Idiom Savant

All I Need Is The Air That I Breathe, Rammed Forcibly Down My Throat

Oh hey guys what's up so apparently I get to sleep with a plastic mask strapped to my face for the rest of my life!

It's not that bad, I guess.

For most of what has passed so far as my "adult" life, I've had sleep problems. Like not getting enough, or getting too much (sleeping through entire weekend days, for instance), and snoring myself awake sometimes, and feeling tired during the day. Plus I got depression. And I'm kind of a big, doughy guy with a freakishly large neck that's apparently packed full of fatty tissue.

And people who are in a position to know have told me that I sometimes stop breathing during the night. So, whenever I see a doctor, it usually only takes him a few minutes to bring up the possibility of sleep apnea.

Which I actually got tested for a few years ago -- somebody brought a pulse oximeter over to my place and told me to clip it to my finger and go to sleep and she'd be back to pick it up in the morning. The thinking being that if I stopped breathing, the oximeter (which is a device that measures the amount of oxygen in the blood) would register the resulting lack of oxygen.

That test did not find anything abnormal, but that may have been because I barely slept that night to start with. I'm kind of finicky about the situations in which I can get to sleep, and the big plastic clip on my finger just bugged me. (After I did manage to drop off for a little while, I woke up to find that the clip had somehow migrated to my other hand.)

But that plastic clip is nothing compared to what they do to you for a full polysomnography, which is what I went to my local teaching hospital to have done to me in early January. I know that some of y'all who might be reading this have had this (or a similar procedure) done -- in some cases, multiple times. So I know I don't really have any room to complain. And, I mean, given the broad range of things that can be done to you in a hospital, a sleep study is pretty benign. They don't cut into you or anything. (They just sandpaper your head a little bit.)

But really, there are few things in this world less restful than a clinical sleep study. You've got the pulse oximeter clipped on your finger, plus about 20 electrodes or whatever glued to your head and face, stuff taped to your arms and legs and chest and side, some plastic tubing looped under your nose, and big rubber bands around your chest and abdomen. And everything smells kind of weird. I'll say this for the sleep lab I went to: It didn't look that much like a hospital room. It looked more like a slightly run-down motel room.

I don't remember sleeping at all that night, frankly. But apparently I slept enough to have 99 "respiratory events" (48 obstructive apneas -- stopping breathing entirely due to the airway collapsing, then waking up to breathe -- and 51 hypopneas). Which is a lot, but not as much as some people do. My AHI only indicates "moderate" apnea, which is between "mild" and "severe."

Enough, however, for them to recommend CPAP therapy, which is where the above-mentioned plastic mask enters my life. Apparently, what they do normally is make you do another sleep study so they can determine the optimal pressure of air to pump down your airway to keep it open -- this is called titration (hee). For some reason, they didn't do that to me. Instead, I received a phone call directing me to an office park near the airport, where I picked up an auto-titrating (hee) machine. For the past week or so, it's been gradually cranking up the pressure every night and storing a bunch of information on a card which I have to take back to the office park, and somehow from there my doctor will arrive at the correct air pressure to prescribe, eventually.

I can't really tell if it's helping yet. The mask itself isn't that bad, but I guess I'm still getting used to it. The machine doesn't make much noise once I've got the mask strapped on, and I think it has cut down on my snoring. Plus, it's kind of fun to have a new gadget to play with. But it may take a while before I really reap the benefits. It's funny to think about the fact that I might not have had a proper, full night's sleep for most of my adulthood.

I don't know how I'm going to pay for all this, though. Like the gambler I am, I opted for a comically high deductible on my insurance. And now, sitting next to my humble bed, I've got an apparatus that, all told, is about the price of a used car -- and which also takes more fuss and cleaning than I'm used to providing. (One of the reasons I never got contact lenses was that I just didn't want to fuck with the solutions and cases and stuff. Anybody who's seen the state of my apartment can verify that I do not have the kind of lifestyle that's conducive to keeping up with minuscule, fussy details.) The various elements (mask, filter, humidifier tank, hose) have got to be cleaned frequently, and the humidifier needs fresh (distilled) water every day. It's what I imagine having a small housepet would be like.

I guess I can't complain too much, though. As one of the interviewees on the DVD that came with my mask said, what other disease can you get that can be treated by just wearing a mask every night? I'd rather have sleep apnea than polio, for instance. Or Huntington's chorea. Just to pick two examples.

Interestingly, when I visited my hometown for Christmas, I found out that a few of my relatives have similar problems, and had either had or might soon have their own sleep studies. So, if you're reading this, relatives, this is what happened after my sleep study. Sorry I haven't called to tell you this in person, but I've been busy trying to get to sleep with a plastic mask strapped to my face.

