17 March 2005 1155z - So if there is one thing that hasn't been in short supply over the course of the last week while I've been doing this experiment, it'd be strange and disturbing dreams. Now, when I say disturbing, I don't mean the kind that would require me to be admitted to some sort of mental institution. I just mean that it makes you take a step back, scratch your head, and say hmmm... So I already told you about one of them. But during my S2 today, delayed because of a visit to the JOC and the BDOC, I woke up after only sleeping for maybe 6-7 minutes. I'd already finished up my first dream...pretty amazing, huh? But here's the image that stuck with me. For some reason...I don't know how we ended up getting dirty, but my sisters and a couple of male friends and I ended up in a bathtub together. It was completely innocent; just five people taking a bath. But it was strange in that I remember the bathtub being a regular-sized bathtub, and it just seems strange that we would all fit looking back on it. Plus, you know, we were all naked and whatnot. My mother was involved too, and my father came in with a towel on near the end of the dream. My big brother had a role as well, but I don't remember what it was. Anyway, what's interesting is that everything seemed perfectly normal in the dream, like it was something that we did all the time. Hmm...I think it may have had to do with swimming, but I can't be sure. What's funny is the whole naked thing really didn't bother me when I woke up. In fact, I was relieved that I hadn't broken my shower boycott more than anything else. How bad is that?
For those of you who are just jumping on ship here, today marks the 8-month mark. I try not to bring the topic up so much now that I am such a public figure; but it's been a little game I enjoy playing with myself. I just boycott random things. It usually has nothing to do with priciples or anything deep like that. I just like to challenge myself sometimes; and it's my way of being wild and crazy. So if you've wondered about that list of boycotts along the left-hand column, that's what it's all about. It's just stuff I've decided to give up at this point in life. I guess there are Christians who do something similar around this time of year as well...but for completely different reasons.
Anyway, that's all I've got for now. BUB just wrapped up and we have a special ODP in about ten minutes...so that'll probably push back my S3 by a little bit. After that, I'll be heading out with a couple of the medics to bring some non-alcoholic beer to the guys up in the towers for St. Pattie's day.
17 March 2005 0140z - And I was doing so well too. I cut my S5 down to an hour and a half, and I am feeling incredibly drowsy right now. It's been like that for the last two hours, in fact. It wouldn't surprise me if I've fallen asleep while sitting here for the last hour. Part of me thinks it's just the sleep inertia of such a large block. Maybe I should cut the S5 down to a half hour as well. I mean, I know that's what I need to do, but I don't have enough confidence built up yet. *sigh* oh well. One more day down. Maybe I'll give it a shot tomorrow.
On a side note, time is starting to go by sooooo slowly. I mean, there are four months left in this deployment. And every time I wake up, there are four months left. I wake up five times a day, so in that sense, every day is like a week and every week a month. In my own way, I've stretched the last four months of this deployment into another year. Oh well. If I weren't having such a good time, I'd go back to my old schedule. But now, I don't feel so guilty taking time for myself, especially the late night hours. Anyway, I would have written more, but I got on AIM and chatted away with a bunch of people, including some old friends from college/grade school, and a few students as well. Good stuff. Anyway, I'm going to wrap up and head in for my S1 in a few. After that, it's off to work again.
16 March 2005 1707z - Okay, so I'm so wired now, it's not even funny. I just woke up from a 15-minute S4 and decided that I wouldn't go back for another 15. That's usually what makes me drowsy I think. I mean, I woke up on my own, so I must be rested, right? Okay, before I forget, let me tell you about my dream. It was so strange and intense that I have to get as much of it here on paper (electrons) before I forget. Number 1, I somehow ended up going home on leave. And I had a few extra hours to spend, so I ended up going to this bowling alley for some reason...just to waste some time. And I'm looking for something. I don't remember what it is now, but it seemed pretty important. I get stuck on one side of the bowling alley...nowhere else to go, and there's a divider between myself and the lanes. So I walk outside and circle around. but when I go on the other side, I can't find the lanes either. Instead, I reach this pit where a bunch of guys are playing ping-pong in an area sunken into the ground a good 5-6 feet. There's a big-screen behind them too. I forget what it's playing. Then I walk on...I see a group of people...asian-looking. One of them is kinda tall, with a distinct haircut. I realize that it's my cousin Matt and my Aunt May and Uncle Alex and my cousin Dorothy. I speed up my walk and sneak up on them. My aunt almost has a heart-attack. She didn't understand why I would be home, so when she saw me, she thought that I was my ghost.
Fast forward to my hotel room. I'm going to bed for the night and I wake up to go to the balcony. I turn around, and there's Staff Sergeant King standing behind me. He asks me for my AKO (e-mail) password. I'm about to give it to him, but then I get suspicious. Why does he want my password? He must be trying to kill me! And once I realize that, he closes in and tries to push me off the balcony. At this point, I realize that it must be a dream. This is too crazy to be real. So I yell at myself, "wake up! wake up!" It takes a second for it to kick in, but I'm finally awake.
I'm back in my hotel room. I must be on leave. Wait a second...what am I doing alone in my hotel room. If I'm on leave, I should be out looking for women. So I get up and start going outside. At that point, I wake up for real, and I check the clock. It has only been 15 minutes since I put my head down. Amazing.
Anyway, I just wanted to get that out before I forgot it. It felt really good. The best part was waking up completely refreshed...and it only took 15 minutes. But who knows...maybe I'm still sleeping right now and this is part of my dream.
16 March 2005 1542z - Like clockwork. It's so nice to be able to fall asleep when you need to. I was sitting at my desk feeling drowsy after running a couple of errands up and down the flight line, so I decided to start my S3 about 15 minutes early. I was out in about a minute and up in half an hour. Then I hung out a little bit and had dinner with the commander and a couple of my fellow LTs. It's kinda nice actually socializing more these days. I think I've been very lonely these last two months since I got up here. That's probably one of the reasons why I knocked down one of my walls. Oh, did I mention that? Hehe...I kept on getting lonely, so I'd go outside my door and walk right in the other side to hang out with the First Sergeant or the RTO or whoever. Well, about two weeks ago, I decided it was too much work to walk around. So we knocked down part of the wall between us and installed a door. I'll take a picture of it one of these days. We made the door out of a broken bunk, so it gives it a kind of cage feel. It's quite beautiful, actually. The next project is knocking down my other wall to open up a doorway into the guard shack. For that project, we're going to make the door out of a bookshelf...you know, that high speed, secret squirrel kinda door. I'm pretty excited about it. And even better, in Afghanistan, you don't have to worry about building permits.
