The end of uberman... back to everyman.

So, Friday night I crashed. Saturday night I did well and did the nap thing just as planned. Sunday night/Monday morning, being yet another attempt at going all through the night with just naps, was of course very difficult. I slept way too much of the night even with outside encouragement. I had things I should have worked on, and I had Dr. Jones calling me over and over again. But that didn't keep me from ignoring everything and shutting the world off while I got the sleep I needed.

With so many things, they say it's like 90% mental. While I guarantee that adjusting to uberman is a major mental challenge, it's extremely physically demanding as well to stay awake and alert. The way I scheduled it, I just couldn't get through the second night... no matter how alert I felt at some other given time of the day.

I figured that if I wanted to succeed at uberman, I would have to do a few things differently:

• I would have to be extremely strict with the schedule. Naps every 4 hours with only 15 minutes of leeway for every nap. That sort of schedule makes everything difficult.
  
• I would have to figure out a better way to sleep on the Trax. It's not relaxing and causes interruptions often. Unfortunately this is something I need to figure out ANYWAY, since I'll still be attempting to nap on the Trax.
• I would have to nap twice at work every day. With an 8-hour workday that's interrupted once in the middle of it for sleep, there's no other way to sleep right on the dot without putting a second nap in the work day.

So, tonight I return to everyman. It will be nice to be going to sleep at the same time my wife goes to sleep. These days I can't keep a very strict schedule, and everyman doesn't need nearly as strict of a schedule as uberman requires, so that will be another helpful aspect.

I'll post my sleep times on a daily basis...

Uberman: Crash...

So... I was so pumped about going through the night last night, but it unfortunately didn't happen.

My evening nap yesterday took place at about 4:40 to 5:00. Then Amber and I went out with some friends for the evening, and we were heading home at about 11:15. I was out cold during the ride home, and although I had set my phone alarm for 20 minutes, Amber had to make a couple different attempts to get me to wake up. It was ridiculous. And I was told I was snoring pretty badly, too.

Well after waking up, we were almost home... and for some reason I didn't feel refreshed. It was most likely because it was so long since the nap before that I just really needed more time to catch up. Amber and I have both noticed that I'm much more irritable when going through this sleep deprivation thing. I get mad at little things much more easily. It's definitely not a fun side-effect, and I'd much rather be nodding off every 5 minutes than have to deal with getting annoyed with little things... that's not fair to anyone. Anyway, I stayed up until about 2:00 and set the alarm for 20 minutes after that, but I don't know if it woke me up at all. Dr. Jones called at 2:35, and that woke me up. It felt like I had been sleeping forever, and I think I slipped into the much deeper sleep than REM because I was quite groggy after that. The grogginess lasted all night, and no matter how much I tried to stay awake, I went right back to sleep soon after.

Conclusion: The second night of attempting uberman is EXTREMELY DIFFICULT.

I'm going to keep trying. It's going to happen.

Uberman: Night vs Day

11:30 this morning compared to right now... it's like night versus day (in a little closer-than-figurative than typically intended [usually someone is tired at night and alert during the day])...

The lunch time nap was weird. I woke up six minutes into it (maybe there was something outside the room, I don't know), and of course I didn't want to be done sleeping, so I went back to sleep. I woke up and came back to my desk like normal. The thing is... after about a half hour I found myself to be SO alert... full of energy and pretty wide-eyed. The thing is... at the same time I still felt like I could go back to sleep and get in another nap.

I really couldn't believe how different I felt after just one nap. I didn't even hit REM (at least not for very long), as far as I could tell... no dreaming I could remember. But it still worked incredibly well.

I don't know how, but this brain hacking thing is actually beginning to work.

Uberman update

Well, to say I'm sleep deprived right now would be a major understatement.

So, all my past naps in the last 24 hours have been as follows:

12:40 pm - conference room on the floor
5:00 pm - Trax (seated, noisy)
11:20 pm - Bed with wifey :)
2:20 am - Couch
4:20 am - Couch
6:20 am - Couch
8:20 am - Trax (seated, noisy)

So... that's 7 naps, each 15-20 minutes. Maximum sleep I could have had from that was 2 hours 20 minutes. I have to admit that the break before bed was longer than I wanted it to be. I do think the extra nap during the night helped me to fix that though.

