Sleep Deprivation

I had a very rough morning. So I thought I’d chronicle it. But the chronicling spiraled out of control and ended up being a very detailed description of my entire weekend. I was even able to focus my eyes long enough to edit a little, but not too much.

Today’s Exploit:

My trip back to the mountainous regions of Denver and Laramie was very eventful. So many activities paired with the night schedule I’m used to equated to very little sleep.

First was the excitement of going home. That meant that I went to bed late in the day and only slept 3 ½ hours before anticipation of leaving the rig took over. That morning I decided not to remove my contacts because putting them back in my eyes in a few short hours would be excruciatingly painful. This idea resulted in really dry eyes on the three hour drive to the Dallas airport (that means I had a really hard time focusing. My eyes would randomly get really blurry and I’d have to blink 23 times to be able to see again). The other option, taking them out, would have hurt really badly and I still wouldn’t have been able to see for the tears streaming down my face.

Of course as soon as I got to the airport, where I could take them out and use my glasses, they stopped bothering me.

When I arrived in Denver I spent 18 minutes trying to convince my sister that it didn’t matter what terminal she went to. I tried with all my might to get her to tell me where she was and sit tight. She didn’t believe me, so we ended up wandering all over the place trying to find each other.

On the drive to our lodgings, in addition to Cupcake’s random yelling directed at her GPS, we came across a drug bust. We had stopped at Good Times for some food and 1.68 blocks later we discovered 19 cop cars, lights flashing, surrounding one lowly, beat up, Honda.

We finally stopped talking at 12:43 am and went to bed. It was lovely to sleep, until I woke at 5:30 am. I ate some frozen custard and talked to some very excitable dogs and one disinterested cat.

When Cupcake finally got up at 7:30 we went to the waffle place around the corner. Then we walked around looking at houses for the next three hours. We then decided to go see the plasticized bodies on display at the Museum of Natural History, which meant more walking. After ogling at muscles and hearts and spleens and embryos we decided to leave for our concert and beat rush hour traffic. We arrived two hours before the gates opened, so we walked some more. And took “senior pictures”.

We then stood/danced for 4 hours.

The concert ended at 12:04 am, or somewhere around that time. We stopped for food again and went back to our beds, probably at 12:47.

I woke at 5:30 again.

This day also consisted entirely of walking and/or standing:

Walked to the store
Walked around a farmers’ market
Walked around the mall
Stood in the kitchen while Mary cooked some amazing Greek lasagna
Walked to the Theatre
Stood for the concert
Walked back to get the car

I then got to sit for a while, the problem with this was that I had to stay awake long enough to drive home. My sister said she’d drive half way, but she was not about to be woken when we got to that point. That left me with the option to continue driving, or sleep in a dark parking lot.

I finally got to sleep at 2:43 am. I then woke at 8:06. Luckily this time, after staring at the wall for 27 minutes, I was able to go back to sleep. I woke at 10:21. We were supposed to be at my parents’ house in nine minutes. I still had to wake myself, wake my sister, get her moving, and we both had to get dressed. Then we had to make the eight minute drive. Amazingly we were only six minutes late.

After eating toast and potatoes and ½ a slice of bacon, we took coffee or tea and sat on the porch. It was so nice out, under 83 degrees for sure! We sat there for a while, and then decided to go for a drive to the mountains. On the way there we talked about dandy antelope and spleens affected by leukemia; we also were hit by a hail storm. This storm came on very suddenly with huge chunks of ice beating on the car. We had to yell at the top of our lungs if we wanted to communicate verbally.

The massive downpour of ice chunks did abate before we arrived at a good spot to take pictures of me and the snow. I got out long enough to take four pictures, and throw two snowballs. Then they made me get back in the car because I was shivering.

On the drive back my mom slept in the back seat. I sat in the front with my dad. It was very difficult for me to keep my eyes open. I had help though: every time I would fade out my dad would turn to look at me with something to say. I could feel the thoughts burning into me: hey, I have something to say! So I’d open my eyes half way and he’d tell me about how Delta Nu might be hiring soon, or that at nights the Cowboy cutouts on the new firehouse light up.

After eating fried burritos we went to the viaduct over the train tracks. My mom wanted to take photos of Cupcake and me for a frame she has. Mom, I hope you like all my pictures with puffy eyes and rings around them. We stayed up late looking at the pictures.

It rained that night. Hard. I was on my feet trying to get to the window to save the photos all over the floor before I registered that it was actually raining. I think I’d slept for 2.46 hours. I was able to sleep fitfully for a few more hours, until my dad woke me at 5:30 to go for a run. The one where the antelope blew raspberries at us.

I made it to the airport and through security in time to sit for seven minutes before boarding started. I was also able to sleep on the plane with my head under the head rest. The head rests were the ones that can fold up on the side, but also give you a crank in your neck because they make you lean forward so far. I also occasionally started awake when the person behind me kicked the seat.

I escaped the tangle of highways in Dallas and arrived at the rig with just enough time to put on some coveralls and run to my box. I was able to stay busy for most of the night, talking to the driller, the roughnecks, and doing prep work for another run at drilling the well. This all went smoothly until 4:49, when my eyes would start to cross if I focused on anything longer than three seconds and my arms stopped responding and my ear decided it really liked my shoulder. My only problem was that I was supposed to be conscious for another hour and 11 minutes.

I spent the rest of my shift staring blankly at the computer occasionally realizing that seven minutes had lapsed without my awareness or telling my hand it should reach out and click the mouse for that computer.

When the day hand arrived I walked to the trailer like a zombie on autopilot. I made it into my room and may have taken off my smurf-suit and brushed my teeth before falling into bed.