Anyway, I've got about an hour before S4 time, so I'm going to start reading now. Hopefully, that'll make me a little sleepy and help me out. But if not, oh well. The eBook is How to Accomplish More in Less Time. The commander gave this to me a few nights ago after a talk we had and he had a bunch of other books he threw on my thumb drive too. Looking forward to it.
16 March 2005 1040z - So...a lot of talking going on today. Not gossippy stuff, but just good conversations. I sat down with one of our admin clerks and a fellow LT at breakfast this morning and just chatted for a bit. The LT asked me some questions about my sleep schedule because he was interested. He'd already been through ranger school, so he's experienced his share of sleep deprivation. Anyway, he just had a lot of things he wanted to accomplish and didn't have as much time to do those...so when he found out I was doing this, I think he saw an opportunity. It may take a little while longer to convince him, but that'd be neat to have an ally in this battle against sleep. Well, maybe not that far...but it'd be nice to have someone else to talk to at night.
Oh well...I had a conversation with my commander about an hour or so ago. It was in reference to an article he forwarded me. His wife had forwarded it to him. Anyway, it was an article written after studying a bunch of high-paid hotshot consultants and it was an analysis of their behavior...very interesting stuff. They talked about how smart people are bad at learning, mainly because they rarely made mistakes. And so when they did make mistakes, they were often to repeat them because of a deficiency they had with self-analysis. When things went wrong, they were quick to bring up external factors and rarely looked inward to figure out what they could have done to make things better. That was good stuff. I saw a little bit of me in that...you know, the part about always being right. *cough* Yeah, I guess I don't take criticism well, but I think I've grown a lot in just these last two months. I've gotten better at delegating and sharing the workload, and I think a lot of that comes from trusting a lot of my subordinate leaders...not that I didn't trust my squad leaders in the past. It's just that it's such a large organization now, I can't follow up after every little thing. So even if I don't want to, I have to. With a platoon, especially my old one, I probably jumped down into a lot of stuff i maybe didn't have to. But with a small organization, you can do stuff like that.
Like I said, good stuff. And for those of you still keeping track of sleep, S1 and S2 went exactly as scheduled.
15 March 2005 2340z - Last night, I found myself nodding off while reading The Five Dysfunctions of a Team by Patrick Lencioni. It was a good book, but I just didn't have much juice left in me by the time 2000z rolled around. So I went down for a full three hours and I feel great right now. Adding up all of my naps from yesterday, though, it totals 4.75 hours for today and 5.5 hours the day before. That seems like too much to me. I'll stop talking about it and publish a new sleep schedule some time later today to cut it down further. If I can maintain three and a half hours/day, I think it'll be worth the sacrifice. Otherwise, I'll shift to a triphasic cycle with 3 x 1.5 hour blocks. I forget...have I said that before? I forget what things I've thought to myself and which I've already posted, and I'm too lazy to read through what I've written over the last few days right now. So, with that said, I'm off to the gym.
15 March 2005 1731z - S4 went like clockwork, but I am feeling pretty tired right now...even more tired than before I took my nap. Again, it's the sleep inertia. I'm blinking like every two seconds and it's hard to concentrate on writing right now. I'll jump on AIM to see if anyone can keep me company for the next few hours until S5. Today was the first time I actually hit all of my sleep times...my way of making up for yesterday. The only thing I'm worried about right now is my three hour of core sleep interfering with my body adapting. Though as much as I'd like to get rid of it, that's the only way I've been able to treat my body to a solid sleep cycle...even if just for three hours. I'd cut it down to an hour and a half, but I don't see myself staying awake for more than three hours right now. Plus, I'm a little too tired to visit towers tonight. I think I'll take a day off from that to regain a little bit of sanity...not that talking to troops makes me insane in any way. I just need to take a little more of my extra wowwers and spend them on me. After all, that was one of the main purposes of shifting to this schedule. There were a lot of things I haven't been able to take care of. So far, the only thing I've really taken the time to do for myself since I've started this sleep experiment is update my weblog more.
What can I do more of though? I'm starting some reading tonight in the hopes that it'll lay some groundwork for making me drowsy...though right now, I don't think I need that much help. Besides that, I have some corresponding coursework to complete before attending my infantry officer advanced course at Benning in August. Oh, my commander said that I had to take leave today. So that means I'll probably have two weeks off some time around mid-late April time frame. Any thoughts on that? I'm thinking Germany, but home actually does seem pretty appealing right now. Maybe San Diego...I don't know if Arun is still out there. I don't know. I should be able to make this decision myself, but I'll go ahead and solicit input from you all. What do you think?
15 March 2005 1455z - S3 went about as well as I could have expected. Because of a meeting at 1300z, I pushed my nap about 15 minutes early. I was out in less than five because I woke up from a dream at about ten minutes. I actually woke up at the 10 minute mark and again at the 20 minute mark before falling asleep one more time just as the alarm clock went off. I wasn't completely refreshed, but it felt alright. I remember parts of one dream though...really strange. It was army-related. We had a platoon out on a patrol and we came to this bridge made of rock. Anyway, for some reason, some guys decided to go rappeling off of it. I guess that's understandable...but then they decide to set their ropes on fire. What the heck, right? And then they decide to lower this net filled with supplies. But it didn't make sense why they were lowering it down into a river. And then I look closer and there are soldiers caught inside the net. They're waving their arms, but not in desperation. They're just yelling and saying hi to me. I wave back just before they are cut loose and the net falls a good 30-40 meters down into the water. And then I woke up. Now, all of you psych people...figure this one out and tell me what it means, okay?
Oh, and I had to link to this one article that I read today in the news. Understanding that many of my readers are pretty conservative, I worried a little about expressing my views on this issue; but I'll be honest. This one issue is one of the biggest ones I can think of. The link is to an article about the California court decision finding the ban on gay marriages unconstitutional. Time after time, these judges are coming through on this very tough decision, and it gives me confidence in the system. I know a lot of people disagree, but I consider this a huge civil rights issue more than anything else. And I wasn't alive at the time, but I know thousands and thousands of minorities and interracial couples have already fought this battle in the past and it amazes me that we have to go through this again. For those of you who have time to read this, it's a summary of Loving v. Virginia, a case I've mentioned before regarding interracial marriage back in the 60s. Here's the summary paragraph for those of you with SASs.
