Functioning with no sleep

[Joe Nerve]

Being musicians this is something I'm sure we're all somewhat aquainted with. In my case the get up 6am during the week, go to bed at 6am on the weekends often reaks havoc on my sleeping schedule. Naps during the week keep me going strong.

I slept 4 hours last night and I'm about to head off to work. 4 hours sleep used to mean "No way I'm goin to work today!". I've got one of those jobs (substitute teaching) where the only one affected by my absence is me. But since hearing a Henry Rollins tape where he talked about lack of sleep, my attitude has been completely transformed. He said something to the effect of, "Lack of sleep makes everything really... neat." I'm so easily influenced. Since then I've been able to somehow have fun with this.

How do you deal with lack of sleep? Does it keep you down, or can you function on 4, 3, 2, 1 hour sleep?

[IvanMike]

i'm kinda sleep deprived at the moment. It's funny, i was just talking to someone about getting old. when i ws 18, i used to gig on friday, say up all night afterwards, work a double on saturday, (or a single and do another gig), and work a double on sunday. now at 36, i do a gig and get to sleep at about 4:30 and work or no, i'm not quite right for about 2 days.
There's really no such thing as "catching up" with sleep, you really should find your minimum requirement and get at least that every night. hah! nice thought. with my job i work all 3 shifts, and although i have to do 1st shift 5 days a week i really am more of a night owl. hmmmmm, i'm rambling, i told you i ws sleep deprived. The worst thing overall is the irritability, that and the inability to focus. go check my last posts, i had insommnia all night (slurps coffee) now i gotta drive my kids to school. After that i'm gonna come home and put on public access tv with last moths town council meeting, that should put me out in say, 45 seconds.

[Dave Siff]

Having worked a total of six years on overnights or "early mornings", I've gotten pretty good at operating on little or no sleep. My current hours are 4am 'till noon, and I have band practice on Thursday nights until 11, so Fridays are always rough. When I was in my 20s and feeling indestructible, I'd play a gig until 12:30am and go to work at 2 (those days are gone!) The most helpful thing I've found is working out.. if you're in halfway decent shape, lack of sleep isn't as big a deal. The other thing is just having the right attitude about it, kinda like Henry Rollins as quoted by Joe Nerve. If you can convince yourself it's fun to work on no sleep, it will be. Just be careful driving home!

[lbanks]

Get your sleep, lad! You'll go mad!
(Liked the CD, good hard rockin'!)