Lend Me Some Peanuts! I Am Your Neighbor!

Lordy, Lordy, Guess Who's 39

That would be me, I guess.  On the 31st, I will begin my 40th year on this crazy ol' ball of dirt. 

Go, me!  Good job having been born and not dying within the last 39 years!

My thoughts on birthdays haven't changed much since last year, so you can consult those, if you want.  I thought about adding to my list of people who died when they were younger than I will be, but I think I'll just go to bed early instead.

Wednesday night, my special lady and I plan to be drinkin' it up at various places around Chapel Hill (perhaps including Local 506, Reservoir and Hell).  Give me a jingle, or just keep your eyes open for a stocky 6'2" guy dressed like a nun.  A nun who has just turned 39.

Image from The Perry Bible Fellowship.

Lend Me Some Sugar! I Am Your Neighbor!

Query: Are "ukulele covers of hip-hop songs" the new "accordion covers of rock songs?"  Discuss.

For More Proof Of My Weirdness, Please Refer To Every Other Entry Here

So, I got tagged for this thing by the most excellent Media Diva.

Here's how you play: Once you have been tagged, you have to write a blog with 10 weird or random things, facts, or habits about yourself. At the end, you choose 10 people to be tagged, listing their names. Don't forget to leave a comment that says, "Tag, You're it" on their profiles and ask them to read your blog. You can't tag the person who tagged you.

I'm not sure if this is supposed to be a MySpace-only meme -- we'll have to see if it can survive outside that rarefied atmosphere.  Anyway, since nearly every thing, fact or habit about myself is either weird or random, here's the first 10 that come to mind:

1.  On my desk at work, where I am sitting right now, there is a hunk of blue Silly Putty that I have been obsessively playing with for the last few weeks -- just squishing it around with my left hand while my right hand uses the mouse to click to and fro on the Internet while I really should be working.

2.  I suffer from bruxism.  In fact, I'm bruxing right now.  I clench my teeth and jaw so hard at night sometimes that I dream that I'm still wearing braces, and that they've just been tightened.

3.  I do not have cable service; it sloughed off of my budget a few years ago after I was laid off.  The only channel I can get clearly with rabbit ears is the public television station.  Therefore, I was very excited a couple of weeks ago when the new season of "History Detectives" started.  Wes Cowan FTW!

4.  Nervous tic: flicking the second or third fingers of my right hand against my right thumb.  Sort of a weak, un-consummated finger-snapping gesture.  I sometimes do this to the beat of whatever song is running through my mind, but sometimes it's just a random rhythm -- although I'm sure if I were to analyze it, it would reveal the binary code for my genome sequence or something.

5.  For years, I was buying size 12 shoes and wondering why my feet always hurt at the end of the day.  I figured it was mostly because I worked in bookstores where they don't allow you to sit down.  But then I discovered I was actually a size 13, and things got better.

6.  I have had no pets and no houseplants as an adult -- I have never been consciously responsible for the existence of another living organism.  Whether this is selfishness or laziness, or a heady broth of both, I leave for the sweet Zombie Baby Jesus to decide.

7.  I own a basketball autographed by Shaquille O'Neal.

8.  Whenever I board a plane, I press my hand against the outside fuselage, just for like a half-second as I'm walking in the hatch.  This is so my prints will be on the plane, in case there's no other way of identifying my body after the plane crashes.  Of course, I don't think my fingerprints are on file anywhere, so this is a completely futile gesture.  It's also possible that I'm unintentionally adding aerodynamic drag to the plane, making us 0.0001 minute later at the arrival gate.  (This habit was possibly inspired by a friend telling me that a highway cop will always put his hand on the trunk lid of a stopped car as he approaches the driver, to leave prints in case something goes wrong.  I'm not sure if this is true.) 

9.  I feel weird leaving home without a watch on.  Consequently, I sometimes intentionally leave home without a watch -- just to experience the weird feeling.

10. I carry a small change purse with me most all the time.  Inside that change purse is a purple Mardi Gras doubloon embossed with Steve Guttenberg's face.  It was a gift from a friend.  I plan to have this coin in my possession until I die.

Tagging (in alphabetical order):

• Charlotte
• Dawn
• Elrond
• Lint Queen
• Mab
• Marianne
• Phil
• Stew
• Switchboard Susan
• xtaNor

You Might Not Be Looking For The Promised Land, But You Might Find It Anyway

As someone who, despite my official "unaffiliated" status, has voted for every Democrat since Mike "The Duke" Dukakis, I reckon I'm part of the America-Hating Left by default.  However, around the Fourth of July, I do like to take time out from my busy schedule (advancing world socialism, lobbying for mandatory abortions and gay marriage for everyone, chaining myself to spotted owls, drinking the blood of Christian babies, etc.) to think about some things I actually love about this country. 

