Raging Insomnia

There is an idiom that seems to have become very popular over the last year or two and, like many things do, it drives me absolutely nuts. Every time I hear it, or see it written down, a rage builds within me and I am compelled to internally rant to myself. Mentally pacing up and down, gesticulating wildly, while I sternly lecture an imagined gathering of offenders on the error of their ways. I am referring to the colloquialism “sleeps until...” I’m not even sure why I hate it so much. It’s probably that it sounds quite childish. I'll be the first to admit that I can be somewhat immature in my humour, but I'm an adult and I talk like one. This is more like baby talk, and I’ve never been a fan of that. I’m not talking about the baby talk that adults do to babies; the “googoo gaga” kind of gobbledygook, although even that winds me up a little bit. No I’m talking about the kind that adults do to other adults. That supposedly flirtatious baby talk someone might do in an effort to manipulate another person, normally of the opposite sex, to do a favour for them. “Would oo do me a ickle favour pwease?” I know that quite a few people, particularly men, tend to be suckers for that kind of shit, and I’ve seen guys go all googly eyed and jelly kneed when it’s used on them. I guess it’s meant to produce an instinct to protect and nurture, but it just makes me want to punch them in the face. I haven’t as yet punched anyone in the face for it; normally I’ll just agree to do the favour on the condition that they never speak to me like that again.

To me the puerile phrase "sleeps until..." also represents the apparent dumbing down of society as a whole. It’s something that parents say to very young children who maybe don’t quite understand the passage of time yet; a child may not fully comprehend minutes, hours, days, and weeks, but it sure as hell knows what sleep is. Eat, shit, and sleep are an instinctive part of every animal on the planet. So I can understand telling an excited child they’ve got six more sleeps until they go to Disneyland to be scared shitless by an eight foot tall mouse with a penchant for nipple high red shorts. It’s something we’re meant to grow out of though. Our language is supposed to become more complex as our cognitive development advances. Surely as adults we can find ways to express our excitement for an upcoming event without resorting to such childish measures.

There are even apps for smart phones, dozens of them that will tell you how many “sleeps” there are to any event you care to programme in. There are more than ten of them dedicated purely to telling you the amount of “sleeps” you have until Christmas. Most of these apps are free, but a couple actually cost money. One of these, simply titled "Sleeps to Christmas" (Obviously you don't want to be too esoteric for your core customer base), has a description on its info page that starts as follows:

"Excited about Christmas?

We are! We love to keep track of exactly how long it is until Christmas day.

That’s why we created Sleeps To Christmas!”

This particular app has over five hundred reviews, meaning that more than five hundred people have handed over 69p to own an app that tells them “exactly” when Christmas is. What kind of people would need this app? If today is the 18^th November I can tell, using my quite average powers of deduction, that Christmas day is “exactly” 37 days away, regardless of how many sleeps I have. The key to achieving this unremarkable feat is to remember that Christmas day is, and has been for just over sixteen centuries, always on the 25^th of December. And if, as is quite often the case, I don't know what day I'm actually in, I can take a quick look at a calendar. The things have been around in one form or another, letting people know just how many “sleeps until”, for several millennia.

There’s also the issue of what actually constitutes a "sleep". I'm partial, if unrestricted by work or other responsibilities, to a bit of a nap late of an afternoon. When I'm on holiday particularly, having got up reasonably early so as to make the most of any breakfast included in the price of a hotel, I'll spend the best part of the day doing my thing; exploring, sightseeing, or interacting with the locals to see what interesting situations I can get myself into. Then I’ll go back to the hotel for a two or three hour sleep before heading out to find somewhere to have dinner. And I do mean sleep. This is no half hearted nap or snooze. I’m not just noncommittally resting my eyes. I’m talking about a full blown, deep and comfortable sleep. Telling people I’ll be on holiday for twenty-eight sleeps may sound impressive but it’s still only fourteen days. And it’s not just me; many people take a nap during the day, from young children to OAPs. Does Christmas come quicker for these people due to their increased sleep schedule? Do insomniacs have to celebrate events long after everyone else once they’ve caught up on the specified amount of sleeps? It seems a bit cruel really, and telling someone who suffers from insomnia that there are only three sleeps until Festival of Sleep Day would quite frankly just be rubbing their noses in it. (Festival of Sleep Day is an actual holiday, taking place every year on the 3^rd of January. Look it up).

As a method of time measurement “sleeps” is wildly inaccurate. Okay, I know it’s not meant to be taken literally and is just a replacement for “days”, but then why not just say days? Other words are get pointlessly shortened like "lol" "OMG" or "amaze", so why decide to use a longer word in place of days? Just to get sidetracked slightly, what the fuck is "amaze"? Where did that come from? When did we start lobbing off the end of words? What exactly are we meant to get from missing out a syllable or two? Whenever I hear someone say "amaze" I just want to scream at them “No, that's not amaze. A complex series of pathways with dead end branches designed to disorientated and confuse, THAT'S a maze. The word I think you are looking for is amazING!” while banging their head against a wall on every syllable. While I’m on the subject: “totes”, “deets”, "delish" and “redic” can all fuck the fuck off too.

I need to lie down. I’m off for a sleep.