But also, to be honest... 45 minutes ago I was DEAD TIRED. I was sitting at work reading documentation, and I had to catch my head from falling at least 20 times in 10 minutes... no joke.

At 11:45 I had a free 15-minute seated massage (double woot for job perks!), and I was sure I would fall asleep during it. Luckily I kept myself alert the whole time, and I felt much more loose and relaxed than before. So that was great.

I do think the 7 naps will work just fine for the next couple days. Tonight I'm finally going to make it through a second night in a row of uberman, as I have plenty of things I need to get done at home.

I have to say that my wife has been amazing throughout this experiment. I know she doesn't like it, but she's still supportive of whatever I want to do. I must say the worst part about uberman is that there's no extended period of time to lay in bed with her. I hope after adjustment, I'll be able to lay with her for a while longer than a quick 20 minutes without having the worry that I may fall asleep again and oversleep... and ruin what I'm working for.

Well, the quick head-nodding is coming back, and I'm tired of catching myself. I'm heading to a conference room here at work to take my lunch time nap. And yes, I will have a backup alarm with me... I can tell already that I'm going to need it.

Uberman!

Okay, so I haven't given an update on polyphasic sleep for two weeks now. Why? Well, probably because I got off track in my adjustment to the everyman sleep schedule. I have been keeping a log of it, which I will post on here in the next few days, but I'll say right now that it's definitely not pretty. I've had setback after setback, and my body has still never given in to the hack I've been attempting.

One night (about a week ago - the date slips my mind) after crashing for the entire night and getting rather upset about it, I decided to use that sleep as a complete reset. The more and more I would read about uberman, the more I wanted to be able to at least give it a shot. Well, I decided that was the point to try it. So, I've been attempting that ever since. And unfortunately, ever since, I've had alternating good days and bad days.

Last night was a bad one... didn't care about anything else besides just going to sleep. I was trying to delay my nap to 1:40 so that I could get up at 2:00 when Dr. Jones was getting up. Well, I fell asleep earlier than that, and when he called me at 2:00 I HAD to have been in the deepest phase of sleep because I didn't care about anything except going BACK to sleep. I was only half conscious when we were talking, and I made up some story about having a party at my apartment but that I didn't want him to come... and my reasoning to myself was that it was because I knew he'd try to keep me awake. Normally staying awake would be a good thing when trying to adjust... but waking up in the middle of a deep sleep cycle is never a good thing and only seems to cause problems. When it comes to sleep... less is more!

So, I think I've had 3 waking nights and 3 crash nights since trying uberman. Something like that. Point is... I'll never adjust if I keep going back and forth. So, I have a new strategy for my sleep. I'm going Pavlina style and adding a nap at night whenever it feels needed. Maybe adding two. Eight naps at 20 minutes each STILL beats any other everyman schedule out there, and it still lets me stay awake most of the night. What that means is if I'm tired, I can always get a pick-me-up during the night if I need to. The only catch is they need to be two hours apart so that my body has time to reset and doesn't think they're part of the same sleeping session. No big deal, though, because I have about 8-9 hours of night time, so that still gives me plenty of time then. If I really needed to, I could potentially sleep at 10:00, 12:00, 2:00, 4:00, and 6:00 (although looking at all that, it really seems like overkill)... get projects done in between... leave for work at 8:00 and get my Trax nap in, nap during my lunch break at work, and then go home and get another Trax nap in. Then the evening is still family time as I've intended it to be, and all is well. We shall see how it goes, and my circadian clock isn't so severely hacked, as more sleep is taking place during the night. All with under 3 hours of sleep per 24 hours. Cool stuff.

I also decided that I NEED to create my "big fat list" of things to get done while trying to stay awake. I'll be doing that tonight, no doubt, to make sure I have things to do all weekend.

More updates to come... especially after I make it through a second waking night in a row. So, definitely expect an update by Saturday morning! ;)

Polyphasic sleep adjustment - Day 4

So, I've been making the adjustment to an Everyman polyphasic sleep schedule since Monday around lunch time. Everything was going great until this morning. I actually had TWO set-backs.

