One Quarter Left: of the Year ... and of Me

October began yesterday, so now we're into the beginning of the final quarter of the year. It opened with me making a platelet donation at Canadian Blood Services, and then going through the futile process of trying to rest before doing my stupid night shift.

I gave up in frustration with trying to rest through the day to prepare for it by trying to bore myself to sleep with studying. I ended up starting and processing a bunch of other household stuff. I hoped that the later sunrise would allow me more wind down time, but it wasn't so. I have three more of them to do before year's end. I do my best to push myself through when I do work them, but I've resolved to not put myself through any future hell of doing anymore of them. I have enough vacation hours and banked stat time to allow me to do so. It's better for both me and the people I serve if I avoid them. I don't want to go to any job, or do any task, or sign up for anything else where I'm reduced to being only 25% (or less), of the kind of person that I want to be; when it becomes such that it reflects both mentally and physically in my performance, which is what is effectively happening when I commit to doing these shifts.

So, I've been awake for more than 36 hours now. Here are a few more peculiarities that I'm noting and learning about me while I'm stricken with this degree of insomnia, with my senses working overtime, and depleted of a few less discretionary mental faculties:

• I try to chill out with music, giving eighties alternative/indy artists a good play over (The Cure, The Smiths, Siouxsie and the Banshees, David Bowie, The Jesus & Mary Chain, XTC, Joy Division, old school R.E.M., et al.).
• Anything I tried studying the previous day is just not in memory, thus wasted time and a total write off. I have to redo the last unit from my programming manual.
• I get strange and ridiculous surges of hunger that interrupt sleep, and for very carb-loaded foods too. This time I did something out of character and made pancakes ... for myself , after I came home, a true sign that I'm having some sort of a mental breakdown from exhaustion.
• I purposely isolate myself at home to prevent myself from making impulsive purchases while having less than adequate decision-making ability.  
• I get really geared to do something to fix myself better, despite the fatigue, with problem solving strategies by exploring productivity improvement sites, like Mind Tools™ (only after when my eyes aren't hurting too much to read).
• Gobbling up any pain-relieve pill that will sooth the headaches and muscle/eye-soreness, (I usually avoid anything in pill form if I can).
• I try to vent my general edginess and frustration through blogging, hoping that sleep will strike me down soon afterward.

If I'm still not able to sleep after this, my next manoeuvre is to review my stack of scans, sketches, and scribblings to see what of these non-ongoing things are most likely achievable within the next three months. Part of my problem with the lack of headway in some things is the degree of interest diversity I have, and trying to do eight or nine things at a time, rather than just narrowing the focus down to one or two items. My To-Do list really needs to be abbreviated.