“Wait! Where are you going? It’s only 12:30 a.m. We still have more Walker to watch. Come back! He’s about to figure out who’s killing the Native Americans with contaminated milk. Don’t go! Don’t leave me all alone! It’s still early!”

If so, then you may be suffering from insomnia. 

(The smile of a man who roundhouse kicks insomnia’s ass.) 

The night can be a lonesome, isolating time for insomniacs. This is especially true for those of us whose spouse refuses to use the crack pipe and Ritalin prescription a little elf slipped into their Christmas stocking and instead complains about having to wake up early for work before selfishly passing out just (seven to ten) hours after sunset.

To cope with the boredom and anxiousness insomniacs know so well, experts suggest reading, sipping warm milk, and soaking in a bath with lavender scented aromatherapy candles. While these ineffective traditions bolster the salaries of PR pros in the publishing, dairy, and wax industries, respectively, I have discovered a more entertaining way to while away the hours that is not only free, but does not discriminate against our sleepless lactose intolerant friends.

So, without further ado, I give you a new method for coping with the monotony of sleeplessness. I call it…Accidentally Overhearing Your Neighbors’ Conversations While Stifling Laughter and Unintentionally Taking Notes on their Dialogue.

The following quotes that I am about to share with you, dear reader, may one day be used in court as evidence that not all adult Americans should be afforded the right to vote in general elections or the privilege to operate machinery, including but not limited to cars, forklifts, and cell phones.

There are about forty people living in the one story house to the left and below ours and I can accurately report that each roommate’s declining cognitive functioning is more fascinating than the last. My anthropological night job has uncovered the fact that some humans, after blowing pungent smoke signals, become hungry and struggle to make sandwiches but their attempts are ultimately thwarted by…lizards.

(Let me just remind you that what you are about to read is an actual quote, that I actually accidentally overheard, and that, thankfully, Brian bore witness to as well. Let me also inform you that this quote comes from a Britney Spears wanna-be type – circa pre vaginal-post-birth-photo era – who favors strange hats like fedoras and has a propensity for screaming obscenities and various verbal abuses at her boyfriend.)
 
(Image of my actual neighbor punting an iguana.)

Exhibit A, My Favorite Quote Ever:
 
“Do you have to feed all the lettuce to the fucking iguana or can I have some, too?”
 
(Learn to share, iguana.)

Call me judgmental, but I’m pretty sure that when your life is reduced to haggling over iceberg lettuce with a domesticated reptile, you have some problems. Combine that with the cranial accoutrements and Tourett Syndrome and a trip to see that land walrus Dr. Phil is likely in your future.

The only other quote worth reporting was good, but not nearly as good as Exhibit A, which made my eyes water it was such a thing of strange beauty.

(I should probably explain that while I am not sure exactly which of the 36 male tenants said this, I have a good idea that it was Britney’s boyfriend, the neglectful owner of a cute English bulldog. For more in-depth revelations on his character I shall post Britney’s diatribes in the near future, which are chock full of information regarding everything from his penis size to his predilection for engaging in dirty acts with women who have procreated.)

Exhibit B:

“No, I can’t go to fucking Vegas to get married. I already told you! It would violate my parole.”

Ah. So tender is young love. Who needs books and ShamWow infomercials when there’s so much drama right below my living room window?

If only I could throw away the laughing hyena’s nitrous tank. She’s really starting to stress me out. Nothing is that funny. Nothing! She has been laughing uncontrollably for days now. Brian says she must be hot or else no one would put up with it, but I’m too afraid of getting caught to peek out the window. For now I shall just lay back, relax, and accidentally eavesdrop while searching for a periscope on eBay.

(Image: My future offspring.)

Soon after discovering this astonishing information I found that I couldn’t sleep, took an Ambien, and subsequently forgot about the aforementioned astonishing information.

So surprised was I today when I recalled this scary fact that I decided to look into the issue deeper. Further investigations in the field of mathematical analysis revealed an even more appalling fact. Careful calculations that took into account onset age of first usage, minus current age, equaling time spent half-awake tripping out on imaginary bed fairies…adds up to ten years.

Ten years! That’s practically a decade. The gestation period of an abnormally large and well-developed Tyrannosaurus rex. The time it takes for Train A that left Boston at 3:20 p.m. traveling at two m.p.h. to collide with Train B that left San Francisco at 8:49 p.m. traveling at negative eight m.p.h. The time it takes for John McCain’s handlers to air enough commercials to adequately compare and contrast the growth of his jowls over time and adept presidential-worthy aptitude for being carried out of Vietnam prisons on stretchers.  

