BrewBlog

Word Salad

When I think of some of the absurdities of corporate life one thing that pokes its head up often, almost daily, is word salad.  Like alphabet soup, word salad seems unavoidable.  Word salad can be defined as a string of words that vaguely resemble language, and may or may not be grammatically correct, but is utterly meaningless.  That definition is more centered around the institution of mental health and not really corporate life.  How ironic.  Another common way to refer to the same thing is "bullshit".  Really, they are about the same thing.

Word salad (bullshit) attempts to use industry or office buzzwords and catch phrases to confuse the listener into thinking the person talking is smart, articulate and very very busy.  Very busy.  At the same time, the speaker is conveying nothing at all.  Then another chuckhole speaks up and says the same nothing while simply rearranging the same or similar words.  Others sit around nodding as though they get it.  Then there are people like me that get a headache from rolling their eyes.  All day meetings are murder for this reason.  Fortunately, I sleep through half of those.  I noticed Donald Trump called a candidate on it on The Apprentice and referred to it as "talking in riddles".  Excellent.

A few years ago, some of us in our team would play "bullshit bingo" during all day meetings.  Basically, we'd make a simple bingo matrix and fill in the boxes with stupid corporate words.  For example:  Integrate, synergy, strategic, convergence, leverage, ubiquitous, dynamic, etc.  Then when the usual talkers would go off on an irrelevant tangent or simply cover the important materials of the day, we'd listen for our bullshit words and "X" words as they came up.  The object of course being to get a bingo.  Awesome.  Of course we didn't invent this so I'm not staking claim by any means.  In fact, here is an example I found [Bullshit Bingo]

I could attempt to come up with countless examples but others have done that already.  Check out these bullshit generators.  Some are better than others.  They are pretty spot on in terms of capturing the spirit of my post here.  You have to imagine a bunch of people sitting in a room spouting these phases.  What's hilarious is that it is completely true and not even really exaggerated.  It's so ridiculous.  So here are a few:

• http://www.atrixnet.com/bs-generator.html
• http://members.aol.com/matt999h/bullshit.htm
• http://andrewdavidson.com/gibberish/

Narcolepsy

This is the third and final installment of my little story of restlessness and middle of the night crazies.  If you've happened upon this post, you can read about my discovery and diagnosis of Narcolepsy from "Bugs Everywhere" and "Lab Rat".  It's important to note that all of this is old news for me and nothing I'm coping with is too serious.  What is odd to me is that my biggest problem these days is the nighttime issues much more so than the daytime symptoms.  So what is Narcolepsy?

Narcolepsy is a sleep disorder of neurological origin.  It's most publicized and reported symptom is something called excessive daytime sleepiness (EDS), which is what it sounds like.  Basically, you suffer from daytime sleep attacks and persistent drowsiness.  Microsleeps intrude on normal awake states during the day.  microsleeps are fleeting moments of sleep during an awake state.  It's a common problem among non Narcoleptics that get much too little sleep as well.  It's different from being tired in that prolonged periods of immobility render a Narcoleptic unable to stay awake often times.  Personally, I've had serious problems in classrooms, at work and in my car.  No matter how hard I try, I'm sucked into little mini-naps and there is very little I can do about it.  I can feel it coming on as well.  It feels like being tired but for me it is a warm sensation followed by a bit of a dizzy feeling.  Everyone at some point has fallen asleep at inappropriate times and it's pretty much like that.  The EDS aspect if Narcolepsy is something I've battled with but never attributed it to the disease, at least until I was diagnosed.  I've been notorious for falling asleep in meetings at work.  I've also made it a habit to pull over and take power naps while driving long distances. 

Some Narcoleptics suffer from Cataplexy, which is a sudden form a paralysis brought on by an emotion of some sort.  This is what many people think of when they think of Narcolepsy, which is correct, but not common among all Narcoleptics, including myself.  It's the idea that someone is walking along or doing something and then suddenly collapses into an apparent sleep state.  It's particularly dangerous because of the obvious risks while driving. 