There are quite a few things.  What follows is a list, in no particular order, and not complete by any means.

Iconic American foods.  Such as the hot dog (pictured here), which is so very stereotypically American that of course it turns out to have its origins in Vienna.  However, in the great American tradition of taking raw materials from elsewhere and transforming them into an entirely new creation (see also: hip-hop), the humble wiener really found its voice, so to speak, in Coney Island.  And the meat processors' thrift in using some of the more obscure parts of livestock to create hot dogs hearkens back to the Native Americans' desire to use every part of the buffalo they respectfully slew.

(The above picture is my own hand, by the way, holding a 'dog I was about to consume at a July 4th community celebration in 2001.  The memories -- and parts of the actual hot dog, I'm sure -- are still with me six years later.)

Other enjoyable United States of American foods: barbecue, hamburgers, unlikely deep-fried stick-impaled objects found at State Fairs, and those foil-wrapped burritos that are the size of your forearm.

The grand tradition of American musical theater.  Giving us such classics as "My Fair Lady" (set in London), "South Pacific" (set in the South Pacific), and "Oklahoma" (set in Burkina Faso).  I think "The Music Man" was on TV every July Fourth of my youth.  ("My Fair Lady" was on every Easter.  What was up with that?)

"Roadrunner," the classic Modern Lovers song.  With exemplary Yankee ingenuity, Jonathan Richman takes, like, one and a half chords and turns them into a Zen parable of drivin' around at night, "going faster miles an hour," listening to the radio, and falling in love.  When Jonathan chants "One, two, three, four, five, six!" at the beginning, he's not just counting off the start of the song -- he's counting off the start of the Great American Adventure, with all the optimism and joy and promise that a four-minute punk song can hold.

And, for that matter, "Road Runner," the classic series of Warner Brother cartoons.  But -- metaphorically speaking -- is America the Road Runner, lord of the open highway, unperturbedly shaking off all predators without once losing his native optimism?  Or are we the Coyote, too clever for our own good, unable with all of our advanced technology to master an elusive foe (in the desert, no less!), despite frequent escalations, always ending up hoist on our own Acme-brand petard?  Maybe we're both.  Maybe we're neither.  Maybe we're actually Foghorn Leghorn.  Or maybe Foghorn Leghorn is actually Robert Byrd.  Or Fred Thompson.  Unless Fred Thompson is actually Deputy Dawg.

Las Vegas.  Oh, man, Las Vegas.  I mean, I've never been there, but it's gotta be awesome, right?  I guess I just love the idea of Las Vegas, the fact that it exists.  I heard somebody on a PBS "American Experience" show say that Las Vegas is, like, a microcosm of American society or something.  And yet, somehow, there still isn't a plaque, or a statue, or a signpost in that town for Moe Greene!

The military.  I'm not really on board with everything the military gets asked to do by its political commanders-in-chief, and maybe its presence in certain parts of the world causes more harm than good, but overall I think it's a better thing to have a military than not to have one.  Maybe (probably) I'm naive.  Still, there was that whole thing where they helped stop the reign of Fascism in Europe a few decades ago.  That was pretty cool.  So, yeah.  I'm glad for the military... and I'm really glad I'm not in it.

James Brown.  What's more American than James Brown?  Singing about America?  In a "Rocky" movie?  In the "Rocky" movie where Rocky fights an evil commie, and thus, by proxy, the entire goddamned Evil Empire?  And wins?  Nothing, that's what.  James is dead now, just like Apollo Creed in "Rocky IV," but their truth goes marching on.

Shitty American beer.  Nobody seems to create cheap beer, that unifying elixir of the proletariat, better than us.  Of course, I have only the cheap beer of this country to judge by.  And in America, most of the cheap beer is so weak you can have it for breakfast.  In the past, I've tended to lean toward the Champagne of Beers, but lately I'm trying to break out of my comfort zone and sample other cheap suds.  I tried Schlitz and found it not horrible, but maybe my palate's totally out of whack.  Maybe I'm supposed to hate it.  I know I don't care much for Budweiser, and I can't find anything in particular wrong with PBR, except maybe it's been too heavily embraced by hipsters lately.

And finally, America's where all my stuff is.

So.  Anything to add, my fellow Americans?  (Non-Americans can participate too. I guess.)

Happy Independence Day, The Internet!

Uncle Sam image from adtcomedy.com.  The picture of the hot dog and the picture of the sparkler -- I took those myself.  Both photos feature parts of my actual left hand!

Someone In This Room Is... A Murderer!

I'm sure everybody in the world has seen this by now, but this little guy has been giving me no end of delight recently:

All hail Drama Prairie Dog!

