One of the best things about doing a comedy degree is you can sit around watching funny TV shows and call it "summer reading".
Unfortunately, since I have absolutely nothing else to do at the moment, I've slipped back into staying up all night and sleeping all day. I'm back on USA time, strictly speaking. Which means I'm going to have to either have either a 5/6 hour day or 30/31 hour day to set it right. I can't stand my relationship with sleep.
The Science says that any sleep debt one incurs, even an hour or two, can never be 'paid back'. You could miss just a few hours sleep and then doze for a week and still not get back to normal. That depresses me - what does that mean for my 'tired lines'? Are they just going to get worse as I create more and more sleep debt?
And how much sleep is the right amount, anyway? I remember reading in 1998 that an adult should get 8 hours a night. But at the same time, I also read that everyone should sleep in three hour multiples. And different people have different levels of energy. Some can get by on a few hours a night, some need to sleep for half the day. How are we supposed to know without experimentation? How are we supposed to experiment without creating sleep debt that can never be repaid?
This is why I was so attracted to polyphasic sleeping. It had a clear system based on science, and nature. It seemed logical to me(lets not forget, though, that I am crazy). Of course, I have almost zero willpower and could never get past the adaptation period, so I don't know if it works. And even if I had made it - it doesn't fit in with the way the world works. You can't always find a way to take a nap every 20 minutes.
I think the entire world needs to take a look at how we treat sleep. It won't happen, of course, there are too many of us now to for any kind of system for such a huge part of our lives to take over the current one(one big chunk of sleep, slowly lose energy through-out the day). The only time things are going to change is when the Corporatocracy decides that we're ready to work for them more, and releases Modafinil (a drug which allows everyone to sleep for only 4 hours a night) for general consumption.
Which is totally not a downbeat way to end this post, I'm sure.