The Big Sleep

I have developed the capacity and the compulsion to sleep for fourteen, sometimes sixteen hours a day. Much less time on my hands. This happened for periods in the autumn, but is quite a novelty for this time of the year where I haven't seen darkness all week. There are some advantages: Sleep isn't subjective; when one is unconscious, one doesn't spend too much time worrying about what might be achieved if one made a little more effort. The body is far more comfortable when asleep and rather more comfortable having been asleep for most of the day. Being unable to resist sleep is far better than being unable to sleep when one needs to. The nightmares are getting easier to manage. I'm not missing the laptop as much as I would otherwise. There is, of course, a downside: Time is passing at a tremendous speed; my days are literally half the length of those for folks who only need eight hours sleep in any twenty-four period. It isn't following a strong pattern which allows me to know how long I'm going to stay awake for in between times. This is playing hell with my powers of organisation. For some reason, I am feeling incredibly hungry. The effort of eating tends to send me off to sleep again. Thus my appetite and food intake has increased at a time when I am (presumably) burning off even less than usual. And of course, all this means I am ill ill just now, being strangled by my lymph nodes and feeling weak and feeble as well as the everyday efftects of ouchy-slouchy-grouchy syndrome. Still, it is all right. A few weeks ago I was being awake in the middle of the night and this is much better. Just hope it stabilises before we go down south. Apologies to all those to whom I owe e-mail; I'll get to it but now I need to go sleep again.