Can alcohol cause insomnia?

Once again I have attempted to help out a pour soul. Anything in bold is a personal view, not that of the good doctor Breus

Expert: It makes you sleepy, but you won't get a good rest By Michael Breus(is it Bruce?), Ph.D.

Question: Can alcohol cause insomnia?(only when mixed w/ a stimulant like coke or amphetamines) I'm wondering because anytime I drink, regardless of the amount, I usually have trouble sleeping afterward(you obviously are not drinking enough! Bingeing will get you the sleep you desire). I'll either be up most of the night or at best drifting in and out of sleep throughout the night(Maybe he is drinking enough and these are just 'blackouts'). I'm a relatively healthy, college-age male. I'm not really a regular drinker (Think wine coolers. What's up Sly!)-- usually once or twice a month(Hence the problem...). Is it normal for alcohol to cause insomnia? I mean, it's a depressant, so one would think it would make sleeping EASIER if anything, but it seems to have the reverse effect on me(Lay-off the crank!). Is it something I should be concerned about?

Answer: Although alcohol can make some people sleepier, it often will keep them in the light stages of sleep and once it goes through their metabolism it will certainly make sleep worse(Especially if you are throwing up or if you have the dry heaves.). Remember, many people have strange reactions to all kinds of medications which are the reverse of what you might expect. Like Benadryl: Some people it makes tired, and others it makes wired(Nice 'cop-out' Dr. Bruce! It may do this and it may do the opposite, no one knows?! And he's supposed to be the expert!).

Anyone else have advice for this dude?

Sex Ed.

It is the time of year when I get to play Dr. Ruth. Sex Education with my 7th graders. Fun, Fun. As the hormones are going crazy, I get to talk about reproduction!

I always think about Kindergarten Cop, "Boys have penis, Girls have vagina."

At least I am not teaching this to any of my kids (I don't have any yet). I had sex ed. with my father in 8th grade, he was my Health teacher. What a joy. It was probably just as bad for him. All the girls kept asking him, "What if Robb got so and so pregnant, What if Robb got so and so pregnant." I had made my rounds with the class below me, so there were plenty of names to throw around at him. Junior High Gigolo.

I always seem to get the wet dream question, and if they are really brave or stupid, I get the masterbation question. They always snicker a little, but I can't blame them some of this stuff does sound a bit silly.

Missed me?

I am finally back from a long two days at the State Science Fair. We took 24 students (4 boys, 20 girls!). I am actually at the school now trying to grade papers, but instead found myself bolgging and looking at the classroom gerbils and admiring their lifestyle. It can't be too bad being fed, sleeping, running around the exercise wheel, and grooming each other. Here are some thoughts that I took note on (in my mind, I'm not quite to the stage of actually writting out notes for my blog....yet - think DORK.

*On Friday nite they provide a DJ for the kids to let off some steam wtih. This year, the DJ didn't show up, although we didn't know this until Saturday. So they got another dude who volunteered his CD's and tried, I need to stress that, TRIED to DJ. The pour fellow stunk it up bad. He is a former Science Fair winner, so if you can imagine a DJ with a collection of soundtracks for LOTR and Star Trek to dance to, your right on. He did have Enya (Ha!) and his best CD.....AC/DC. The kids were dissapointed and so was I as a former DJ, I felt some of his pain.

* After the dance I drove the HS kids through sorority circle and frat row. It was Geek Week (not a misspelling, well, not on accident anyway). You should have seen the looks from the yards of drunken college students as a HS van drove by at 10:00pm. It brought back many memories.

*I had the pleasure of listening to a pair of mothers extolt the virtures of how great Michale Jackson once was, and how he had gone "down hill". They knew all kinds of facts about how he had left some of his "whitening cream" in a hotel one time. Ladies! Welcome to the new world.

* At the hotel I was hoping for a good HBO soft porn flick to watch once the kiddies went to sleep. No luck for me, it was VanDamme. Frickin VanDamme, and not a good VanDamme movie either. I don't even know which bad movie of his it was. He was riding a motorcycle...well, he wasn't, it was a very bad stunt man. It could have been Blood Sport, his only half-way decent movie, or at least Time Cop.

* After lunch one day we drove by one of my old houses. For those of you who know (Asylum), the railroad ties that we used to brace the floor during parties were still there in the back yard. I wanted to stop in and chat, but I was in a bus.

* Just like every year, I was mistaken for a student instead of a teacher. Not bad when you consider I will be 30 in less than a month. Damn these boyish good looks!

* We came away with several winners, one student won $1600 in scholarship money. Antoher two got to split $800 in scholarship money. We had several place winners as well. Although I am a Science Teacher and certified science nerd, I never participated in the science fair. I wish I had, if I knew I could have earned some money for college I would have partaken. Oweing 20K sucks.

Well, thats it for now. Make sure you check out the new "Blog-o-the-week". Although we have simialr names, there is no known relation.