Marriage is one of the "basic civil rights of man," fundamental to our very existence and survival. To deny this fundamental freedom on so unsupportable a basis as the racial classifications embodied in these statutes, classifications so directly subversive of the principle of equality at the heart of the Fourteenth Amendment, is surely to deprive all the State's citizens of liberty without due process of law. The Fourteenth Amendment requires that the freedom of choice to marry not be restricted by invidious racial discriminations. Under our Constitution, the freedom to marry, or not marry, a person of another race resides with the individual and cannot be infringed by the State.
Okay, I hate when blogs get political, so I won't go much further. Thanks for your time.
15 March 2005 1017z - Okay, I've got a quick meeting I need to leave for in about 20 minutes and I need to do a number two before I go, but I wanted to log this before I forgot. S2 went without a hitch today. I was feeling a little drowsy around 0730z, so I decided to start early. Good call on my part. On of my fellow LTs in the hooch next to mine was reading a book, and after I woke up, he mentioned to me how quickly I was able to fall asleep. It probably wasn't longer than two or three minutes. Then I woke up about ten minutes into it feeling pretty good. But I decided to put my head down for the full duration and ended up with a good half hour of sleep...just like it's supposed to be done. I woke up and ran into two other LTs on their way out to lunch and joined them for what became a pretty interesting meeting of the minds.
The two other LTs are Company XOs that I've worked with for a long time now; and being LTs, I think we all took comfort in being able to put all of our opinions and concerns and gripes out there on the table. It's never really appropriate to gripe down and it's never comfortable to gripe up either. Anyway, great conversation...probably lasted nearly two hours with a little bit of eating here and there. Whether or not anything good will come as a result of it, who knows. But it was nice. That's all I'm saying. Okay, off to meeting. I'll write more later. And no...believe it or not, not an ounce of caffeine consumed .
15 March 2005 0258z - So I think my body is sleep retarded. I think I've gone so long being sleep-deprived, that it just doesn't know how to adjust to this new sleep schedule. It might have to do with the three hours of sleep that I got last night though. I don't know. Maybe keeping that core sleep around has made it harder for the body to adjust. Anyway, lets recap what's gone on since the last nap. I did get the three hours of sleep that I planned and at the right time too. I think that's actually the first time since I started this thing. I woke up and took care of a few minor issues before heading out to the gym. I hadn't been there for a while and it showed. I stepped on the scale and it was tipping at 180. I don't feel like a fat-body, but that's pretty big considering I'd been sitting around 160 for the last two years. Anyway, feeling bad for skipping the gym this last week, I did 10K on the elliptical. I kept a good 6-minute mile pace the whole way and had my heart rate hovering around 180 for the last fifteen minutes of the run. It felt good. Then I went on to lift some weights for an hour before heading back to the office.
I noticed the ole bowl getting shaggy when I looked at myself in the mirror when I was shaving, so I decided that I would give myself a haircut this morning. It was a good morning to do it too...because I was actually feeling rather alert. That's probably one of the worst things that you could be doing when you fall asleep...giving yourself a haircut. Anyway, as I was wrapping up, one of my fellow LTs came in the door. He had just gotten off of leave and we caught up for the next half hour or so. It was nice to have someone to talk to in the morning. Usually, I'll wander in the guard shack just to find someone to keep me up for a little bit.
Anyway, that was pretty much the morning. It hit near 0230z, so I decided to head back to the hooch to see if I could squeeze out an S1. I wasn't feeling very sleepy though. But I tried anyway. I think I may have hit Phase 1 or 2, but not much past that. I was just trying to think of nothing as my mind was wandering and it eventually rolled into a dream. I tried to steer it towards a situation involving women, but to no avail. That's what makes me think that I was at least somewhat unconscious. Anyway, that was over by 0245z, and I didn't even bother trying to go back to sleep.
And now, I'm at a bit of a decision point. I think I'm going to try to stop sticking to these rigid sleep schedules because these naps just aren't going anywhere. I think I'm going to keep a window of about an hour or so for each napping period. And if I feel the least bit drowsy at any point, I'll put myself down. I need to get into the habit of sleeping and then cutting myself off, I think. Otherwise, my body will never figure out what I'm trying to do. It'll think I'm just doing what I always did. Like I said, I think I'm sleep retarded.
14 March 2005 1940z - I made my evening rounds early enough today that I can actually lie down for three hours before first formation in the morning. I was reading an abstract that Jeff e-mailed me today and it talked about a study that forced people to live off of sleep, whether monophasically, biphasically, or polyphasically. The monophasics were the worst off. But the more I think about biphasic or triphasic sleep, the more it appeals to me. When I have an hour and a half, it feels very refreshing, as if I had slept a whole night. I could probably live off of two or three of those a day. Of course, I'll still stick with my original plan as much as possible before I give up on the half-hour blocks. I mean, if I can get from a half hour what I can get from an hour and a half, why not, right? It makes me think about a line from a movie that I don't remember...you know, when they talk about 8 minute abs and then 7 minute abs and then 6 minute abs. I mean, if you can accomplish it in less time, why not? Speaking of abs...that reminds me that I have to go to the gym. Did I say that I was supposed to do that today or tomorrow? It's bad how all of the days just mix together now that there isn't a single period of sleep separating them.
Anyway, that's all I have for now. Don't forget to write me.
14 March 2005 1347z - Okay, so maybe today wasn't as productive as the last few. I needed a little break. I'd been running pretty hard with planning and meetings and getting people out of trouble and visiting towers. I know that doesn't sound like hard work...and it isn't hard work. It's just constant work and long hours, and that's just as tiring. Okay, I'll stop complaining.
