The Importance of Sleep

I know that getting enough sleep is important. Researchers have found that people who don't get enough sleep at night are drowsy during the day (duh), and more likely to nod off at stop lights or doing things like watching TV. People who don't get enough sleep suffer cognitive impairments, coordination problems, and are less likely to lose weight. And let's not forget about the grumpiness factor. People who don't sleep well are grumpy and irritable, and don't cope as well with life's little annoyances like the stupid person who cut me off at the mall today because she thought I had a stop sign, but if she'd taken one second to read HER stop sign, she would've seen the words, "2 WAY STOP. CROSS TRAFFIC DOES NOT STOP", but noooo, she was too busy talking on her stupid cell phone to pay attention to insignificant details like that, so I had to slam on my breaks and I may or may not have called her an unsavory name that shocked my kids. Ahem.

So, as I was saying, sleep is important and this point was reinforced to me today. Oh not because of my reaction to the stupid driver who shouldn't have a license and really I think at least 85% of people on the road today shouldn't have licenses and I'd love to take them all away from stupid people because it, quite frankly, amazes me that they were even given licenses in the first place because really, how do people who can't see over the steering wheel and have the reflexes of a sloth even get a license in the first place?!!! deep cleansing breath

As I was saying, once again, sleep is important. I'm not actually talking about me here, believe it or not. I'm used to utter sleep deprivation. I'm talking about my kids. When Jackson doesn't get a good night's sleep, he's guaranteed to throw an all-out temper tantrum the next day. I mean, knocking holes in his door, whipping toys around his room, and pretty much just raging out of control. The signs are a little more subtle in my other kids, however. When Austin is tired, he just babbles incessantly about nothing in particular until we're all ready to duct tape his mouth shut. Today, we were all reminded of how Lexi acts when she's tired.

Clayton taunted Lex while they were playing Dance Dance Revolution and said that she stunk at it. Lex, who would ordinarily have rolled her eyes at Clay and told him that he stunk more than a skunk, stomped off to her room and started dramatically crying. This went on for some time until I threatened persuaded her to knock it off by telling her that if she couldn't get a grip, that I'd have to drive her friend home. She got a grip.

Then, on the way to the store to get her glasses which we didn't even get because I left her prescription at home and then had to drive back home to get it and then Lex picked out the most expensive frames in the store and I drove her to a second store to see if they had comparable frames that wouldn't require a second mortgage, but they didn't, so we went back to the first store and learned that it was cheaper to get 2 pairs for some reason so we left to get Jackson so he could pick out a new pair too, but then it was getting late and I had to get dinner for the kids and it was taking me forever because there were so many stupid drivers in my way. Oh yeah, back to Lexi.

So, there we were, on our way to the vision store when Lexi opened the case for her glasses and screamed. "Where are my gum wrappers?!" she screeched from the back row.

"I threw them out," I answered, thinking I'd done her a favor. When I grabbed her case as we headed out the door, I saw that there were a dozen or so foil gum wrappers in her case. I tossed them in the garbage can and handed Lexi her case.

"I was collecting those!" she wailed like I'd just killed her puppy. I mean, she doesn't actually have a puppy (and not because I killed it or anything.) She just doesn't have one. But if she DID and I killed it (which I would never actually do, of course), this is how she'd wail. I'm pretty sure. This is all hypothetical. I'm really tired.

"Why were you collecting those?" I asked in bewilderment.

In between great sobs, she choked out her profound reason. "Because."

OK then. "Well, Lexi, I just threw them away. I guess you can get them out of the garbage can if you must."

"But they're in the smelly garbage!" the last word said with utter disdain.

"Lexi, the gum wrappers ARE smelly garbage!" I retorted.

Big mistake. Big. Huge. She cried over her precious garbage gum wrappers for half an hour.

What's the lesson here? "One man's trash is another's treas...." oh wait, that's not it. "Don't take half a dozen kids shopping for eyeglasses when..." Nope, that's not right. "Don't throw away your kids' crazy collections..." Hmmm, "Get enough sleep so you're not cranky when stupid people cut you off in traff...." Oh yeah, it's "Make sure you put the kids to bed by 6:00pm so they don't go nuts over garbage the next day!"