The most interesting and prevalent symptom for me is another symptom known as hypnagogic hallucinations which are vivid, realistic and frightening dreams experienced in an awake state.  Other direct symptoms include frequent disrupted sleep where you just wake up often for no particular reason and automatic behavior.  Automatic behavior is the performance of a routine task, without conscious awareness of doing it, and often without later memory of it.

For a good description of what Narcolepsy is, I'll quote a description from the Narcolepsy Network:

Narcolepsy is related to REM (rapid eye movement) sleep, the dreaming portion of sleep. As a protection against acting out dreams, the muscles become immobile or "paralyzed”. For the normal person, a sleep period first progresses for about 90 minutes of non-REM sleep and then REM sleep begins. But for a person with Narcolepsy, sleep begins almost immediately with REM sleep. Since the brain may not be totally asleep when dreaming begins, the dream is sometimes experienced far more vividly and is thought of as a hallucination. After waking, REM periods, or fragments of REM, occur inappropriately throughout the day. This explains excessive daytime sleepiness. Cataplexy is related to the muscle "paralysis" of REM. When automatic behavior occurs, sleep has partially overtaken the brain, but the body continues to perform familiar tasks.

Narcolepsy is a neurological disorder caused from the absence of a neurotransmitter, normally present in the hypothalamus region of the brain, which produces the hypocretin peptide essential to the human sleep-wake cycle.  Psychological problems can develop from coping with the symptoms or from being unaware of the cause.  I've talked to my managers at work about the issue so that they would understand why I'm struggling so much at times.  My doctor even wrote me a prescription for an afternoon nap to alleviate the EDS.  I've been tempted to tack it to the outside of my cubical and crawl under my desk to take a nap but of course I haven't.  Wouldn't that be great though?

Predisposition to Narcolepsy is believed to be hereditary.  Researchers also believe that certain triggers may determine whether someone predisposed to Narcolepsy will develop the disorder.  Potential triggers include:  Viral and bacterial agents, abrupt changes in wake-sleep cycles, illness, accidents, stress, drug usage and even hormonal changes.  Also, a genetic blood test has been developed which measures certain antigens often found in people who have a predisposition to Narcolepsy.

In 1999, Provigil (modafinil) was approved as the first non-amphetamine wake-promoting drug for EDS, which is what was prescribed for me.  I've tried it and it does definitely help but I'm pretty opposed to a drug/pill regimen if I can help it.  My doctor strongly advised that I try to allow plenty of time for sleep and, in short, live as clean a lifestyle as possible.  He said that anything that would make me feel batter would offset the EDS.  He was right.  About that time in my life I began going to bed earlier and taking better care of myself (thanks in large part to my wife; thanks!).  The EDS problem still exists for me but it is much better, only resurfacing lately because of our little baby Jackson wanting some attention throughout the middle of the night.  the hypnagogic hallucinations have been bad lately, again because of my poor sleep.  Poor sleep causes more issues with it and it causes poor sleep; a bit of a vicious cycle.

All in all the problem is not too bad FOR ME to deal with.  The issues I have at night are a hardship but there are worse problems.  Many suffer much worse symptoms so I'm in no way downplaying the disease.  I just thought I would share my experience.  For most, Narcolepsy kicks in the late teens and early twenties.  Then it sort plateaus and you live with it.  It will not get worse for me nor will it shorten my life span so I cannot complain too much really.  Thanks for reading and sleep well! 

Lab Rat

Last week in my "Bugs Everywhere" post, I left off in the story with the strong desire to solve the mystery of my brain.  In 2001, Internet fueled theory in hand, I went to the doctor to help me in my quest for knowledge and perhaps even solve my problem.  Luckily there is a sleep center in Sacramento with specialists that deal with sleep related illnesses and diseases.  After a brief consultation, a sleep study was scheduled.  I was excited.  Now experts were going to help me solve this whacky problem.  As you might guess, the sleep study was very interesting. 

