prechance to dream

It's autumn in the northern hemisphere. I love this season. Do you hear me, you poor deprived creatures who live in more southern climes? I FUCKING LOVE THIS SEASON.

It's cool and the leaves are all yellow and orange and it's windy all the time. I was in a conversation once with somebody who told me that everybody needs sunlight to be healthy, and I countered that I could live quite happily without direct sunlight -- but I would wither and die if I never got any wind.

So of course I've been out walking in it. The other day I was noodling home from something or other and my path was blocked by police tape. They had the entire street cordoned off because this fuck-off big maple tree had blown down and crashed across the street, taking out a few cars and the local hydro wires.

Fuck yeah. Neanderthal brain happy.

I once had a conversation with somebody from southern California who had never been north enough to really experience autumn. He'd been assuming all his life that the pictures he saw of trees with coloured leaves were doctored -- I'm not sure if he beleived us when we told him they really did look like that.

I've often wondered why it is that red trees aren't more common in the city, because I see them all over the place in the country. Is it because the city tends to plant species that have more of the yellow-causing chemicals? Or something to do with the content of the soil?

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I finally decided things were getting retarded and set aside time in schedule to go twice a month and deal with all of the health-related appointments that have been piling up. Going to the dentist turned out to be a multiple-week commitment, so getting my neck fixed is going to have to wait until after England.

A word to the wise. Do not ever ever ever wait five years between appointments to get your teeth scaled. Trust me on this one.

So next on the agenda, the chiropractor. Then the booty-check.

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My caffeine monkey has evolved into a 1800 pound gorilla with red eyes and a voice like Tom Waits.

I've actually been getting enough sleep this week, mostly by virtue of the fact that I just cannot force myself out of bed in the morning. This is a good thing. Last week I had so many nights in a row of less than 6 hours of snooze that my brain just melted like Taco Bell cheese.

I couldn't remember anything I actually had to call up the_axel and ask him what I was supposed to be doing that day. Any of you who know us in real life can immediately grok how horribly horribly wrong that is.

I've done some stupid work-shifts before that involved extended periods of exhaustion, but the only time I've ever been this bad was when I was in the really severe stages of depression. I had chronic insomnia. I would go to bed at 4-5AM when I was so exhausted I hoped that I could finally sleep, would get about 3 hours of nightmares and cold sweats, then would lie in bed for hours listening to everybody else in the house moving around and trying to find the internal strength just to sit the fuck up.

Prolonged sleep dep made me literally psychotic. I remember walking through the parks at night just looking for somebody to fuck with me. I needed to hit something so badly. I look back on that now and wonder how the hell I didn't end up in jail or a sanatorium or something.

I read an article once on the subject of prions. (In case you don't know, prions are proteins implicated in diseases, one such being Mad Cow.) The arricle talked about a specific herditary prion that causes chronic fatal insomnia. It drills holes in the part of the brain responsable for sleep. The victim develops psychosis, hallucinations and then systemic neurological malfunction. It's like the brain overheats and melts.

Right now I cannot think of a worse way to die.