I just had a quick link I wanted to add as I was wasting some time net-surfing today. Here is the coaching line-up for TJ this year. Note Coach Travis's biography. It talks about how he contributed to the development of such greats as All-State Wide Receivers Gordon Avery, Stu Greene and Brandon Buchanan; All-Region Wide Receiver Chino Rodriguez; and All-District Defensive Back Sonny Louie. Wait a second...wait a second. Who was that last guy? Hehe...it's nice to reminisce, but can you believe that was eight years ago? Pretty wild, huh? I'm getting old.
14 March 2005 1025z - So another slip-up today. The timing has been off all morning because of that first hour and a half nap I took to catch up. So by 0700z, I was getting pretty tired and I went to lie down because it'd already been a good 5-6 hours since my last nap. Because it was off-schedule, I went and set the time on my old alarm clock so as not to throw off my five new alarm clocks. Then I put my head down only to wake up 2.5 hours later. So what was the screw up? I thought I set my alarm clock for 0730z, but after adjusting the time, I never actually turned the alarm on. I'm kicking myself and cursing in my head right now. I'm pretty upset that I made a mistake as stupid as that..plus I missed lunch. With that said, I think I'm going to skip my S3 today and stick with my S4 along with a shortened S5. Oh well...can't beat myself too much over this.
14 March 2005 0248z - Louie...you got some splaining to do. Yeah, S5 ended up getting cut down to a half hour tonight. I had to adjust it because I ended up taking close to four hours to round the towers and then I had to type up an operations order and an e-mail before I wrapped up. If I wasn't going to get a full 1.5 hours, then I'd rather have a half hour, you know? So I took my half hour and I sat down at my desk with about fifteen minutes before guard mount. Then I'm sitting there. Then I'm sitting there. And it's like lost time...I look at my watch and realize that it's now half an hour past guard mount. I'd just been sitting there in a state of half-consiousness and lost out. I was still groggy. It's the sleep inertia, I'm guessing. But I figured the best way around it was to just get a full cycle of sleep in. So I set my alarm clock for an hour and a half and passed out. I woke up two minutes before my alarm clock was going to go off, and it was amazing. It had felt like I'd just had a full night's sleep. I'm going to have to use these cycles sparingly in the future to catch up, but I know that I have that technique in my toolbox in case I ever just crash again. Tallying up my sleep for the last few days, I'm looking at 3.5 hours for day one, 3.75 for day two, and three hours for yesterday if you count that additional hour and a half I just pulled off.
Considering all of that, I think I'm functioning well. I just hope there aren't any long-term effects...hehe.
Anyway, with some of my extra time, I jumped on AIM and had a chance to chat with a few people. I got forwarded a link of one of our soldiers here who also kept a blog...and then I started to look for some more. I haven't found many, but I've inlcuded 3-116/OEF related links to the side for those interested. The one for Waheed is actually a blog maintained by one of the local national interpreters working with the Army here.
Other than that, it's rainy and ugly outside. Weather has been amazing around here though...forties in the morning and it's starting to hit the 80s during the day here. It's like night and day around here. Actually, to be technical, I guess it is night and day, not like night and day. Task for tomorrow: return to the gym.
13 March 2005 1830z - So I caught up on my sleep with my S4. I didn't think I was going to be able to fall asleep today, but I actually ended up oversleeping. I didn't do it by much, but I did oversleep. I think I ended up hitting the snooze a few times...enough to confuse myself. See, I was supposed to wake up at 1700z, but when I kept on waking up and seeing the clock, I thought that I was supposed to be waking up at 1800z. So I hit the snooze, not thinking. Some time around 1750z, it finally hit me. I thought to myself how I shouldn't have been hitting snooze because my clocks were set to go off right when I woke up. And then it hit me...1700z, not 1800z. So, strike one for me. I don't feel all too bad because I did miss my S3 today and my S5 last night was shortened. I think I'll adjust S5 to be an hour and a half for tonight and keep it that way until I am fully converted. So with that said, I have about three hours left until my last nap of the day. I signed out the gator keys from supply earlier today with the idea of visiting some more towers tonight. I should be pooped enough after that to pass out pretty quickly, I'm sure.
Reflecting on everything as day three is starting to come to a close, I find that this schedule has given me something to be excited about. I mean, I genuinely look forward to each of my naps every day and I constantly have that one thing to look forward to every 3-5 hours. The experience hasn't been without its low points though. This afternon, I didn't even realize it, but I guess I was kinda mush sitting at my desk around lunchtime. One of my E5s told me how he got a picture of me as I was just nodding off in my chair. Another one of the sergeants here was making fun of me, talking about how I'll probably go crazy within a few days. I don't know...I think in a few days, I'll be so used to it all, that I probably won't bring it up any more.
Anyway, thanks to mom and sister for their support through this. My commander has been pretty supportive of me too. And if anyone wants to throw in their two cents, I'm all ears. For now, I'll head back out and troop the line again tonight. Maybe there'll be more stuff in my inbox by the time I get back.
13 March 2005 1456z - I'm on such a high right now, it's not even funny. I just came back from dinner with three of the platoon leaders in my company and one of the staff captains. And we spent nearly an hour discussing issues from our ODP that occurred earlier this evening. It was great to hear all of that...just the fact that it generated so much discussion. I just hope that the excitement and emotion doesn't just fade with time. The ODP was the first I'd delivered. So you've got a few captains, one my current boss and one my former boss, our battalion XO, and a bunch of platoon leaders. I think it started off a little slow, but then I rolled into issues with training and what challenges we face when we get back to the states...and we've already run twenty minutes past our normal hour allotment, but they're still into it. No one's looking at their watches. They have genuine concerns and they really care. It's been so long since I've felt like a teacher, that part of it felt good. But even more, I felt like a commander. Over the course of the last two months, I've been given a lot of opportunities to grow that part of me, and although I've run into some stumbling blocks...I felt like I've made a lot of progress and there may just be some lasting effects of the work we're doing here. And I'm not talking about Afghanistan. I'm talking about our soldiers that we have here with us.
I mean, I go and talk to soldiers in the towers a lot now. And when I hear them talk about not staying in the guard when we go back home, I feel like we've failed them in some way. I mean, I know family has a big role in that. A lot of soldiers just don't want to sacrifice another year with their family...and I can understand that. But there are guys who have just given up on a lot of things...including themselves. I don't know. I don't want to sound negative here, so I'll just say that I think we have a lot that we can do in our last four months here. I just hope I can convince the guys to use these last few months to make things better instead of giving up and counting the days until we get home.