Specifically I had an overnight polysomnogram followed by a Multiple Sleep Latency Test.  Both procedures involved recording my brain waves for analysis.  I showed up in the evening for my first test and they promptly hooked me up to every monitor you can think of.  Ok, maybe not every monitor but it was extensive.  I had at least a dozen electrodes glued to different parts of my scalp to record brain waves.  A heart monitor and breath monitor were also attached, among other things.  They had me go to bed there at the clinic and attempt to sleep all night.  A camera was fixed on me and someone sat in a nearby room and watched me sleep all night.  The next morning I had to hang out at the hospital and wait to begin my next test.

With all the wires still stuck to my head I began my next test as follows.  Every two hours at the top of the hour I had to try to sleep for twenty minutes.  They came into my little room, shut off the light and instructed me to sleep.  Twenty minutes later they would turn on the light and I would sit there for an hour and forty minutes until my next nap.  This happened for ten long hours before I was released back into the wild.  I drove home, looking like I had been in some strange accident because I had red grease pens marks everywhere there was an electrode.  My hair was unusually messy, again because of all the glue and wires over many hours. 

My condition was verified as being Narcolepsy.  This was no big surprise to me since I had done my Internet research and was easy to narrow down because very few things can cause hallucinations (other than drugs of course).  But I never sought answers until a short time before my lab tests so I spent over ten years in the dark with this problem.  Ten years plus of an odd mystery.  I was shocked to learn that the average diagnosis time is fifteen years!  So what exactly is going on, what is Narcolepsy and what can I do about it?

Well, Narcolepsy...is...zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

to be continued...

Bugs Everywhere!

Over the past month I've had some nighttime issues.  I saw a skunk in my bed this week but it turned out to be nothing.  For no apparent reason I knocked the lamp off my nightstand,  making a crashing sound, waking us up.  I woke Allison up in the middle of the night to make sure she was comfortable.  I got up several times to make sure nobody was in the house.  I've been concerned about Jackson's safety in our bed even though Jackson doesn't sleep with us.  Lately I've reverted back to some involuntary and highly disruptive behavior that best be explained with a trip down memory lane. 

Very late in my teen years I began having strange episodes at night where I would wake up to hundreds of bugs crawling all over my bed.  Astonished, I'd frantically brush them away and leap out of bed.  Mere moments later, my vision adjusted, the bugs are gone as are any signs of them.  OK, so there really are no bugs.  I'd return to bed and that was that.  These episodes repeated and eventually began to include snakes.  Now it is bugs and snakes invading my bed, covers, pillows, etc. 

As I entered my twenties and throughout my mid-twenties, these hallucinations were getting meaner and were beginning to happen more often.  An occasional occurrence would become weekly or as frequently as several times a week.  The bugs and snakes took a back seat to more human shaped threats.  I began to see silhouettes of people in my windows, doorways in my room, closets.  Several times the "person" would be in my bed.  I could never see any faces, just silhouettes.  I'd be just about asleep or having just fallen asleep and I'd feel as though someone was watching me.  Sitting up quickly I could recognize that there is in fact someone coming into my room through the window blinds or else they were already in my room.  Heart pounding, I'd leap out of bed to deal with it, how, I never knew.  Eye's adjusted or lights turned on, staring intently, my nemesis would fantastically morph into a drape, hanging shirt, towel or nothing at all.  Sounds incredible but I'm not exaggerating. 

After dozens of run ins with hostile images, my leaps out of bed were reduced to a strong sit up in bed, where I'd stare down the image until it went away.  After a time, you'd think I'd be wise to whatever was happening and I would know better.  Let me tell you, when your mind is telling you something is happening and your eyes confirm it, you believe it no matter what.  The other trick is that I'm almost always very groggy from being asleep or near sleep.  Judgment is impaired.  Things aren't rational.  I've even had some occasions where I was barely falling asleep and it would happen while still fairly alert.  The time for it to go away would be much shorter but my heightened awareness made it stranger than normal.  After several years of this happening on a frequent basis it was time to figure out what was happening.

to be continued...

