An Eye-Opening Article (pun intended)

So…catching up on last week’s New York Times Magazine, I came across an interesting article…well hardly came across it, as it was the cover story, but dammit you know what I mean!  The article was about all of the marketing dollars being put into getting us a “good night’s sleep.”  And about how we have to go back to the good ol’ days when we used to sleep…at least that’s what the mattress and drug companies say…but, the truth is…we “used to” sleep, well, a lot less.  The article goes on to point out how in the late 1800s and early 1900s people used to sleep in (literally) piss-poor conditions.  Three or four people would share a “mattress” on the cold floor, usually next to their porto-latrine, in a not-so-sound-isolated room.  Also, people would sleep in two “shifts.”  There would be three hours of sleep, then they’d awake and either lie there, read a book, do a tribal dance (see the article) or you know, get busy…any combination of the preceding, for about an hour…and then sleep another three hours.

What am I getting at?  Well, as usual, not much.  I have purchased a great visco-memory foam mattress and I love it…it’s just, i don’t know…sometimes we are over-thinking some of the frivolous things on this earth, and under-thinking (if that’s even a hyphenated word) the more important things.  It’s like Justin Timberlake is bringing sexy back—when it never really left now did it (so says Prince.)  Like, the only reason you need a “good night’s sleep” is to just be more productive at work anyway right?  You never have a good day’s work leading into your slumber…that’s not how it works.  I think maybe we are focusing too much on facilitating the unconscious as opposed to taking the most advantage of the conscious state. Though I’m definitely not recommending it, your body physiologically can function fine on about 2.5 hrs of sleep.  You can train yourself to operate on significantly less than your average 6-8 hrs of sleep, you just have to, you know, try.  Hahah…trying…why would you go do that?

As the inventions and innovations get more and more clever and “practical”, they got more and more obsurd.  I can see it now…”buy the all new catheter 5000 – got to tinkle, but can’t step away from your powerpoint presentation – boy do we have the product for you!”…. I’ll let your imagination figure out that rest.  Peas 🙂