soon enough to make coherent sentences.

My statement

Uncle Jimi, though I have never called him that before, I said, was a father-figure such that if my father were absent, he would not have to be asked to take on that role. There was no way I would have refused him access to use my father’s car and with my mother’s consent, he did have the car when he required it. I was rather disappointed that they allowed my father to abuse me without even attempting to restrain him.

Whilst I was busy speaking, my implacable father came wielding a big stick again, but this time we had a full-on confrontation as I tackled him the apparently big stick shrunk into a length of flimsy string, his hand hanging down with the incredulity of how his instrument of power and enforcement became nothing of any threat. Yet, it was in the words I spoke than in any physical tussling that this happened.

Leaving the courtyard to return to my bedroom with my brother, along the way, he wanted to go to see my father as I worried that he might not have access to the house if we did not go together. Then across the stream just before a bridge that could be easily crossed, I saw a wolf with a colourful iridescent coat approaching as if towards prey. I growled at it, it cowered in fear and slunk away. My phone rang and that is how I was awoken from my apparent nightmare; it was Brain on the other end.

I prevail

All day, I have been reviewing the events in my mind as I narrated the dream to friends, the seemingly incessant conflicts between my father and I, caught in a time warp of when we were literally of equal strength and I always gaining the upper hand. The situation where the presumed reasonableness he possesses is quickly dispensed for the physical, but more pertinently, the bond of friendship with his best friend that we all celebrated.

Then, one thing I have realised and learnt through life is I have to speak for myself, for fairness, for justice and to arrest that abuse of power and authority by those who think they are unassailable and inviolable. The voice against oppression must be heard and it is there to disarm completely. Another dreamscape.

May the mercury rise soon

In the chill of May

Exasperation and consternation, the tumult in my mind as I woke to see that it was just one degree above zero and this is the second of May. What really could be going on? We practically had a sunny day for all the days in April, yet, we rarely had the double digits for temperature, it could have been February.

Halfway through my walk the sun came out, radiant and bright but not moving the mercury by much. By the time I stepped out for church, it was only 4 degrees above zero, even the confines of the church building were warm enough that after walking over 18,000 steps, but the cold I had endured created a soporific effect, I was nodding off before the service began; I barely kept awake if not for the times we had to stand up.

The short time I had hoped to spend in the sun sipping my Starbucks latte after I left the church was promptly aborted by a drizzle, other plans put in abeyance, and even in the company of friends, I was soon caught away by the heaviness of my eyelids, there was no other option but to go for a nap. Things would not be warming up soon, as the Bank Holiday Monday is supposed to present more rain and hardly the comfort of warmth. It might be May, that is the only thing going on.  

Dreamscape: Parasomnia to the rescue

A low form of sleep

Brian is probably the most aware of episodes of parasomnia demonstrated in REM (Rapid Eye Movement) Sleep Behaviour Disorder that I have exhibited over time when I have vocalised, acted out or even kicked him violently in bed. My dreams can be quite vivid and the fact that during REM Sleep my muscles are not relaxed and temporarily paralysed could probably be related to my medication, but I have for a lifetime suffered a spectrum of parasomnia short of somnambulism. [Sleep Foundation: REM Sleep Behaviour Disorder]

After work, I took a nap and had classical music playing in the background, my phone rang waking me up, but I just turned over not to excite myself too much out of the slumber that had seemed to set in. Soon I was enraptured in the throes of dreamland.

Into dreamhood

There is a characteristic of my dreams that appears to link into episodes eked out of long-held memories probably from other dreams that makes certain encounters seem like a continuing story. I was walking up an exposed corridor with an overhanging roof when I noticed a lady I knew in some sort of distress, two men on either side of her appearing to threaten her, but since they were outside, I felt if anything happened, I could call up a crowd and the police on them.

One of the men happened to be Boris Johnson, and that might have been inspired by news of when he with a friend arranged to have a journalist beaten up. The stuff of dreams draws from inexhaustible material. [The Guardian: A couple of black eyes]

Soon, another man I did not recognise walked up and they now took the lady into a room. As they did that, I called out to her, by name and asked if everything was Okay, whilst she said she was, that is not what I heard in her voice, they were going to rough her up and I was reaching for my phone to call the police.

