Life: Sleep...

I just reread my last blog entry, and it's odd to think I'm writing another one at this late hour due to my inability to fall asleep.

I'm really not sure exactly what it is that's left me with a whole week of poor quality sleep. I've been waking up hungry from any number of stupid dreams. This hasn't happened to me often in the last year since I started taking fibre before bed to fill my tummy up. And not just stupid dreams either, but ones that get my heart rate up and the adrenaline flowing. This just makes it even harder to fall asleep again.

One oddity that has me wondering what's really going on in the dusty recesses of my brain is how I can feel so tired all day, and yet when I finally lay in bed I suddenly feel wide awake and ready to come sit at the computer to write a blog or work on the Flames of War proposal for a couple of hours. I lay down and suddenly all the things I would have liked to think about or ponder during my day rush to the front of the stage with a full orchestra and chorus.

I think about running. I think about work. I think about Aerin. I think about what to do in the backcountry this summer. I think about the future. I think about the past. I think I might just go crazy or have some dangerous lapse of attention at work. Sigh...

Aerin tells me I seem to be doing that a lot lately. The sighing that is. My body seems a bit uptight about something, and is forgetting to breath. Maybe I could hold my breath for a bit until I pass out, and then I could wake up in the morning when the alarm clock goes off again...

Something is there. I'm anxious or worried about it. What 'it' is I won't figure out anytime soon probably. I wish it was something simple like the unfulfilled desire to hold Aerin in my arms for a long, long time while the world goes away. But it's probably something to do with the job, running or my apparent inability to sit down and work on my large stack of unfinished minis. Or most likely at this moment my inability to quickly fall into a deep, restful sleep.

Or maybe I just can't wait to see the first episode of the last half of Battlestar Galactica.

Let me know if you have the answer. 42 doesn't seem to be it.

Life: The New Bed

The new bed was delivered yesterday, but the delivery guys didn't go for my suggestion to just chuck the old one off the balcony to save them from having to carry it back down the stairs.

The initial impressions from the showroom held up once we got to try it out again at home. The one thing that Aerin isn't quite happy with is the height of the mattress and box spring. Our night tables turn out to be a fair bit shorter compared to our old bed, and we got the standard nine inch box spring without thinking this would be a problem. I don't have a particular problem with the height of the bed, but Aerin seems concerned about taking a spill and the position of the lamps for reading. So it might be that we exchange the nine inch box spring for a six inch box spring to lower it a bit.

On the comfort side I had a really good sleep last night, and I hope for more of the same tonight. Aerin was awake most of the night with stomach pain, so hopefully she gets to enjoy a good sleep tonight.

Life: The End (of August) is Near!

The end of August has certainly snuck up on me. The car registration is due. Our last backcountry trip of 2008 is this long weekend. We bought ourselves a new bed that has to wait another week and a half to get delivered. And we found ourselves a new place to live in Calgary, but won't get to move in until the end of October at the latest.

The hot weekend weather for most of the month has made training runs on the weekend hard to take sometimes. About the only thing I could do that would make it tolerable was to slow right down to a fast walk. I also haven't been putting on as many miles leading up to Lost Soul since I have either been feeling very run down and tired, or I haven't had a particularly great time scheduling training runs with all the other stuff we've managed to do this month.

The next couple of nights are dedicated to tidying up before this weekend and getting the gear packed for another trip out to Kananaskis. The one thing that would appear to be lacking for this trip is the heat and snow pack. I don't know if this is pushing our luck, but we will drive out after work on Friday to pack 8km into Forks CG that night. The next day will be a little easier with the climb to Turbine Canyon, and then Monday will require us to hike out all the way. I am looking forward to a few good nights sleep though.

It would seem this weekend is to be about the best sleep I will get until the new bed arrives. We had our doubts about the bed surviving the move from Edmonton last year, but when test driving new beds turned into a purchase it was all too apparent how bad the bed had become. We are both eagerly awaiting the delivery day.

Last weekend was our practice move now that we found a new place here in Calgary. Aerin's Parental Units moved out of the house into a townhouse condo further west in Edmonton on Sunday. As one of the designated "strong, young men" I got to have all the fun with the heavy appliances. In the end things went pretty smoothly and we were done in about five hours. My back was kind of stiff, but it's been good since.

Which leads me to mention that I must be getting old since I managed to tweak my back somehow the weekend after the long weekend this month. I was cutting up styrene sheet for miniatures terrain when I stood up and had a bad muscle spasm in my back. It was the same spot where I had trouble last fall, but the dying bed has countered the exercising and stretching that would help it out more. So things are stable, and I hope getting better when my back gets better support from the new bed.

That's it for now. It's time to clean up and start packing. Cheers!