Involuntary Celibacy

The following is a legitimate question from a woman. It has been answered by Louanne Cole Weston, Ph.D. It is from WebMD

Anything in bold has been added by yours truely.

"I'm a healthy, 26-year-old woman. Why can't I find a partner?"

By Louanne Cole Weston, Ph.D.
Updated: 3:04 p.m. ET March  22, 2004

Question:
I am 26 years old and have never had any relationships at all with men(How about women?). I am otherwise a completely "normal" person, but for some reason it just won't happen. People always say you're not "trying" hard enough(Maybe not drunk enough.), or "you secretly don't want it to" but I don't think this is the case at all. I think most people just can't relate since they take it for granted and don't understand. I don't really know anyone who can understand what this is like(Try enormously obese, ugly people). I feel like I am missing out(You're right! You are!), like I'm really far behind, and I feel hopeless that I will never have a boyfriend.
Besides the effect on my mental state (think stress), I am wondering if complete lack of a sex life can be detrimental to my health at all (unfortunately not the case, otherwise more people would be having it after marriage!). I am a fit and healthy person, but I always feel stressed and cannot relieve it, and I can't sleep a lot(See! I told you it was stress). I also tend to get a lot more food cravings (oral fixation?)than most people and I wonder if any of this is related.

Answer:
You might be a perfect candidate for a dating service. When you join one of those you know that the other people you meet are looking to be in a relationship and possibly marry. That would take the "chance meeting" aspect out of your situation.

In the meantime, masturbation is a good way to keep your sexual parts active. Women who can masturbate to orgasm are more reliably orgasmic with a partner when they do partner up.

Any thoughts from the peanut gallery?

I'm Feeling Lucky

My new fun thing to do when I am bored on the computer is to enter things into Google and hit the "I'm Feeling Lucky" button.

I entered Schmidts Beer, and check out where it sent me:BeerPal.com

Way-cool site for those of us who enjoy a tasty beer now and then, especially the cheap ones.

I am now entered as an offical reviewer, go sign-up for yourself!

Hang Time

I am definatly not as young as I used to be. My tolerance level has been weakened as well. After a night of carousing until 3, I woke with one of the worsed cases of a hangover that I have ever had. It reminded me of a time back in school, after a 4 day binge that we call VEISHA at Iowa State. The difference being that this was only one night.

Oh, well. Back to work, the feeling of normalcy is slowly returning. Lesson learned.

Happy Monday to everyone.

Inactivity, obesity are killing Americans

More deaths expected from sedentary lifestyle than smoking

By Jeanie Lerche Davis
Updated: 7:32 p.m. ET March  17, 2004

Over the next decade, America's unhealthy lifestyle is expected to cause more premature deaths than smoking, a new report shows.

"We believe diet, inactivity, and obesity -- that constellation - will be the leading cause of death if things don't change," says study researcher Dr. James S. Marks, MPH, a CDC epidemiologist.

The CDC report appears in this week's issue of TheJournal of the American Medical Association.


Does blogging count as an "activity"?

How do you pronounce "function"?

Well, if you were me today you said, "fuck-schun".

I swear my mouth cannot keep up with my brain sometimes. Luckily it was my seniors in anatomy class. There were only 4 of them in class today, and the just giggled it off after I appologized.


yeah, yeah, I know, pretty professional.

Death by knowledge.

A student asked me today if it was possible to know too much. It was partly in jest I think...er hope. He wondered if it was possible to know so much information, that you just perish.

He was finding it hard to comprehend the vast amount of stuff we were working on and planning to work on in the future. So I asked why he wondered about the whole dieing from knowledge thing.


He said I should be dead by this point...I know too much. Damn it's hard being smart.

ST. Paddy's Day

I am jealous. When I was carefree, living in West Des Moines, with a simple job with few real responcibilities, I was able to party all day long on the 17th of March. Some of the bars were open all day long, starting at 6!

The Guiness comercial has it right, treat St. Patricks day like a real holiday. I think we should let school out on the 17th of March, and maybe the 18th too, for recouperation. Kind of like New Years.

What are you doing on St. Paddy's day?

D.A. - Dorks Anonymous

Hello, my name is Robb, and I am a dork.

(eveyone now) Hi! Robb.

I have been a dork most of my life. But it wasn't until today that I really realized just how dorky I am. I have been anticipating the reception of some books I ordered last week. My wife was getting tired of me asking her if they had arrived yet. I was like the kid from "The Christmas Story" waiting for his little orphan Annie decoder ring. Except I am a 29 year old dork, instead of an anxious 10 year old.

I don't mind being dorky that much. It's part of my charm, or at least that's what I tell myself. You take a bit of dorky-ness, add some "blond" moments, and some boy-ish looks, and this is what you get.