Acting out the dream

I could hear a bit of thumping in the room, and I suspect from what I overheard in the snatches of conversation in that room, they wanted to know how much I knew about them. I guess they were about to include me in their nefarious activity when that man I did not know came out and walked towards me, because I was not leaving until I was sure she was fine.

As he approached me, I could hear myself say in a loud voice, “Do you want to know who I am?” as I woke up out of the dream. Sometimes, this happens as a safety reflect preventing an escalation or a deterioration leading to harm for myself and stress on my mental and nervous system. I probably need to visit a sleep clinic to study the phenomenon better.

However, it was another bout of parasomnia and my sleep was over with me thinking if the dream had continued, as there were many people around, I was about to shout out to them. “Call the police on these thugs.” It is likely, that dream might continue in another episode of Dreamscape, the vivid dreams of I and the parasomnia that defines them.

Sleep and grow

Cherish the sleep

Night sleep is not what I usually get enough of, it is a precious commodity and so I am quite judicious with it. I get as much sleep as I can despite the night-time insomnia and do the best with the naps I get during the day or after work. It is all good rest.

It all adds up to useful sleep hours for the day, disjointed perhaps, too dreamy with rapid eye movement (REM) sleep, quite a lot of light sleep and on my sleep chart the moments of deep sleep together is reasonable but like a series of saw-tooth chopping marks, essentially, I am not a natural deep sleeper.

Managing your portions

That seems to be something I grew up with and there might be drug interactions that limit the stretch, but what I have decided is not to use drug-induced medication. Though I have noticed that herbal teas that include ginger, lemon, peppermint, honey, or camomile can help in my relaxation, I have no scientific proof of that.

When I get the sleep I have been given, I prefer not to be woken up or disturbed because I am not one to just roll over and go back to sleep. Once I am up, I get busy until I tire out to fall asleep again, which could be hours later. Maybe having lights on that the radio playing in the background does not help but switch off the lights and I lightly wake up in minutes. We are all freaks of nature to some extent and that is not entirely a bad thing.

What I learnt about sleep

The beauty of sleep

After about 5 weeks of observing the sleep analysis data produced by my Honor Band 5 tracker, I am gaining some understanding as to how my body works. Yet, the use of the tracker is only indicative, it does not replace proper medical supervision and analysis that would require attending a sleep clinic.

Taking a day at a time, looking at the sleep data can be disconcerting for there are nights when I literally got no sleep, maybe just under 3 hours and I could not attribute it to anything, in particular. The Huawei Health app is full of suggestions, if I wake up more than twice in the night, I might have drunk too much water close to my bedtime.

Just about enough

Depending on the quality of sleep, there are dietary and fitness factors introduced, it almost becomes prescriptive, yoghurt is good, do more exercise or exert yourself less. You get to a point where you decide none of this really matters in the bigger scheme of things, but some adjustments can be made.

I know on average, I am getting just over 7 hours of night sleep, the stages of sleep are within the tolerable limits of normal, that is; REM sleep, Light sleep, and Deep sleep. Deep sleep continuity is low, but that is one switch I am not sure of how to tune, the charts are show me transitioning between the stages, spending more time in the Light sleep stage.

Worrying about nothing

My bedtime habits need considering, like when I go to bed and the whole idea of being a nocturnal animal needs putting aside. My tracker and app scream with curtains if I am not getting enough hours of sleep. I am good at waking up, I guess because most times, it is by alarm clock.

As I collect more sleep data, I think I will get a better idea of what minor habits like having an early pill time, not taking food after a certain hour, and probably varying the light and sound environment in the bedroom need to be altered ever so slightly. There isn’t a problem, just a situation to study, understand and keep under constant review, as for worry, that is completely unnecessary. Sleep tight!