In other news, S2 went about as well as S1. Then S3 didn't happen because of the ODP. I'm still surprised about how alert I am considering I've really only had two hours of sleep in the last day and a half. I'm hoping I'll dip a little before S4 time though. We'll see.
13 March 2005 0339z - So S1 didn't pan out this morning. Around 0130z, I was all ready for my nap. I was half passed out in my chair as I tried to finish up a task that my commander and I talked about the evening before. But then I took a break to use the latrine and ran into my commander there. He invited me to breakfast with him and I obliged. We talked about a lot of issues and then I went back to my desk to finish the task. It was good...the whole conversation helped to refresh me. Unfortunately, it came just maybe 20 minutes before my S1. So when I finally lay down to sleep, I couldn't do it. You would think that after going on an hour and a half of sleep, I'd be able to turn it on like a switch. But I couldn't. So I lay there in silence until the alarm went off. Then it was up and back to work. So that takes care of day two.
With today being Sunday, I'm pretty confident that I can hit most of my hard times for naps. Again, I just worry that I won't be able to fall asleep.
12 March 2005 2357z - I got caught up with a lot of the tower visiting last night. I had planned on getting back by 2000z for my S5, but there were a couple of towers that had guys who just had a lot to get off their chest. I probably stayed over an hour each at towers eleven and one. Add a couple more towers and a 25 KPH speed limit and I didn't get back until after 2130z, which left me about 75 minutes until wake-up. Ideally, I would have had closer to 90 minutes, but I went with what I had. I'm hurting right now though. I can't wait until 0230z rolls around, though, and I get to go back to bed. I'd pay real money if I could have that now.
12 March 2005 1737z - S4 was a bust again today. It was better in that I was calm and relaxed tonight; but I just wasn't tired. I think I hit a near dream state at one point, but I don't feel like I was truly asleep at any one time. Oh well...it's less than three hours until my core sleep cycle, so I think I'll just go out for a drive and visit some guys in the towers. By the time I get back, it'll hopefully be S5 time. I should probably let up on the updating after today too. I don't know how interesting it is to read about this stuff. There just isn't that much to do sometimes with all of this extra time. I keep on checking RSS feeds to see if anyone else has updated their blogs and I wait for e-mail. Realizing that I go to sleep every 3-5 hours, I guess I shouldn't expect something new in my inbox every time I get up...but I do. So with that said, I'm off to make some use of my extra time. I'll write more after my S5.
12 March 2005 1507z - Okay, so I missed my S3 today. I think that'll be something I'll have to deal with on Saturdays just because of the meeting schedule. I've got my Synch meeting followed by the Battalion BUB, and there just isn't much room in between to pull a half hour nap...hmm...though I could just ride the shuttle bus on the way back and just sleep for two trips up and down Disney, the main street. A normal walk is right around a mile and that takes about fifteen minutes. So if I take the bus and just go to sleep while it circles, I should only need an extra fifteen. Make sense? Either way, I have a week to work out the details. For now, I'll just look ahead to my S4. That's just an hour and a half away. I think this'll be the hardest of my naps to adjust to just because of the circadian rhythm thing. From what I read, it your alertness tends to peak around 9:00, AM or PM. This is the one I had trouble falling asleep for yesterday, but I'm hoping it was mainly anxiety and not some deeper issue. As always, I will keep you posted.
So far, I've been actively trying to recruit people into doing this with me. There hasn't been much luck so far. Most people just look at my line of five alarm clocks and give me a look like I'm crazy. My commander is pretty supportive, though not willing to join me. My little sister has given me some positive encouragement though. Everyone else...eh, I'm not doing it to make anyone else happy. I'm just trying to get some more time to troop the lines and to get some down time of my own without having to sacrifice my work.
It's kinda funny. You know the feeling you get when you buy a lottery ticket? The odds of actually winning are horrible, but you still think about all of the ways you'll spend your money, you know? Well, I'm starting to feel the same way about this whole thing. I think to myself, "what am I going to do with all of this extra free time?" Back in college, I used to talk to Jeff about coming up with a sleeping pill. It didn't make you sleep, but it was like in the video games when you can just restore your health...except in this case, you would restore your sleep debt. That'd be really neat. Anyway, I'm just trying to think of ways I could spend my extra w-hours. I mean, seriously, if time is money, then this really is like winning the lottery. Maybe not the big jackpot, but it's close to winning one of those $5000 scratchers.
12 March 2005 0919z - S2 went well, but I have had problems staying awake through just the last ten minutes here. I tried to wash my face with a baby wipe here at my desk and had a small bout of microsleep as I discovered that I'd dropped the baby wipe on my lap in the split second that I was asleep. In less than two hours, I have the big weekly synchronization meeting with BDOC. There should be a full-bird or two there, so I need to find some way of getting myself together. Even on normal Saturdays, it's hard enough to stay awake during those. So on a day like today, I need to take a few countermeasures. Looking around my desk, I'll start by filling my pockets with some Halls defense vitamin C drops.
The sleep itself went well. I don't know exactly when I fell asleep, but I woke up about 10 minutes into my half hour. Then I went back to sleep again and got up at the sound of the alarm. I'm feeling a little better now that I've started to type and get some thoughts on paper, but I was hurting just a few minutes ago. I'm not sure if it's the sleep inertia or if it was the fact that I just filled my belly up at the DFAC. Either way, I'm looking forward to my S3 which is scheduled just over three hours away.
12 March 2005 0311z - S1 this morning went much better than S4 last night. In this 30-minute block, I think I actually fell asleep. I had two quick dreams...not so much dreams so much as a cross between a hallucination and a vivid dream...very short. The first image was that of one of my fellow LTs walking around asking if I was asleep. I know it wasn't real because I could wake up and see my poncho liner draped over my head. But I was able to fall back into that mixed state of consciousness again. The second time, I had a somewhat more pleasing image of a girl that I used to know back when. I won't go into details on that one. Anyway, before I knew it, the alarm clock went off and I was back on the job. We'll see how the rest of the S's go today. I did a little more research on circadian rhythms, and I think that S4 is placed at a bad time, right at one of the peaks of consciousness if you convert from zulu to local time. Unfortunately, my sleep is going to be based around my meeting and guard mount schedule. Hopefully, my body will adjust, right?