The interesting thing is I wasn't even feeling sleepy. My body was physically tired, but I really had no idea I wanted to go to sleep. But you know... I was on the couch, and I guess I just couldn't resist a "just for a minute" lay-down. Yeah, it was for 45 minutes. I had originally woken up at 1:50 after going to bed and falling right to sleep at 10:50, so I got my full core sleep in. But by 2:45, somehow I was out. I got a call from my good buddy Christen at 3:30. I was pretty mad at myself for falling asleep. It's nice to have somebody doing this along with me, and we're helping keep each other in line. We decided to ping each other every so often in the mornings, and I set an alarm on my phone to ping me every half hour.

Well, I stayed up until 7:00 and shut off the 30-minute pinging alarm. It was about time for my 20-minute nap, so at 7:05 as I was going to sleep and waiting for 7:25 to come around. It did, and I slept surprisingly well, since I didn't even feel tired. But sure enough, at 7:25 I just simply woke up and didn't jump out of bed like I should have. I ended up getting ANOTHER 45 minutes of sleep after that! LAME!

These mistakes kept me from sleeping at all during my mid-day nap today. Since Tuesday I've slept at least SOME during each nap, but not during this one.

In the last 79 hours, I've only slept 13 hours and 50 minutes. That's only 17.5% of my time, which is still pretty awesome. The goal with Everyman is 16.67%, so I'm doing pretty well... except for the fact that it'll take me another day or two to make the full adjustment. But it'll happen.

Total Irony

I just had a conversation on AIM that was totally the perfect example of irony. I've never talked to nor heard of this guy before. I thought I'd share.

(8:29:30 AM) tekservejimd: hi paul...you were speaking with the wrong jim
(8:42:38 AM) Paul Brill: And I believe you're speaking with the wrong Paul then
(8:43:02 AM) Paul Brill: Because I don't know who you are
(8:43:30 AM) tekservejimd: are you Paul from Locate IT?
(8:43:36 AM) Paul Brill: Negative
(8:43:48 AM) tekservejimd: Paul from Viadex?
(8:43:53 AM) Paul Brill: Negative
(8:44:07 AM) tekservejimd: Paul from where?
(8:44:18 AM) Paul Brill: You want to know who I work for?
(8:44:35 AM) tekservejimd: Paul from Tekerve UK?
(8:44:47 AM) Paul Brill: I live in Utah
(8:45:13 AM) Paul Brill: You know, in the USA
(8:45:35 AM) tekservejimd: did you IM jim amato?
(8:45:40 AM) Paul Brill: No sir
(8:45:51 AM) Paul Brill: That's why I'm telling you you're talking to the wrong Paul
(8:46:04 AM) Paul Brill: ... which is ironic since you said I was talking to the wrong Jim
(8:46:09 AM) tekservejimd: ok...sorry about that
(8:46:26 AM) Paul Brill: I love irony
(8:46:34 AM) Paul Brill: Thank you for the cool story
(8:46:44 AM) tekservejimd: np

That was awesome.

Polyphasic sleep log - Day 1 mid-day nap

Last night was a full night's sleep, but today begins the journey of adjusting to a controlled 4 hours of sleep every 24 hour period. This will gain me 4 additional waking hours per day, or an extra 60 5/6 waking days' advantage (the equivalent of 90 1/4 days, based on a normal 8 hours of sleep per night) to the average person in the next year.

So... first nap... I went outside, set my alarm for 1:35, and at 1:15 and closed my eyes. I got sick of waiting to either fall asleep or for my alarm to go off, so at 1:32 I opened my eyes. Maybe I'll sleep for 3-4 minutes of my evening nap.

How is this supposed to work, anyway?

Well, the system I'm following is called the "Everyman" sleep schedule. Basically I'll be sleeping very little during the night (3 hours - known as my "core" sleep period), and then during the day I'll have three 20-minute naps. These are to act as little pick-me-ups to keep me going. The first few days will be rough until my body gets used to it, but after a week or so it'll realize that it actually works. Even though I'm not tired since I got a full night's sleep last night, I'm napping today to begin the habit.

More to come after the evening nap...

P90X Complete! - Pictures

Some of you may know that for the last three months I have been doing P90X. Today was my last day, and I have my 0-30-60-90 day pictures right here for you.

A couple quick stats from the last 90 days...
Weight: 192 pounds to 176 pounds
Body fat: 24% to 16%
Farmer's tan: Yep, still there

I'm definitely not "done" getting into shape. I'd like to drop another 12-14 pounds of body fat and gain some more muscle, but that'll come in time. Anyway... more updates to come soon. Here are my pictures in the meantime.