Sleep data for August 2020

Stop wishing others sweet dreams as they go to sleep

Sleeping duties

Knowledge can be troublesome at times and nowhere has this been that interesting than getting an understanding of my sleeping patterns over the last week. My Honor Band 5 tracker has been plotting my daily sleep cycle from wakefulness to deep sleep, indicating I have not been getting enough deep sleep and the continuity of my deep sleep is too below the expected levels.

I seem to have lots of REM (Rapid Eye Movement) sleep, which apparently is the lightest form of sleep and the region in which you dream and remember the dreams. Who would have thought wishing someone sweet dreams as they were going to bed was hardly wishing they would have a restful night?

Then, I do appear to have an above range period of light sleep, I am putting in the hours though the graphical representation of REM Sleep to Light Sleep to Deep Sleep with the fluctuations and durations can be the stuff of serious mathematical computations yet to find some formulaic expression.

Becoming better friends

I have decided not to bother too much about it, I am getting some good hours. Except if I go to a professional sleep clinic for clinical and scientific observation, I probably will not learn much more about how to benefit from sleep.

Then, it is probably the long-term side effects of pills I have been on for over a decade. The somewhat imposed decision to change them did not work that well with me for after 7 weeks, I had had enough of being a guinea pig two years ago that I asked to be put back on my old drug regimen. Besides, I have shied away from sleep medication for as long as I can remember, I would get as much sleep as nature will allow.

Some modifications to diet, the time I take my sleep and when I take my pills, might help. I have not murdered sleep; I just need to find out how we can be better than just friends.

Numbering for slumbering

Where is my sleep?

My Huawei Health app in the Sleep quadrant has the curtain drawn with the snooze sign because I did not get the expected amount of sleep overnight. 2:44 hours is just not enough but I could not sleep. I went out in the morning and did just over 6 kilometres and the allotted 10,000 daily steps by the time it was 9:00AM.

I got just over another hour of sleep before having a meal in the afternoon and then setting out for another walk that stretched to 15.06 kilometres and 30,168 steps by 20:24 today. I don’t think I would be doing much more today, I tired enough to have settled in bed to lie down and fall asleep.

Numbers showing effort

In all, I have put in 24.78 kilometres altogether. To think there were months when I did not make 20,000 steps in total and now, I exceeded the 25,000 steps from 2 years ago on Sunday at over 28,000 and today bested it.

What I have noticed is I feel no effects from the walks, however long they are and averaging 22,520 steps a day for this week. Though it is not the numbers that matter, they still give an indication of what effort is going into it and hopefully, the effects would begin to show, not yet on the weight, but the girth is narrowing. That’s progress and good too.

Caught at the end of a long walk

Wandering briskly into suburbia

Ashton before time

I just barely made it home in once piece after 17 kilometres of walking. I did not feel like going back to Alexandra Park today, though from my tracker, I found out that walking the circumference of the park was just over 2 kilometres long and I did 4 circuits yesterday before returning home.

My plan was to walk towards Manchester City stadium and round the city ring road, but I found a footpath that towed the course of the River Medlock then through some estates into Beswick, before I was on to Droylsden and then on to Ashton Moss, slightly short of Ashton-under-Lyne before turning back.

Unlike churches in the city, the ones I saw as I walked into suburbia still had sprawling graveyards. We sometimes forget that life, living, dying and death all used to revolve around the church.

A break for safety

At the turn, I had put 11 kilometres, and by the 16^th, I got on the tram because the route back was not that safe to walk. At St. Peter’s Square, a man was remonstrating about his girlfriend canoodling with another man on the benches, rolling over with abandon that it was getting tense.

I quickly made a getaway before things turned dangerously bad. I might be getting used to walking now. My sleep after two nights of observation is under review, and I a definitely not getting enough deep sleep. I need to review the recommendations.

For music, I had Alisha Keys, Justin Timberlake and Luther Vandross, all that made for a different pace of walking. Sunday might well be a day of rest. Though that might break the trend for a badge celebrating 21 days of doing at least 10,000 steps.