11 March 2005 2345z - Okay, so I'm not sure whether to call yesterday day one or day zero. *flips coin* Day one it is...which makes today day two. I guess that decision-making process that they taught us in OCS does work after all.
Let's talk about last night...well, the last three hours of it at least. S5 went well. That's my three hours of core sleep at the end of each day. Eventually, I'm going to cut that down to a regular 20-minute nap, but I figure three hours is small enough of a time to help me to transition. Anyway, I left the office around 1950z last night and put my head down to the pillow just a minute before 2000z, my scheduled sleep time. I was probably out in about two minutes, plus or minus. I was already pretty tired by that time, and I felt like I was near useless typing up reports as it was starting to take longer and longer to complete each task. Like it took maybe an hour to finish my SITREP along with my BUB slides for today. I had some notes I typed up for the leader meeting as well as part of an AAR for the boss regarding the events of the last week. Those last few tasks weren't complete, though, as I just left the windows open on m desktop because I couldn't really concentrate on any one thing. I'm feeling a little more composed right now...composed enough to write this entry, but I am looking forward to my next little nap.
I woke up this morning at 2259z. I looked at my watch just one minute before my alarm clock went off. I guess it's a good thing that I woke up on my own. I imagine I went through two full sleep cycles during those three hours because I was feeling pretty good. I'm sure it would have been worse if I snoozed it and slept in an additional 20 or 30 minutes like I normally would at home. If nothing comes out of this experience, I'll at least pay more attention to these hour and a half chunks of sleep and calculate my morning wake-up based on them. There were people sleeping in the hooch, but I let my alarm clock go for a split second before turning it off. I needed to know how well the alarm worked. I did just buy five of them, already a decent investment sunk into this project. So I hit snooze right away and started dressing for guard mount. Halfway through that, my alarm went off again. A four-minute snooze...not bad. I think that'll help me to stay on my schedule...though I'm tempted to market a snoozeless alarm clock for those like me who need to get up out of bed on the first try. Anyway, with that said, I'm going to do as much as I can during my next three w-hours before my highly-anticipated S1. Good night.
11 March 2005 1725z - Since I'm going to have so many more waking hours...I think I'm call them w-hours, pronounced wowwers...I decided to look up some more things on sleep. There is surprisingly little information on the internet about polyphasic sleep, so I just started looking up a few things about napping instead. Ironically (in the Ben sense), it just happens that were are less than a month away from National Workplace Napping Day which I found out about at napping.com. NWND takes place on April 4th this year, the day after the start of daylight savings. It makes sense since everyone will be going to work with an hour less of sleep that day. Plus, there is also National Sleep Awareness Week, which occurs the week prior from 28MAR05-03APR05. Interesting stuff, huh?
I've got a couple of other links too, to include: Napping Enhances Worker Productivity, The Sleep Foundation, and SleepEducation.com.
Okay, fast forward a little bit. I just tried to go to sleep about an hour ago. No luck. I lay in bed for a whole twenty-five minutes and couldn't fall asleep. I think that's the first time I've been able to do that in a good three years...not fall asleep, that is. I think I was just too excited. I could feel my heart pounding the whole time. At best, I maybe hit stage 1 sleep for about ten minutes. But before I got too far, my alarm went off and it was time to get up already. I was okay with that, but I wonder how motivated I will be to get up after a day or two of this. Anyway, I came back to my office where I ripped through some packaging and synchronized my alarm clocks. (see below) I preset all of the alarms in the hopes that I would be able to stick to my schedule. I know things come up around here, but they won't miss me for a half hour here or there. I think it was more symbolic than anything else. I had to put little stickies on the top of the clocks to keep them straight though. I plan on keeping them here in the office and then bringing one to my bunk or just sleeping here in my seat whenever the time comes. As always, we'll see how it works. I'm sure I'll be updating a little more over the next few days.
11 March 2005 1148z - Okay, Jane. I'm going to give it a shot. I finally had a chance to read through a whole bunch of polyphasic sleep articles and made a decision to start transitioning today. For the most part, I think it'll be an easy transition to make because 1) I'm used to being sleep-deprived already, b) the military environment helps me to maintain my discipline, and thirdly, because I am just that hard. For those who aren't familiar with polyphasic sleep or the Uberman sleep schedule, it's basically an attempt to increase your REM sleeping efficiency. The following is just what I've found through a half hour of internet research, so don't take the next paragraph as fact.
So your normal person is a monophasic sleeper, someone who gets all of their sleep at one time. I guess research into brain waves shows that there are five stages, with the last one, REM sleep, being associated with dreaming and other functions essential to survival. In a normal night's sleep, a person will go through these stages multiple times (4-5 per night), with each cycle lasting somewhere around an hour and a half. During each successive cycle, the percentage of REM sleep increases, with a nightly total ranging from 90-120 minutes.
Again, take your normal person. Without sleep, you will eventually die. And there are other things that come with accumulation of sleep debt and severe sleep deprivation. Like microsleep...that's something I've experienced all too often over the last few years, but didn't have a name for. That's basically a short second or two bout of narcolepsy. And there are myoclonic twitches, which occur frequently underneath my bottom eyelid when I am short on sleep. Anyway, I don't know about the other phases of sleep, but from my vast experience with REM (basically consisting of watching that one episode of Star Trek: the Next Generation when they go through that causality loop), REM is one of the most important. So when you are sleep deprived, your body will figure out a way to cheat and jump straight to REM sleep.
Enter polyphasic sleep. The basic concept is to reduce all of the other stages of sleep so that your body maximizes the REM sleep. Take the Uberman sleep schedule. That involves sleeping for 20 minutes every four hours. This is what I figure to be the ideal polyphasic sleep cycle, requiring two hours of sleep each day, with most of that two hours being REM. I think the key is getting your body trained to whatever off the wall sleep cycle you can come up with. Then, it'll know to kick into REM right away. I had a similar sleep cycle when I was going through JRTC in Fort Polk, except I averaged maybe two different thirty minute periods of sleep every day. I seemed to do alright with that, but I knew that I would have to catch up eventually.
