Vehemently Vitriolic

I used to have really bad insomnia. Like ten years ago, before I met my wife, I would regularly pull all-nighters simply becaase I could just not pass out. But my wife has a very soothing and calming demeanor in dealing with this. While in bed she would say things like “Sssshhhhh….just relax and stop moving the bed, put your head on the pillow and rest or I’ll cave your skull in with a hammer”. Just like mom used to do.

But, now that she’s been gone for close to a month on a tour of duty in Alaska, I have been in a steady decline back to primitive-man state, which includes not sleeping overly well, and using only a single frying pan for every meal (eg: spaghetti. Figure that out).

I try to keep a schedule as my wife keeps me on, but I am nowhere near as disciplined as she is, so bedtime tends to vary wildly from 11 to 1am (MythTV does NOT help this. “Hmmm….its 10 to midnight, but there’s this great half hour show I wanted to see. And without commercials, its like 20-minutes, which is only 10-minutes past midnight which is like, nothing” is the general way things go. Repeat the cycle at 12:10am so you land on a half-hour, then the show ends at 12:36 so you try to make it to 1, and you catch the drift)

Off to bed I trundle about 12:30, and read for what seems like half an hour, but turns out to be close to 2-hours. There’s that dread when you see the clock at 2am that you MUST get to sleep to be functional the next day, which then starts the brain going, which essentially garantees you won’t be hanging with the sandman anytime soon. About this time, the rational part of the brain has left to a Motel 6 to get some shuteye.

Just as I am making the decision to get up and do something useful, I get this fantastic craving for Mini Wheats, which is unusual as I have never ever been a midnight snacker, and I had dinner very late. The more I thought about a bowl of cereal, the more it became an all encompassing darkness. Obsessed, I get up and have a bowl of cereal. At 2:30am. It is everything I had convinced myself it would be. So I have another. Then a glass of milk. Then two mandarin oranges. I had dinner, where is this coming from? At any rate, no I am no longer hungry. Or at least not obsessed with fiber.

Figuring this was the problem, I stumble back to bed. And lie there. Waiting. Wondering. Unfortunately, in this slightly hazy state, I become a full-blown hypochondriac. It happens every time, and I know its coming, but rational brain has already checked in to its room and has ordered an in-room porn movie and started the vibrating bed.

Do I have COPD (Chronic Obsctructive Pulminary Disease. Its been advertised on the radio many times daily on the station I listen to while working)? I have this tickle in my throat, and a slight cough. Classic signs of emphysema. My lungs are shutting down. Also classic signs of the head cold I had last week, but rational brain has long since left the conversation. Its very possibly COPD.
Or its diabetes rearing its head again (I do not have diabetes, and have no family history, nor am I high-risk in any way). Yup, thats it. Diabetes has started, and the weakened immune system has brought about COPD (despite COPD being a non-transferrable disease that is neither bacterial nor viral). That explains the craving for the frosted side of the Mini Wheats. Its trying to kill me by sugar ingestion.

But that doesn’t explain why Mini Wheats as opposed to, say, a big glass of sugar water. No, it doesn’t want me to become a hummingbird….so why? Nutrients. I have been depriving my body of essential nutrients, and possibly developing rickets. That’s why I needed the wheat. It makes total sense now. It explains the odd pain in my leg (or that I was playing a video game at an auction recently that you have to jump, duck and run around in place and I’m horridly out of shape). I am not looking forward to having to wear leg braces at my age.

The oranges, though…..could I be getting the first documented case of scurvy since the 17th century? Absolutely. This was a last ditch effort to get some vitamin C. I would check my gums in the morning to see how far they had receded already. Maybe even pick up some teeth out of the sheets.

Around this time, rational brain realized it forgot a change of underpants, and returned briefly (pun intended). If I was just going to lay here driving myself crazy, I may as well get up and do something. Take a look over a proposal that was being emailed. Good idea. Then Rational left again.

Yeah, I’ll check my emails for that proposal. But they said it wasn’t coming until tomorrow. Well, maybe the sent it early. Does that make me seem desperate for the cash? No, it makes me vigilant and attentive to my clients. Or does checking emails that don’t yet exist mean I am a workaholic? Its a classic sign. And one addictive behaviour leads to others, so by checking for this email, I may actually be sending myself down the road to alcoholism. And this would destroy my liver. By going to my computer, I was starting the sclerotization of my hepatic system. Surely it would fall….and could endocrine be far behind once the diabetes took hold?

Come to think of it, I drank a LOT of wine at that dinner party on Sunday. Perhaps the Mini Wheats had some mineral my liver desperately needed to stay alive. That didn’t really make any sense……but renal failure fit perfectly! The wheat and fibre was needed by the kidneys to clear my blood. How was I going to get to the hospital when complete renal shutdown was inevitable? My legs didn’t work with the rickets, and I could barely catch my breath because of the COPD. This night was turning out to be a disaster! My entire body was turning on itself! Maybe it was Lupus!

About this time I must have fallen asleep, because I was awoken about 7am by my neighbour when he was rummaging around to take the garbage out (and loudly. Like he had a very angry wolverine in one of the cans that did not want to go to the alley). I realized Rational had come back, becuase the second after I called him a “git” under my breath, I made the very rational mental note to stop watching BBC shows like Top Gear before going to bed. Luckily I bought some nice espresso-roast coffee, so the morning should start better than the evening ended.