The science of sleep and walking

On the levels of sleep and slumber

My Honor Band 5 tracker has been a revelation of knowledge and science that I hope I will find useful as I find out to utilise the features paired with the Huawei Health app on my phone.

This morning I got a good idea of how I sleep, something I need to study more, but I seemed to have a lot of REM sleep, which explains my usually vivid dreams, just about enough light sleep and definitely not enough deep sleep. The graphical illustration of my kind of night sleep at least put paid to the idea that I am a one-hour sleeper, according to Brian.

There is still much more to learn on the science of sleep, and I cannot draw any conclusions on just one day of data. I will observe the trends and with that hopefully look for ways to improve my quality of sleep. That I was able to get just over 6 hours of sleep with waking up once overnight was quite a surprise.

Every kilometre a sign

Today, I was able to set out my workout plan, or rather document it properly, working with my band, I could chart the route with announcements every kilometre of how long it took and what my heart rate was, mostly in the aerobic and the fat-burning ranges. I was able to get in 16.52 km of walking in 3:17:40 hours and an average of 105 steps per minute for 20,941 steps.

For the day, I got in 22,348 steps and that was just before a trapped nerve signalled its presence in the groin. I did not know that sleep under 3 hours is called a nap. I need to choose a day for complete rest, and I hope I begin to see changes in weight and girth soon too. I could do with a deep sleep tonight and a lie-in for Saturday. On the whole, I am happy, I can do this.

Dreamscape: In the shut-eye world

Sleepy follows

I sit quietly observing nothing, in particular, just caught up in my thoughts as the threat of slumber looms. The quarantine period is sending my body clock into a soporific daze, I have to convince myself I am not narcoleptic.

Then, the sleep did catch me away, I was on my settee just as my period of meditation slipped into the unaware, a dreamy world taking to places I had been before. Everything looked safe on the path I chose before a man looking menacingly at me decided to lunge at me with a knife in his hand. I felt myself draw in a deep breath and kick at his weaponised hand.

Acting out a thing

The crashing at the impact of my kick was my centre table kicked about a metre away, things on the tabletop and on the shelves below, strewn on the floor. I guess that was my first observation of movement from within my sleep demonstrated in the physical.

From within vivid dreams, I do at times speak out loud, I have apparently kicked my partner out of bed completely unaware of my sudden skill at Thai boxing. I wonder if I should be bothered or see it as par for the course.

As for my reflexes, a flea, a fly or a mosquito hovers within sight, I wave my hand closing it as a fist over the insect and I want to believe it has been caught and killed, it isn’t in my hand or caught between my fingers and it has disappeared somehow. If I thought I was a magician or an illusionist, I haven’t convinced myself enough to offer it as a party trick.

Hotel life: Looking for "Helpless people"

Woken too early for my liking

Considering I am a very light sleeper, I cherish every minute of sleep I get which rarely is longer than a 3 to 4-hour stretch before I am awoken and have to work myself to sleep again.

This morning at my seemingly lovely hotel which is part of a large hotel chain in Cologne, I was woken to an emergency by the fire alarm and after the catechism in German, we were given an English translation.

Evacuation! Evacuation!

“There is an emergency in the hotel, please leave your room and close the door behind you, do not use the lift and follow the directions to the front of the hotel.” Then, it said something about the staff and that I should look for “Helpless people”.

Bags and everything

That would be funny if I was not woken at that hour, but as I was in my pyjamas, it was easy to step into my trainers without even doing my laces and with my key card to hand I grabbed my cane and made down the three flights of stairs.

The number of evacuees that had left their rooms with their belongings were numerous, if we were fleeing a serious emergency, it would have been a looming catastrophe.

As we approached the front of the hotel, the “Helpless people”, which I eventually got to realise were supposed to be the “Helpful people”, the fire warden and staff assigned to handle emergencies beckoned to us to come into the hotel.

The frying pan was saved

He explained in German to the many guests and just told me in English there is no problem. Someone came to my aid and explained in detail that it was a kitchen incident of the chef leaving the pan on the stove for too long which triggered the fire alarm.