Anyway, with four months left on this deployment, I figured it's worth a shot to maximize the amount of work I can do here in country. So I mentioned it to my CO who already had a basic understanding of the concept. He's pretty smart and reads a lot...so he seemed amazingly supportive and even asked me to copy a couple of articles on his flash drive for him to read later. Supposedly, there's anecdotal evidence that this technique was used by the likes of da Vinci, Edison, and Jefferson. I mean, if it works for them, right? So with that said, I am going ot kick off my experiment tonight. I think I will start off with a core sleeping period to get me started before giving up all of my sleep fully. I have to plan around guard mounts and meetings and the stock market open, so it won't be a perfect Uberman schedule; but I think it'll be close enough. Here's what it'll look like:
S1 = 0230-0300
S2 = 0800-0830
S3 = 1230-1300
S4 = 1630-1700
S5 = 2000-2300
Each of the first four periods should yield REM equivalent to 1.5 hours of normal sleep, so this schedule should give a REM equivalent to a nine hour night's rest at the cost of five. Eventually, each of the periods will be trimmed down to 20-25 minutes, with a total daily sleep of 100-125 minutes. That's the goal at least. That would be the equivalent of sleeping 7.5 hours while still having 22 waking hours in every day. It's worth a shot, right? For now, I need to get my hands on five alarm clocks because I am too lazy to keep changing them every day. I'll keep you posted.
10 March 2005 1658z - You know thngs must be busy if I went a whole day without updating. It's not really worth going into details with all that's been going on, but things have gotten much better over the last 48 hours. Let's just leave it at that.
I was AIMing with an old friend tonight. We hadn't talked in years. But anyway, the topic of exercise came up and I brought up Aerobic Striptease. I saw it during a visit to the P/X like a month ago, and it just baffled me. For those of you reading this from back in the states, can you tell me if this is a new fad back there? My guess is that they just stocked up on that stuff here in Afghanistan because pornography is prohibited, and they figure that guys will pick up anything close. For the people who have AFN around here, it's funny how often I see people watching the morning workout shows on ESPN just to catch some women in spandex. Now that's just sad.
I'm trying to think of what else has been going on over here, but my mind is blanking out on me. Last night, I got maybe two hours of sleep because I was up and about talking to the guys in the towers. I guess that's good, but it's bad for my sleep. I can't just pop in and out when I'm making my rounds. If I stop in a tower, I'll usually talk to the guys for 15-40 minutes, depending on how much they just need someone to talk to. Often times, they'll just bring up concerns or ask for confirmation of various rumors they're hearing. It's hard to come up with stuff to talk to though. I'll usually ask if anything is going on, and they'll just point to the sand. Nope, hasn't moved yet. Next question. It doesn't go down exactly like that, but there is a recurring theme. I usually fish around to find something to get them talking and then I'll just listen. Anything that'll help them to stay awake, you know?
Speaking of which...I moved hooches today. That has nothing to do with staying awake, but I was just thinking about going to bed and I realized that I would be in a different bunk tonight. I had to move to make room for one of the other LTs here. He'd been crashing with the rest of his platoon and I think he was starting to drive them crazy. So when I was in the guard shack the other day, they kindly asked me to hurry up and move so that they could kick him out. Done.
08 March 2005 1741z - Good day today. First off, my big sister rocks. She keeps on writing me letters from "work" and that's been great. It's too bad I don't write her back. I haven't really written anyone lately...with pen and paper at least. Anyway, along with the letter, she sent two Virginia Lottery scratchers. Isn't that a great idea? I had a huge smile on my face when I saw that. It's too bad I lost on both...but it's not like I have a 7-11 to go cash them in over here. It's the thought that counts though, right?
Anyway, having been up here over a month, the kid gloves are off. The NCOs here are more than comfortable making fun of me to my face now and I think that's good. I'm getting more comfortable as well, and I've started to make more corrections of deficiencies that I see. I made three or four today. I'm not crushing anyone yet, but no one has really earned it yet. We'll see about tomorrow though.
I also had two additional people move into my office today. I had so much room and was getting lonely...so I figured it would work out. Plans for the future also include cutting holes in two of the walls in my office. I guess I could always walk around, but I'm in charge now. I shouldn't have to walk around. I should be able to walk right through...hehe. I know it sounds funny, but I think I'm going to go ahead with it anyway. I've got some young carpenter-types that need some practice anyway. Other than that, things are going well. I cleaned up my office today since I had to make room for my new staff. It's strange actually being able to see my desk again. I remember having to do the same back in my classroom. There's just so much paperwork sometimes, you know?
08 March 2005 0030z - Yesterday was another long day. Actually, recently, every day seems to be getting longer. I'm doing a lot of it to myself though. But yeah, it's about 0430 local time now. Already had a good discussion with one of my OCS classmates about his platoon and followed up on a patrol report from yesterday. I checked some e-mail and even stumbled onto this Army Times Article about military blogs before walking over to the DFAC only to find that it wasn't open yet. Then I answered my sister's poll about clones. It was a tough call. If you decided to clone yourself and put your brain in the clone's more youthful body, what would you do with its brain? I said that I'd put it in a bottle. It's a tough call though.
Anyway, when I write about that, I feel bad the time I'm afforded to surf the internet every once in a while. I always talk about rank being about responsibility and not privilege, but this is definitely one privilege I would be reluctant to give up. I'll be honest in that it's kept me sane to keep this little diary of mine. And then I start working numbers...you know how much I love numbers. And I figure, given the 18+ hours that I spend awake every day, I can take out an hour or two for PT, a half hour or so for blogging, another hour or two e-mailing and other BS and still end up working a full twelve hours...that's just me rationalizing though.
But yeah, what got me to thinking about that was a talk we had with the leadership yesterday. We had a near three hour meeting yesterday morning with the CO, the First Sergeant, me, and about 60 sergeants who probably weren't very happy to be there. But the CO set the stage and did his crushing and we worked up a plan to get things turned around. I think about a third of the guys there bought into it, another third was just pissed, and the last third was somewhere in the middle. I think we'll see a lot of progress in the next few days...I'm just hoping I can help to make these things stick over the course of the next four months. We'll see. For now, breakfast.
