Insomnia

I have had about one hour of sleep in the last 24 hours.

I’ve had sporadic bouts with insomnia as far back as I can remember. My sleep cycle has always been totally whacked out, so I underwent a sleep study last fall and was diagnosed with some vague sleeping disorder (Sleep apnea? Maybe. Chronic fatigue syndrome? Could be. Narcolepsy? Perhaps. Gee whiz, thanks doc). Insomnia in particular is kind of an interesting thing. You know you should be tired and sleeping, but you can’t shut your brain off – it still wants to keep going. The harder you try to fall asleep the more restless you become. Inversely, sometimes when I need to be paying attention my brain will shut off whether or not I like it.

At one time I dreaded insomniac nights because it meant the next day was going to be feeling-like-a-zombie hell day. Sleep deprivation catches up with you in a bad way. But now when I can’t sleep, I don’t try to fight it. It only adds frustration to the zombie sensation. I just stay awake and work on something.

The next 12 hours will be interesting though. There’s nothing quite like going through your day completely unrested. My perception gets totally screwed with. Perspective gets weird – it seems like I’m watching everything through someone else’s eyes except they’re in my eyes. There’s a slight delay in processing visual input. My movements become herky-jerky. Strangely, it’s sometimes easier to focus. Some of my most productive days have been after a night of counting sheep to a power of ten.

I should probably get an MRI or something.

Inching closer to Minority Report

This article just blew my mind.

If this proves to be an accurate finding, you decided to click the above link a few seconds ago. The implications are pretty astounding. What does it mean for criminal law? What does this mean about my decision to eat a delicious ham sandwich right now? Where’s your mens rea now?

The Twilight Zone

Have you ever had one of those days or nights where thing are just, well… weird? Weird in the sense that your personal interactions make you reflect back on previous parts of your life. Weird because you have some sort of experience, or you notice certain things that force you to recollect, to reevaluate, and basically shift you into a kind of prolonged state of deja vu? They’re the kind of moments that are total aberrations from your normal routine  and the only thing you can do is step back and try to digest it.

Now this may sound heavier than it really is, but keep in mind a daily routine for a law student is wake up, hygiene, class, eat, class, read, class, read, read, read, chat, read, cry, eat, read, sleep, repeat. So really any fluctuation in that rhythm feels more profound than it really is.

Regardless, life is a strange series of repetitions, patterns and so forth. All done.

George Carlin is dead

George Carlin is dead.

I was exposed to George Carlin in middle school. My folks would take me to Half Price Books and I was usually allowed to purchase one item per visit. On one outing, I picked up a George Carlin album for some reason (I think it had “Baseball and Football” on it). I’m sure my mother didn’t know who George Carlin was or what kinds of things he said or she wouldn’t have let me keep it. The cover art was innocent enough. Well, when I found out who George Carlin was and what kinds of things he said, you can be sure that I didn’t let her find out either. Turns out I really liked his routines – a lot. I didn’t realize it then, but I think I was attracted to the clever wordplay. As I grew older I was attracted to his social commentary and his refusal to yield to censorship.

Carlin is often identified with his “[NSFW]Seven Dirty Words You Can Never Say On Television” routine. I think a lot of people who are aware of this routine have never listened to it and assume it’s just this filthy comedian saying naughty words for the sake of uttering them (here’s the related lawsuit). It’s clear that even while getting laughs for saying naughty words, he loved word play. Heck, he starts off “Seven Dirty Words” with this:

“I love words. I thank you for hearing my words. I want to tell you something about words that I uh, I think is important. I love…as I say, they’re my work, they’re my play, they’re my passion. Words are all we have really.

We have thoughts, but thoughts are fluid. You know, [humming]. And, then we assign a word to a thought, [clicks tongue]. And we’re stuck with that word for that thought. So be careful with words. I like to think, yeah, the same words that hurt can heal. It’s a matter of how you pick them.”

His routines exposed me to semantics. I didn’t start to think about how important, or just cool words can be while sitting in English classes and being forced-fed “The Diary of Anne Frank.”  Perhaps this is sort of a non sequitur, but I link my interests, and ultimately my attraction to law school, to hearing George Carlin at an early age.

I think Carlin’s death is the first celebrity death I’ve ever been kind of sad about. I would say something like “He’ll be floating around with Lenny Bruce,” but Carlin did perform monologues like “There is no God.”If there is a God, he just struck Carlin ([NSFW]or expired like a magazine) dead at age 71.