Thankfully, no one was hurt including the frying pan, but have I seen how not to do a fire drill or event a real evacuation? Then, please, like I always say in countries where English is not the official language, whilst you all speak English better I can ever speak your language, always get a native English speaker or a teacher of English to review your public announcements. Helpless people, indeed!

Dreamscape: The dream-wake

Winnie!

In what looked like a generation ago, we had a dog, a bitch, a canine with an aggressive feline temperament, she was big and fierce, masterly in territorial presence, a terror to the unwary.

She came to us a matriarch from family friends who had moved into town but without the space in which to keep her.

We had an expansive compound, high walls and sturdy gates, we accepted her into the household with rules that indicated an apparent lack of discipline from her former home. She came with an appellation, the name Winnie.

The taming of Winnie

I became the ringmaster to inculcate the better habit of dog friendliness in here because she had become a demigod to serve with trembling and never to be approached when eating. An infringement of that unwritten rule risked giving a digit or a limb to Winnie for her dessert. That was unacceptable behaviour in our household.

At one time, she nicked the head of the household’s finger as he tried to remove a fish bone from her food bowl, that called for an intervention and it was immediate.

Soon, she delivered a litter of puppies, but Winnie had no maternal instinct, we could not help the distressed puppies and within a week the whole litter of five died.

However, as a guard dog, she was menacing, even if when I took her for a walk, the looks from some of the neighbourhood signified a meal. As she protected us, we had to protect her, she was a well-loved family pet.

The mystification of Winnie

It transpired that one Saturday morning as we all were having a lie-in, I was in REM sleep, the subject of my dreams was telling off workers across the road from us where a building was being constructed for disturbing our peace. Our compound had the building materials and each time they needed stuff, they would knock on the gates for us to not only let them in but out of fear of Winnie, they would not access the compound until one of us had Winnie on a leash.

Into my dreamy existence came the rattling of the gate with a bit of hollering to have Winnie curtailed. My aunt, woken from slumber at the same time got up just as I did, she was going to give the workers a stern talking to, but since I was already on the roll from within my dreamscape, I asked her to let me deal with the situation.

If my words did not strike terror in the workers, they were left in no doubt that any other slight disturbance from them again would have them fed to my dog. They were warned once and it never happened again.

The dream-wake

This kind of arousal from dreaminess into wakefulness with a continuation of the same theme of the dream is what I have called a ‘dream-wake’. I had one such dream-wake today when having had a night of insomnia, it was well into the morning before I got some much-needed sleep.

In my dream, I had rushed to the train station to catch a train with just a few minutes to spare. There was a queue of undecided customers in front of me buying tickets and asking questions as I fidgeted about getting a ticket and making it to the right platform. When I was finally attended to, the train was pulling into the station and I had to go up a footbridge to board the train, I never really go on the train because I was suddenly aroused and awake.

In my wakefulness, I looked at my watch and almost panicked; my train was in 25 minutes and I have not even packed my bag, in fact, there were so many things to do. Empty the washing machine, take out the rubbish, turn off the water mains, lighten my baggage because I was having a short week away and I could not afford to forget some essentials for my journey. Luckily, I had picked up my tickets from Friday night, so I only had to make it to the station, some 5 minutes away and get my stuff to the right platform.

Phew! I made it

There was no time to waste, I unloaded the washing machine, jettisoned one suit, packed my bag, forgetting to take out the rubbish or turn off the tap, I was out of the house with just 13 minutes to spare. Panting like I had just done a marathon unprepared, I got to the station, with all the heft I had, carried my baggage up the stairs rather than wait to use the lifts at the far end of the platform and only had to wait 2 minutes for the train.

Thankfully, I could choose one of two stations to board the train and the easier one did not require a labyrinthic journey to the platform. I had to board that train to make a connecting train just under an hour away. My ticket had restrictions that meant I had to be on the particularly booked trains or I risked a full fare penalty.