06 March 2005 1706z - I'm just exhausted right now, both mentally and physically. I started off the day strong, heading to gym after our first guard mount. I did about four miles on the elliptical before lifting. It'd been a week or so since the last time, so that felt good. Then I cleaned up and lay back down for an hour just to recharge. The rest of the day worked itself out rather slowly, and then came to a big crescendo at the end. You like that, don't you? Crescendo. Anyway, I wrapped up the brief I was going to do for ODP today and made the handouts and everything. That was supposed to happen at noon. But then a fellow LT invited me out for a run. Having slacked off for the last week, I figured I'd go. Plus, he'd been asking me a lot, and I kept on having meetings that kept me from going...so I didn't want him to think I was blowing him off. So about 75 minutes before I gave my briefing, I decided to go run 6+ miles...probably not the best choice I've made in the last few weeks here. Wanting to make it back in time, I started off pretty fast, pushing the pace a little. Again, for those who weren't here last month for the Black History Month 10K run, I finished in just over 54 minutes...so that left me a good 20 minutes to set up for the meeting if I kept up the same pace. Anyway, believe it or not, I cut about four minutes off of my time, averaging right around eight minutes each mile...not too bad. I know I'm going to be sore in the morning though. Hopefully, I can recover and head out again before the St. Pattie's day 10K. Oh, and they had a scale at the gym today. I guess they picked it up while I was slacking. Anyway, 178 right now. I'll need to go join the fat boy program before long. I think I'm on the borderline by a pound or two.
Okay, so I get back from the run and I quickly change before rushing to get my projector and whatnot over for the meeting. I keep a towel with me too because I know I'm going to continue sweating for at least another 20-30 minutes. But uh oh...my commander's not there for the brief. He got pulled into another meeting because one of our guys got in trouble while I was joyrunning. It was bad...I mean, no one got hurt or anything, but we just have some discipline issues within the unit. And I just felt bad that he got chewed out because of it. I mean, I think we're at the point where I just need to put my foot down. I've been procrastinating on the whole crushing thing, and I think discipline of the unit has suffered somewhat because of it.
I sat down to talk to my commander last night, and it was amazing how easy it was to talk to him. I mean, you usually don't think of a commander like that. But it was like having a psychiatrist. Anyway, we talked about a lot of things...from leadership to discipline to religion to finance to self-help books and family. And to have this happen the very next day...I don't know...I feel like I really let him down. But I don't know. I don't think he's mad at me, but I think he's frustrated that I don't crush people like I need to. I think I'll add that to my list of new year's resolutions. Anway, I went to visit a bunch of the towers afterwards and had some good conversations with the soldiers. And we'll leave it at that. I'm about to pass out here, so good night.
05 March 2005 0842z - I've been living off of about 4 hours of sleep for each of the last few nights. I need to make myself go to bed sooner. I guess that's my fault for re-arranging the schedule so that there are a bazillion different formations. I've always felt that it was good for the staff and the senior leaders to at least show up at formation, so I've made it a point to show up to each. The main reasoning is that soldiers already think that leaders and staff personnel are pogues for not doing the brunt of the grunt work, and I don't feel like that perception is good for instilling whatever it is that you're trying to instill. So yeah, I've been running low on the sleep, so of course PT has lagged as well. I feel relatively caught up at this point though, so I might have a light day or two coming to me in the future. We'll see.
Yesterday, I jumped through a few hoops yesterday to get some chow for my guys. To begin with, the DFAC had been giving my NCOs problems with drawing chow to deliver to our guys in the towers. That seems horrible, I know. Even back in the states, we would get hot chow out to the guys in the field; and now they're eating MREs and ramen twice a day. So I did a little research and found out that because of the contract with KBR, it requires a full-bird colonel to sign off on the chow request in order to get it approved. Some CoS policy or something. Well, for those of you who aren't familiar with infantry battalions, there is no full-bird colonel in our whole unit. Our highest is a Lt. Colonel (O5). We needed someone in the pay grade of O6 or higher. So I take my mighty computer and type up a memo. I'm getting good at these. I spent a while on it, wording it just right and then bring it to BDOC, our higher in this case. They've got a full-bird in charge over there, so I figured it was worth a shot. But unfortunately, he was out of the office and it didn't seem like he would be back any time soon. So there I was with a memorandum signed by a first lieutenant, just four pay grades short of the requirement. So heck, why not go to the CJ-4 anyway, right? They pretty much run the logistics cell for all of Afghanistan. They wouldn't laugh at me, would they?
So I head over there to the JOC (joint operations center) with memo in hand and look around for CJ-4. CJ-1, CJ-2, CJ-6, CJ-7, and eventually, CJ-4. Not knowing the procedures, I knock on the door. I walk in and they're already laughing. You don't have to knock on the door in here, they correct me. So I hand them the memo and told them that I'd already talked to them on the phone earlier about the memo, which I did. She probably didn't think I understood English because she kept on telling me that I needed an O6 signature, and I kept on telling her that I couldn't. After about 20 minutes of playing Abbott and Costello, she says that she'll try to push it through her colonel when she can catch up with him, but she wouldn't make any promises. So I go away thinking about how I'll have to track down a full-bird, believing that she'd just given me the brush-off. But she didn't let me down. In about two hours, I was sitting in my office and the phone rings. It's her boss on the other end and he asks me a few questions before approving the request. Great, work is done, right?
Hehe...the only problem was that I had to get back to the JOC to bring the memo to BDOC who would end up making the final coordination with KBR. Simple, right? The only problem was that it was getting late, and I didn't have enough the time to walk the two miles and I didn't have the rank to park over at the JOC. They have special parking spaces. So I asked around and there happened to be a vehicle in our unit that was allowed to park there. So I get the keys and here's where it gets a little embarrassing. It's the battlion XO's SUV with manual transmission.
Yeah, I know. I'm a grown man. It's something I should know how to do. And I do know how to drive it...I have my uncle Alex to thank for that. He worked with me for a day over at the GMU parking lot one summer. But that was once and I played around with Jeff Robidoux's Saturn in the Harris Teeter parking lot down in Blacksburg maybe six years ago. So when I had the keys in hand, I thought it'd be wise to get myself an A-driver. Yeah, so they made fun of me for it, but I was pretty proud of myself. The speed limit for going on Disney (main street, basically) is 25 kph, so I didn't have to go past second gear. Amazingly enough, I remembered enough from that one experience to make the round trip and it was set. Mission complete.
MTF. I just got a phone call from higher. I have some crushing to do.