Another Salt Lake City Bicycle Mishap

Lately there have been so many news reports about car-to-bicycle accidents in the Salt Lake area. And then on top of that, some of them include hit-and-runs--three or four that I can think of right now--but even one is too many. At least some people take responsibility for their actions and stop. Well, I don't live right in Salt Lake (I live and work in Sandy, a suburb), but let's chalk up yet another stupid driver.

Usually I ride a scooter to work. It's a big ride that can easily keep up with traffic. But right now my back tire is out of commission, and while I'm working on getting that taken care of, I've been bicycling to work. Generally the road I take to work (9400 S on the west side of I-15) is rather calm. It has a middle turn lane, so it does make it easy for people to pass cyclists if they need to. In fact, this morning there were four cars that passed me in a row, and they all went almost all the way into the middle lane as they passed. Talk about courtesy... so thank you if you're the type that will kindly share the road. The fifth car that passed me wasn't so nice. A woman by the name of Katherine Strode barely sideswiped me, causing my left handle and my left pinky finger to knock off the right rear-view mirror of her green Chrysler sedan. I wasn't hurt and didn't even get knocked over, but what made me mad is that I saw her tap her brakes after that but then decide to keep going.

After I was waving my arms for a bit while pedaling as quickly as I could so I wouldn't lose her, she finally came to her senses and decided to stop. She would have had to stop anyway because there was a line at the stop sign coming up. Anyway, I caught up to her and gave her a piece of my mind and told her how many people have been just like her this year with all the bicycle accidents... and that she needs to pay attention to what she's doing and give cyclists some room. I told her it could have been much worse and that she's lucky I wasn't thrown off of my bike. Her responses throughout my rant were all along the lines of, "I know," and "I'm so sorry!" Of course since I wasn't hurt, I really didn't care what she had to say; I just wanted her to hear my frustration towards her. Obviously she didn't actually know like she said she did or else she would have been paying attention and being a good driver.

I did mention that my finger did get hit as part of this little mishap. I could move it perfectly, but I told the girl that I wanted her information so if it starts bothering me, I'd get in contact with her. I doubt that will happen, but at least it'll scare her a bit for a few days. I also ended up getting her license plate number just for fun... never know, right? One interesting thing with this whole situation is that she lost her right mirror. I told her, "You no longer have a mirror on the right side, but that's your problem." One would think, "Well, that's what she gets for doing what she did," and that I "won" in this particular car/bike battle. But unfortunately with no mirror, this lady can't pay as much attention as she could before... and who knows if she's going to replace it? Great... now she'll have yet another blind spot.

Well... my bike wasn't even scratched, and I wasn't hurt (my finger knows something happened to it this morning, but it's not bad at all), so the only real purpose of this blog entry is to tell people to WATCH OUT. Pay attention to the road and people on the road. You have a responsibility while driving, and if you can't handle something big like a car, ride a bike instead (ironic, I know)! Give cyclists three feet when passing, and although I was wearing a bright shirt this morning, some don't do that, and it's still your responsibility to watch for anything on and off the road. We shouldn't HAVE to feel unsafe while getting a little bit of exercise just because you care more about your phone and your music than others' safety while you drive. Thank you.

Almost Fooled by KFC

For the last little while, I've been saying/thinking, "I'm not going to eat at KFC anymore. The food is just too greasy, and I always feel like a fat pig when I'm done eating there." It's quite true. The chicken is way too greasy, and no one should be taking in that much fat in one meal. But of course this is the USA, so people do it. I must admit that KFC's macaroni and cheese is the best there is anywhere though.

So, we've established two things... KFC has great macaroni along with chicken that will lower your lifespan way too much.

Well, lately, more and more places have been giving healthier alternatives to the greasy foods... like McDonald's with apples, yogurt, etc. KFC caught on to this and hopped on the bandwagon by introducing Kentucky Grilled Chicken. My guess is it's a bit less greasy than the fried stuff (call me crazy). Along with that, they set aside two days for people to go online and get coupons for a free meal including two pieces of grilled chicken, two sides (MACARONI!... x2!), and a biscuit. The coupon could then be used for the next two weeks or so. Of course I printed off a coupon... it wasn't the greasy stuff I knew, so I thought I would give it a shot. And really... how hard is it to print a coupon?