I made both trains, but the dream-wake experience must have been the subconscious saving me the accident of misfortune at great cost. Whilst I do not seek meanings to my sometimes vivid dreams, I do not ignore the simple lessons, insights, warnings or triggers the dreams offer in terms of preservation, information and caution. Without my dream-wake, I would have been left in dire straits.

Chasing the forty winks away

I’m scared to slumber,
Fading in a moon’s penumbra,
If I care to remember,
The months since December.

For my mind to keep,
And recover by sleep,
All my counting of sheep,
Never got too deep.

In the dawning of Friday,
The clock that made me sway,
Dressed and on my way,
To work to make some pay.

Heavy my eyelids weigh,
Down over my eyes to stay,
Hard to nap as you now may,
For a bed on which to lay.

But for another few hours to go,
What things to keep blood aflow,
My face to have a glow,
Let’s be done it’s time to go.

Out of a tired brain,
A hopper of words like grain,
In order for prose to gain,
A reading free from pain.

The mistiming somnambulist

Unslept

Quite much of an early riser that I am, the clock alarm serves no other purpose than to confirm the arrival and the passage of time. There are very few times when I get woken up by the alarm clock, my body clock seems to have the essential biorhythms for diurnal and nocturnal existence whilst being tuned to abort somnolence at the appropriate time.

Yet, it does not serve much purpose to the insomniac that gets to sleep well past midnight or more happiness slipping into dreamland with the lullabies of Sailing By and the Shipping Forecast.

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Overslept

Sleep arrives probably before 02:00AM and I will probably have 2 or more wakeful times by the time it is 06:00AM, BBC Radio 4 keeps my mind ticking away as I roll over trying to get a bit more sleep which altogether may not total more than 4 hours in the night with the 2 hours I have in the early evening.

Then yesterday, my eyes popped open at 7:16AM and my train was leaving the station at 7:17AM, how did I sleep through the alarm? It meant a day of working from home as I cancelled my pickup from the destination station to the office.

Had a health check and the prick of a needle in a number of places before the day was over and I looked forward to the next day. The night fell and I went to bed.

Underslept

The dawn broke with the imprint of the last day; did I miss the alarm again? It was light, the light of an early summer’s day and one glance at my watch and I saw 7:00AM, jumped in my trousers and in 7 minutes I was in a rapid trot to the station.

The streets were eerily quiet for the time of the day and as I got to the station and looked at the clock on the noticeboard, it was 5:13AM. I smiled, got my ticket and sauntered back home for a lie-in.

The memory, the drugs, absent-mindedness or the simple blurring of the sight that gives the mind the wrong information to act on. I looked at my watch at least 4 times before I saw the time on the station clock, all the time, I saw a time 2 hours ahead on a watch with hands until the digital display at the station reset my perspective to see the right time.

Some made fun of me, I chose to ignore them. It was a lovely day.

Never underestimate the benefits of good sleep

Sleeping off the pain

So I went to bed a bit unwell hoping to get some rest and relief from the pain. There is something about the healing power of sleep or maybe it is the calming effect of sleep.

Now, I rarely have long stretches of sleep, usually never more than 4 hours at best, but as much as possible it is restful and relaxing. It is one reason why I do not like my sleep disturbed since I am rarely one to be stirred from sleep to roll over and fall asleep again.

However, just like when I had to manage the pain of cancer, when I was tired enough, I just fell asleep and with that, my thoughts and consciousness are taken off concentrating on the pain exacerbating its effect, likewise with my eyeball hurting, I wrapped up and found two hours of restful and literally dreamless sleep.

Restored and refreshed

When I woke up, apart from feeling a bit hungry, the pain had gone and it was way past the time to take my pills too. Some immediate concerns trumped the regimen of pill-popping.

As for the healing power of sleep, I woke a lot better and quite ready to sleep off again, probably because I put my mind to it. Another 90 minutes past before I got up and had some coleslaw for a bit of strength before doing a bit of work and resting until dawn broke.

I am a lot better now, not nauseous, some bearable discomfort, but I’ll be fine. Thanks for all the best wishes.

Never underestimate the benefits of good sleep.