The books, I almost forgot to tell you about them. One is on organizing, one is about teaching Talented and Gifted students, and one is about the "one Step" millionaire or something to that effect. Did I tell you I was a dork?

This just in....

I am the number one link from Searchalot for big bouncy balls!


How did they ever know?

Spammed....

Apparently I have been spammed. I didn't know it was possible to do it to blogs. I guess I never really thought about it.

Soooo, if you had been here this morning and saw a post that is no longer here. That is the reason. Sooooo, I have deleted both the comment and post.

I have to thank Goose's lawyer, who really should be my lawyer since I don't know any others.

Thanks Haws.

Boy have I changed....

Last night I caught a 9th grade guy in the girls locker room. I thought I saw him go in but wasn't sure. So I camped out on a landing a short distance away. His girlfriend and her friends were trying to figure out how long I was going to be there. It was uncharacteristic for me to be waiting for anything after school.

He finally tried to make a run for it. But I caught him. I turned him over to his coach. Responcibility is a pain in the ass sometimes. Not that I thought he should be allowed in the girls locker room, but it was probably pretty harmless. It could have easily been me at that age. He just needs to learn how to make "wise" decisions.

That sounds too "old" for me to be saying. Maybe he just shouldn't have been stupid enough to get caught.

I need your help.

I have some good friends who I know would be great bloggers. Yet, they are content with merely making comments.

So, I would like you (my viewers, however few) to help me encourage them to step into the blogging world, so we can enjoy their wit, humor, and opinions.

Their names are Giese and Nate. So lets give a big cheer for them and see if they can stand up for us! (is that from the Bozo show?) Anyway, let'em have it in this comments section.


Thank you for your support.

DetentionDuty

You must go to jail. Do not pass go, do not collect $200.

I have detention duty. It is pretty wussie. All I require is no sleeping, and you must be doing something (homework, reading etc.). The only time it gets fun is when they aren't working and I make them clean my classroom. Usually garbage duty, sometimes dusting. Sometimes they clean desks and tables throughout the whole 3rd floor.

I wish I could make it harder, but people are so soft on their kids that they expect everything to be easy for them. That is probably why they are here in the first place...no discipline at home. So then when I apply discipline at school, the kids think I am being a hard-ass. When actually, if they followed directions and behaved like teenagers, and less like elementary kids, we would all get along just fine.

They just don't get it. Or maybe I don't get them.


Too bad, my classroom, my rules.

Procrastination....

To be continued......

Cleaning House

There is a realtor showing our duplex to someone today. That meant that we had to clean up the house. I don't mind doing that, actually it would be nice if I had someone calling to come check the place out every couple of weeks. That way I would be more motivated to clean things up. Not that my place is a "pit", but it gets a little exta treatment when we are expecting visitors.

What does bother me is thinking about people I don't know snooping around my pad. I would like to see and hear what they are doing and thinking. It kind of creeps me out when I get home after I've known that strangers have been walking around my house. Almost like they were ghosts.

Me and some buddies walked into a house that wasn't ours, or a friend of ours once. We were looking for a friend who used to live at that address and he had moved since and we didn't know it yet. So, we walked in and looked around, (it was between 1&3 in the am.) we had been at the bar all night and were looking for some more fun. It took us a few minutes to figure it out. When we did, we laughed and snuck out the back door.

I wonder if the residents had that same feeling that I do when strangers are in my house?

A lack of motivation

?Cornfused?

I put my underwear on backwards today. I was so tired I almost considered leaving them that way. We need underwear that can go both ways. Maybe I will just quit wearing them altogether.

Uno, Dos, Tres, Quatro

I have forgotten my debit card number. I think I can remember the digits, but apparently when I type them in it is the wrong order. Yes, I know there cannot be that many combinations of numbers, assuming that I DO have the correct digits. Yet, when I tried to enter them, I fail and it tells me that I have exceeded my chances.

I have yet to call the bank to "find" the missing password. They probably cannot give it to me anyways. I will probably will just be directed to someone else. Luckily the machine has not eaten my card yet.

I attribute this loss of memory to extreme stress. Normally I would attribute it to alcohol consumption, but I haven't had more than a bottle in a day for several weeks now.

Long, Long Ago, in a Blog Far Far Away...

Actually it was this one. But anyway, now that I have your attention, I don't really have much to say.

My head hurts. I just finished leading my 3rd Science fair. I was the head of it all. I guess that's why mine hurts. It was the usual bunch of projects, "which carpet cleaner works best, which liquid does alka seltzer dissolve fastest in", and of course we had the "home made hovercraft". Where is creativity? Is that a genetic trait that has not been passed on?

Actually I believe it is because most kids don't have to be creative anymore. Their toys do it all for them, whether it is a video game or something on TV. Things need to happen so fast for todays kids. If it doesn't happen almost immediately and it isn't entertaining, than forget it most of them say.

Has technology killed creativity as you and I know it?