Miriam Parkinson

Yesterday I grabbed this tutorial off the GIMP website and started practicing some new skills. The result is a photo of me as a child, converted to black and white and then selectively recolourised.

That rainbow dress was my favorite party dress when I was a kid. It has been passed on to my cousin Alice, and now my other cousin Victoria wears it.

Tags: Photography, Editing, GIMP, Tutorial

Last night after skipping one nap and then oversleeping on the next I was a wreak. Not just physically but emotionally too. I ended up crying through my shower (to wake myself up) and in the end decided to just go back to bed. Colin, upon finding me in bed crying softly, made a couple of attempts at motivating me to keep going but in the end just let me sleep.

I don’t regret stopping, nor do I regret trying it out. I’ve learned a few things about myself and I’ve also seen how this could work. I probably could have kept going for a bit if I hadn’t skipped a nap but I think even with adaption I ultimately would have stopped fairly quickly anyway.

The reason for this is loneliness. I am a very social person and I really couldn’t handle not being able to cuddle in bed before I went to sleep, and cuddle again when I wake up. I’m also fairly panicky and afraid of the dark so noises in the night freaked me out when I didn’t have Colin to cling to. Another massive problem with this method is that a simple thing like dinner and a movie doesn’t work if you need to sleep every 4 hours. Its like having a baby with you, except that you’re the baby.

If you have too much happening in your day to handle and want some spare time, and if you’re not a particularly social animal (or you can at least handle being alone at night) then this method could work for you. But if you’re life isn’t very flexible or you just want to try this out for the fun of it then its just not worth the effort.

In the end I’m confident that you can get a 22hr day, but you need to weigh up whether it’s really worth it.

Tags: Sleep, Polyphasic, Uberman, Experiment

Day one is not quite over but my mental faculties seem to be at a highpoint so I’ll take advantage of them while I can still think.
Last night was a little tough. I didn’t really sleep through my naps, I stayed in a sort of half-sleep relaxed state – similar to hypnosis. I was frequently hungry, but strangely I craved relatively healthy things like capsicum and scrambled eggs. I quickly discovered that if I could keep moving I didn’t get tired. As soon as I sat down at the computer I became drowsy.

The best pick-me-ups were juice and exercise. I did the New York City Ballet Workout DVD at 3.30am and found that I actually performed better than I normally do. A glass of orange juice seemed to immediately revive me even at my lowest points. I’ve bought a bottle of fruit and veg juice so I’ll compare results.

Another interesting thing I noticed was that I was very aware of my circadian rhythms. I could feel my heart rate and temperature drop at one point in the night and I started to really perk up around 5am. I also seemed to have an exaggerated startle reflex. I was listening to podcasts and every time there was a foreign noise in the background I jumped out of my skin.

I’ll be getting a heart rate monitor in the next week or two so it might be fun to do one night where I do an hour by hour log with a quick comment on my heart rate, perceived temperature and how I feel overall. Get a feel for what’s happening internally.

Colin is taking me to the movies tonight so this will be a bit of a challenge. I’ll pretty much end up skipping a nap so we’ll see how this effects me later tonight.

Wish me luck!

Tags: Sleep, Polyphasic, Uberman, Experiment

I’ve started my polyphasic sleep experiment tonight whilst I’m still enthusiastic. I thought about best ways to start this but quickly realised that there was no good way to start. The entire aim of the first couple of days is sleep deprivation. That’s what triggers the adaption. So I’ve had my first nap.

I didn’t sleep particularly well, just sort of drifted in a semi-sleep, relaxed but not actually sleeping. Thats what you get for trying to go to sleep before you’re tired. I’m thinking the 3am sleep will be somewhat easier to get into.

Tags: Sleep, Polyphasic, Uberman, Experiment

Colin will laugh when he hears this but I’m thinking about giving polyphasic sleep a try.

Polyphasic sleep is (according to Wikipedia)

a sleep pattern intended to reduce sleep time to 2–5 hours daily. This is achieved by spreading out sleep into short naps of around 20–45 minutes throughout the day.

The upshot of which is, of course, that you get a whole lot more awake time. Apparently once you get the hang of it you feel more alert than before you started. If I do this (and its a very big if because I’m not exactly known for following through with things) then I’m thinking that 11pm, 3am, 7am, 11am, 3pm etc sleeps will be the go (based on my timetable). I’ll also obviously have to figure out a way of doing this without bothering Colin.

The next couple of days will tell whether I actually start this and from then I’ll blog my progress.

This has, of course, been inspired by reading Steve Pavlina’s log outlining his marvelously successful attempt. He’s switched back to sleeping normally now but he kept it up for several months and only switched because of social reasons. If you’re interested in polyphasic sleep its well worth a read.

Tags: Sleep, Polyphasic, Uberman, Experiment

I’ve been having a go at doing things properly when I make coffee over the past couple of days and my problem seems to be fairly consistant. My coffee isn’t bitter enough, it tastes a little acidic and with the one sugar I am used to having tastes a little sickly.

So I’m after some advice, coffee snobs. What is the likely cause?? Bad coffee, not fresh enough, wrong temperature, what?

On the other hand I seem to have a natural talent for making the foam. It consistantly has a lovely texture and body to it.

Tags: Coffee, Espresso, Acidic

The most recent episode in G’day Worlds “Melbourne’s Leaders” series – Brian Watson, Investment Banker – is fascinating for a number of reasons and everybody should go check it out, however one thing in particular got me thinking. Early on in the show they get talking about luck in business and Cam mentioned a lesson he’d been teaching his boys: “Being intelligent is terrific but being intelligent in and of itself doesn’t get you anywhere you need to work hard as well you can’t just coast on the fact that you’re intelligent”.

I am an intelligent person. I’m not telling you this to boast, and I’m not making this statement without anything to support it either. I have several learning disabilities and in the course of diagnosing them I’ve had more than a few IQ tests and its right up there, but that’s not the point.

I’ve been coasting on my intelligence my entire life. Throughout high school I did virtually no homework and I payed minimal attention at school. I was far more likely to be found reading a book under my desk than taking notes in class.

My reports always went along the lines of “Miriam’s natural linguistic ability has allowed her to achieve high results in her listening and speaking exams; however…” (that was my french teacher) and “Miriam has the ability to top the year in maths; however…”

In year 12 I was diagnosed with ADHD which sort of explained my difficulty concentrating and studying and once I got on my Ritalin things picked up a bit. I did hundreds of past papers and achieved fairly well in the HSC.

But the really stupid thing?? I’m not on my Ritalin anymore. I ran out of scripts almost two years ago and haven’t gotten around to getting another one. So here I am again, riding on my intelligence, and when you have 12 weeks to learn all the content for four subjects, intelligence doesn’t cut it. So my uni results went from good, to mediocre, to poor… and then I failed a subject last semester.

So here’s my advice to you. If you’re fairly average, remember that hard work will get you 90% of the way; and If you’re intelligent, keep in mind that even if intelligence has taken you this far by itself it will fail you eventually. Most of all though, if there is a barrier to your success and you know about it, do something about it!

Now perhaps if I’m very lucky, I might be able to take my own advice this semester.

Tags: College, Study, Brian+Watson, Cameron+Reilly, Talent, University, ADD, ADHD,