Slayer - Christ Illusion

Slayer, in typical angry fashion, put together an aggressive and very true to form effort.  It's been five years since their last.  I'd expect more time between releases at this point.  Slayer has been around for over twenty years and that's pretty impressive.  How these guys tour with their catalog year after year is somewhat mind boggling.  Slayer is consistently hard core and have not backed off their aggression since I was in grade school.  Seems like they would be tired.  "Christ Illusion" features a return to form and the return of Dave Lombardo.  Dave Lombardo is so damn good.  He's in my top ten drummer list because of his speed and crisp precision.  The rest of the bunch is back as always, making this the original lineup.  I really liked Paul Bostoph in Slayer and hope he didn't get too screwed with Lombardo's return.  Who knows. 

Slayer's lyrics here would offend the religious, offend Muslims, offend pro war folks, offend...the list goes on and on.  They don't offend me though, because it's just entertainment.  Slayer has not sold out in their two decades of musical madness.  Slayer is one of the few metal bands that I stay up with and still like.  Musically, "Christ Illusion" is as good as they have been in a long time.  Overall, "Christ Illusion" gave me what I was expecting and I couldn't ask for more to get my metal fix. 

Strapping Young Lad - The New Black

Devin Townsend, Gene Hoglan and company are back in full force to deliver another solid dose of genre defying assault of madness and chaos.  At first, I liked about half of this CD but it didn't take long before I got into the whole thing.  I still have my favorites but all in all this is a really good CD.  SYL has taken a slightly different direction as they do with each release.  "The New Black" has some catchier songs and a bit more synth.  By catchy I mean more hooks like you would hear in mainstream music.  I'm fine with it because they did so without losing their very strong edge, speed and aggression.  The easiest thing to say about "The New Black" is that it is not as good as "Alien", their previous effort.  "Alien" was unbelievable and "The New Black" is just really good.  So, who cares.

SYL has become my favorite "metal" band.  How could you go wrong when you have the very talented Devin Townsend and drum monster Gene Hoglan?  Well, you can't really.  It will likely just be a matter of how good.  Gene is really good on this one, continuing to come up with great and seemingly impossible rhythms.  Devin is classic Devin with the louder and yelling style vocals he uses more frequently in SYL as well as the shredding style guitar.  Basically, he's in metal mode here but there are many styles showcased here, which is a strength of "The New Black". 

So yeah, I like it.  SYL is great and that's about all I can say about it.  It's metal, so non-metal fans will plug their ears and say something like, "what's all the scratch and scream?"  It's aggressive, loud, in your face and even fun at times.  The wackiness is there too.  Oh and the use of the "F" word is prevalent.  Forget about a radio edit.  But hey, this doesn't belong on the radio.  the public can't handle it. 

Happy Birthday BrewBlog

BrewBlog turned one year old last week.  A short time back I blogged about my one hundredth post, "100 posts!"  I don't really have anything to add to that previous post in terms of my thoughts about blogging.  My blog is pretty random although it does have some consistent themes of music since deciding to review new music.  I have found it more difficult to remain prolific since the arrival of our son.   For whatever reason my blog appears in Google searches a lot and I get a lot of hits from folks searching for things on the Internet.  My most viewed blog post has been "mare eat oats" which doesn't make any sense to me.  That post is a year old now and still gets a lot of hits.  It's because of Google, obviously.

Overall, I'm very happy with TypePad as a blogging platform and would recommend it.  Just be prepared to pay for it.  For now, it's worth it to me, especially now that Jackson's blog is also in the brewer.blogs.com space.  I'm going to renew for another year for sure.  One thing about my blog is that I was planning for it to be more personal when I started and it tends to not be.  Hopefully I'll have more of the "keep in touch" aspect in the future.  Again, blogging is fun and anyone with access to a computer and the Internet can do it for free.