I'm A Rocker. I Rock Out.

Apparently, I have the same ringtone as Indie Rock Pete.

I don't know what this says about me.

I do know this: Every time the phone rings on The Simpsons, I think it's my phone for about a half-second.  So I guess my phone, Indie Rock Pete's phone, and the sound effects people on The Simpsons all use the same generic "old-fashioned telephone ring" ringtone.

Hankering, Gross, Mystical, Nude

Although I do suspect that resorting to answering the Friday Five is the last refuge of the lazy blogger (in this case, me) who can't think of anything original to say -- and although the questions below aren't even from the current Friday Five -- I'm answering these anyway, because they're about nekkidness and what the hell.

1. Have you ever gone skinny-dipping?

No.  Partly because I can barely swim, but also partly because, as far as I can remember, the opportunity has never presented itself.  I guess I have tended to hang out with non-skinny-dipping crowds -- or, if I have been hanging out with recidivist skinny-dippers, it has been away from large bodies of water.  Maybe this is the kind of thing where one can't wait around for fate to intervene, and I should be proactive and create my own skinny-dipping opportunities.  Keep your eyes on the police blotter; if you read about a midnight visit by the police to my apartment complex's pool, you'll know I have finally seized the day.

2. When you're home alone, do you strip down to get comfortable? Do you ever go out without underwear (bra and/or panties) because it's more comfortable?

I will almost always take everything out of my pockets, and take off my shoes and my watch, as soon as I get home.  But I usually don't disrobe unless it's absolutely necessary.  I find that I'm actually a little more comfortable wearing something, albeit something loose and unbinding.  I'm not sure why.  Maybe it's security -- I feel a little bit protected.  Or maybe I just really am that repressed, when you get right down to it.

However, I am, as I'm sure regular Idiom Savant readers are weary of me mentioning by now, a prodigious sweater.  So, sometimes, in the summer, after I shower, I need to sit in front of a fan for a while in an attempt to completely dry off.

And, yes, I go out every day without a bra and/or panties.  Saucy!  However, I usually do wear man-type underwear.

3. Have you ever/Do you use the bathroom with the door open? Are you comfortable using public facilities?

At home, alone, yes.  But I would not use the bathroom with the door open if there were somebody else around.  (Please feel free to correct me -- and accept my belated apologies -- if I'm forgetting something.)  I'm OK in public facilities, although I tend to get skittish at the urinal if there are others there.  I'll head for a stall if one's available.  And I have big problems at pee troughs, like the ones you find in sports venues.

4. When getting intimate with your significant other, lights on or off?

No significant other at the moment, but usually, off.  But this might not have much to do with modesty.  Without my glasses -- and it's safe to assume I wouldn't be wearing glasses, unless there was some need for protective eyewear, like if we were using power tools or something -- I'm almost completely blind.  And if I can't see anything, why should she?  Fair's fair.

5. How comfortable are you with body exposure/nudity of others? Group shower rooms?, topless/nude beaches?, breastfeeding in public?

Well, as I suggested in the first answer, I don't hang out with naked people often.  (No offense, naked people.  Give me a call sometime; we'll set something up.)  I haven't been in a group shower since the college dorms, and the one time I was on a purportedly topless beach (South Beach in Miami), everyone seemed to be wearing tops.  I'm cool with breastfeeding in public, although I am often just a little startled when I see it, because I don't see it that often and I'm not really used to it, I guess.  Nothing at all wrong with it -- just something I don't see everyday.  But the higher brain functions kick in fairly instantaneously, and I think, "Oh.  Kid's having lunch.  Right on." 

So, I guess, to sum up -- there's nothing inherently morally wrong or dirty about nudity per se.  For many reasons (mostly having to do with us not having fur), it's practical for humans to wear clothes, and so in most situations, we do so.  I'm not going to pretend I don't like looking at naked people (see Jenna Fischer post, below), but that has more to do with context as well as social conditioning.  Like, I'm sure if naked Jenna Fischer was my roommate or something, and I became acclimated to her presence, it would eventually be no big deal and we would start bitching at each other for peeing with the bathroom door open or something.

I'm sure I've contradicted myself or have been inadvertently troglodytic or offensive several times within the course of this post.  My pretenses to being "evolved" and "with-it" to the contrary, I'm just as much of a seething cauldron of bourgeois repression and shameful lust as any other 20th- or 21st-century American.  It's enough to make me relieved I don't have to deal with naked people very often.

And You May Tell Yourself, "Hi Ho! What Have I Done?"

I'll get back to posting... you know, actual content eventually, but first...

...I just wanted to make sure we were all caught up on what the latest Best Thing On The Internet is.