Wednesday, January 11, 2006

Sleep Inertia

"Sleep Inertia" is a fancy technical term for waking up groggy.

Some people have jobs where they are routinely shaken awake and asked to solve urgent problems. Doctors and firefighters are standard examples, but it occurs to me that being on call for tech support is similar.

It turns out that people aren't too good at thinking when they are in this disoriented half-awake state. The article headline reads "Sleep Inertia May Be More Debilitating Than Sleep Deprivation."

What the headline doesn't mention, is that prolonged sleep deprivation can cause visual hallucinations, which seems a bit worse than grogginess.

Sleep Inertia
Can hurtcha.

So make sure to keep
One eye open when you sleep.

Better yet, stay awake.
There are pills that you can take!

Of course your sleep-deprived brain
Will shortly go insane.

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