So, last night my friends and I went to KFC to get free meals. It was about 6:00 in the evening, and as we arrived, we saw a note on the door saying they had given away too much free chicken for the day. It's not that they were out; we could SEE grilled chicken available. They just didn't want to give away any more for free. They offered the option to get a raincheck by mailing in our coupons with another form you gotta fill out, and then they'll send you ANOTHER coupon back in the mail... this time including a free drink too. Oh boy, what a bargain! But yeah... meanwhile, we were debating for a bit on whether or not we should just get something from KFC anyway since we were already there.

But we didn't. We went to Cafe Rio instead. But you know, I realized on the way to Cafe Rio that this was probably KFC's plan all along. After all, how many people are really going to take the time to send their raincheck form in the mail? That takes work, and that's not the American way. And of course their goal was to get people to the store and decide, "Oh well, we're here... let's buy something anyway." Well I'm smarter than that, and I refuse to give in to their little scheme. I didn't buy anything there (not even macaroni), and I will be sending my raincheck form to them because they don't expect nearly as many people to actually do it. Yeah, that's right... I'm going to stick it to them.

You can't fool me, KFC. I can see through you. I will not fall into your little trap. You're nothing but a big joke to me. And yeah... your fried chicken is still horrible.

The ASUS Eee keyboard sucks

Abot to or tree monts ago I bogt an ASUS Eee. I togt it as awwesome hen I got it, but it had a minor keyboard problem. Sometimes te keys wwwwoul register twice wwhen I knkeww I only hit thhem once. After a wwhhile, some of the kkeys wwol stop responing altogeter. It was ridiculous. So noww the kkeys eiter register multiple times hen I hit them, on't respon at all, or tey migt jst decie to orkk. It's orrible. Never buy an Eee. Tey juust aren't goodd... waaaaay too chap! I say you spen a little more an get a $600 Dell... even they're better than tis piece of crap. Ba purcase.

It's official

I'm going to start my blog again. That's right. You can look forward to more random posts about... well... about nothing in particular. But random stuff is what makes life interesting. So, stay tuned for the updates!

New Entry

This is a blog update.

I'm bored.

The title says it all.

Should I destroy my blog? There's nothing to write about, really.

I think yes.

I'm a blog slacker.

I have no interesting information to share. Nothing. Yeah, that's right...

Last Names

The other day I was having an unusual conversation, and I had a question about history... well, you'd think the question would have resolved itself within the conversation, but we were never able to come up with an answer. It's going to take some research to really figure it out. But what I'm wondering is... at what point did we start using last names? I've never read in the Bible or the Book of Mormon about anybody named "Noah Smith" or "Nephi Jones" or anything like that. Now don't try to tell me it was Jesus because I know that Christ was not actually his last name... Jesus was the Christ. I'm just wondering how we can trace it back to figure out when somebody decided they should tack on another name to their given name. I mean I'm aware that names like Johnson and Anderson came from sons of John and probably Andrew, but what about the other last names... like BRILL?! It would be pretty funny to go back and look at names to find Bob Smith, son of Fred Smith, son of Edward Smith, son of Robert Smith, son of... Frank. Hmm, just something to think about...

And wait, where the heck did middle names come from?! I guess at some point somebody couldn't decide which name they liked better, so they gave their kid both names.

Extremely boring people

[This post has been edited since the original posting date.]

Have you ever heard somebody with such a boring monotone voice that it really makes you wonder how exciting their life actually is? I know you shouldn't judge a book by its cover, but I recently had that experience...

Somebody (identity will remain left unsaid) was talking, and it just sounded so dull to me that first I started to think he probably spends his time in the evenings working on upside down jigsaw puzzles. Then I thought he probably likes to discuss the molecular structure of various lettuce types on a regular basis. You never know; maybe this person is an extreme motocross rider in his spare time, but I somehow seriously doubt his hobbies are anything even close to that.

I'm wondering though, what are some other extremely boring activities one could do with their time?... other than the upside down puzzles and the structure of lettuce discussions, of course. I want to hear your thoughts!

Side note: I've also recently heard another one of my pet peeves: somebody saying "JSP page"... ugh...

Fulfilling My Sister's Request

Breakfast: 16 oz 1% milk with two scoops of chocolate peanut butter swirl Spiru-Tein
Snack: Strawberry yogurt ZonePerfect nutrition bar
Lunch*: Four slices of pineapple pizza from Little Caesars, one slice of pepperoni pizza from Little Caesars, basic salad with a small amount of ranch, two oatmeal raisin cookies, one chocolate chip cookie
Snack: Chocolate mint ZonePerfect nutrition bar
Dinner: 16 oz 1% milk with two scoops of chocolate peanut butter swirl Spiru-Tein

... plus 112 ounces of water throughout the day so far

*Thursday is Institute day, and we always get plenty of free food, so I tend to overdo it.

I hope you can all benefit from knowing my food intake for the day. I will be sure to keep you updated throughout the weekend.

Today's breakfast

Today for breakfast I had 16 ounces of 1% milk with two scoops of chocolate peanut butter swirl Spiru-Tein. I mixed them together in the blender and then drank the mixture.

It was good.

Today's Afternoon Activity

I got my hair chopped off this afternoon between classes. It's pretty short now.

And best of all... no artificial coloring anymore! :)

Juice

In this universe of discourse which I'm about to describe, we've got four fruits...

• A plum
  
• A prune, which is essentially a dried plum
  
• A grape
  
• A raisin, which is essentially a dried grape
  

Well, here's my beef (by that I don't mean cattle meat, but the gripe) I have with these particular fruits... or at least the people who do stuff with these fruits...

We have grape juice and prune juice, right? One is from a "regular" fruit, and one is from a dried fruit of a different variety. My question is... where are the other juices?! I want to know why we have grape juice and prune juice, but we don't have plum juice and raisin juice. For all I know, maybe we do have those juices, but they're certainly not mainstream. What's up with that?

Another thing... as far as prune juice goes... so many people think prune juice seems so nasty, but I've never actually tried it. I'm sure it's really good for you, though. But there's just one thing... it seems like it's only old people who drink it. So another question comes to mind. How old do you have to be in order to drink prune juice and not be considered weird for drinking it? If a 25-year-old was to drink prune juice every morning with his 4:30 a.m. breakfast, that would just be weird, but if an 80-year-old was to do the same, that would be expected. At what point was the line crossed?

Caring vs. Not Caring

Okay... you start a conversation with somebody... and that person doesn't care about what you have to say.

So, that person decides to express their apathy toward the topic at hand, so they tell you, "I could care less about that." That's pretty dumb. Why do they say they could care less about it if they don't care at all? They're implying that they care some amount, which is not at all what they intended to say.

People... it's, "I couldn't care less!"

Deceitful Salt Lake City weather

Yesterday was pretty warm here in good ol' Salt Lake... it actually got up to 77 degrees, which is 12 above the average. The thing about yesterday, though... it looked all gloomy outside and just had a cold feeling... up until the point I actually stepped out the door.

Now for today, at 12:00, I look outside and think it's still nice and warm (or at least a decent temperature). So I go on to weather.com to figure out exactly what it's like out there, and sure enough, it's 49 degrees. That's crappy.

What are you trying to do to us, Salt Lake City? You look cold when you're warm, and you look warm when you're chilly. I don't know what you're trying to do to us here and what game you're trying to play, but I don't like it. So come on, just quit it, you jerk.

Clipless Pedals

Last night I got home and wanted to get my bike all ready to ride and stuff. My new bike is a lot like the old bike I had, but as I mentioned yesterday, I did upgrade the pedals to something a bit nicer. Of course the new pedals required some special shoes to go with them... shoes that lock onto the pedals instead of just fitting into an external toe clip or something.

Well, I had never used clipless pedals before, so it was a little interesting when I tried them last night. The shoes locked on to the pedals pretty well, but when I was getting pretty close to stopping, I couldn't get them to detach. I came to a complete stop, and my left shoe was completely connected to the pedal, so my only option until I was able to figure it out was to take off the shoe and leave it connected.

Well, I figured out that you just slide your heel out, and it'll unlock pretty easily. But then I thought about how funny it would have been if both shoes were connected and I had to stop... not knowing how to unlock the shoes. My shoes would be connected, and since I would be stopped, there would be nothing to keep my balance up, so I would just fall over with my feet still on the pedals. What a sight that would be to see. Good thing that didn't happen. :)