Nearly a baker’s dozen of birthday cakes have come and gone (most likely gone, what with the late night Ambi-binges) since I first experienced sleep in a bottle.  Yes, I know I said I thought I was immune to sleep eating, but when I discovered yet another empty bag of parmesan Goldfish this morning, well, even I had to admit that it could not have been the work of our elusive invisi-pug. No, my favorite food in the world was reduced to a few broken dorsal fins and my tongue burned from what could only be 18,000 milligrams of sodium and real cheese flavor.  It’s not my fault; it’s that damn theme song that permeated my subconscious. I do love fishes and they are delicious.

These three discoveries (that I have filled innumerable sleep aid prescriptions, single-handedly wiped out whole schools of the fish shaped snack food population, and made a mental Venn diagram of McCain verses basset hounds) have conspired to form what is known in NA (and the Human Spider documentary I just watched about the world’s best solo climber ) as rock bottom. I believe this terminology may also be used in Boflex commercials, Baywatch casting guidelines, Chuck Norris’s daily shaving rituals, and Preparation H symptom charts. And while that is all well and good, what this means for me is that it’s time to get off the Ambien and get on with my life. (Similar to the song Get Out of my Dreams and Into my Car, only less creepy.)

And so, right now, at 1:51 a.m. I can proudly say that I am Nicole and I have been off of Ambien for fifteen hours. How have I managed this seemingly unimaginable feat, you ask? Well, the answer, my friends, is (I know, you just got a Peter, Paul and Mary song stuck in your head, didn’t you?) the answer is that I have found a new way to entertain myself. Instead of staying up all night entertained by the flashing lights on my household appliances (see FAQ # 185 below) I am staying up all night reading grimy, OCD-inducing library books while fighting the urge to return them before taking a bath in Purell.

What do people do to library books? Each one I check out seems to have been doused with more egg yolk and Spam juice than the last. I can’t imagine the horrors that would appear if these books were placed under a black light. Actually, that’s not true. I can imagine anything, including book lice trapped in semen, and am doing so right now.  Great. Now I cannot finish reading the last few chapters of John Hodgman’s hilarious book The Areas of my Expertise, which for the sake of sleeping synonyms everywhere, I must say, was hilarious.

I can’t trip out and peacefully fade into faux sleep with Ambien. I can’t read my library books. There is only one thing left to do. Reclaiming my place as Most Productive Insomniac Ever, I am off to watch Ryan Seacrest’s identical twin sister hock ShamWows in late-night infomercials. Who knows, maybe I can order one to clean my library books.

Ambien. It is the most popular prescription sleep aid in the nation, and why shouldn’t it be? I say. My love affair with Ambien has been thriving for nearly a decade. Sure, we’ve separated more than once when I’ve gone through a silly, little phase I refer to as wanting-to-be-able-to-remember-things-again, but we always end up coming back to one another.    

 Unlike many of the poor addicted saps I’ve read about on message boards, I have not built up a tolerance and haven’t gotten all Johnny Cash about it, sweating profusely and throwing a tantrum in a mini tractor while Thanksgiving dinner gets cold on the table until Reece Witherspoon breaks down and tells me where my stash is. So, obviously, I don’t have a problem.   

 Ours is a monogamous affair, *The Dambien and I. I don’t mess around with lesser bed buddies like those joke M&Ms called Lunesta or that waste of space Rozarem, and I never bring in more than one partner at a time. It’s just me, one little white pill, and a whole lot of fun. *I affectionately refer to Ambien as The Damnbien (the prefix damn because I can’t remember a damn thing after taking it and the bien because as they say in Mexico, bien is good).   

  It’s a fine day in this country when our copays cover not only a miracle cure for insomniacs, but a hallucinogenic one at that, one that provides hours of entertainment should we fail to tether ourselves to bed immediately upon ingestion. Hit record on a strategically-placed camcorder and you have got yourself a night to remember, my friend.    

 Many Dambien users find they become so relaxed on this sleep aid that they opt to go out for a little drive, feel the wind in their hair, watch the stars through the moon roof, not those pesky pedestrians or vermin so rudely making their way across the street in front of speeding Damnbimobiles.  

When getting into their cars the next morning they discover rabbit-sized dents and fur tinseled about their bumpers, reminding us of why exactly Disney named that little bunny Thumper. (I always figured old Walt for an insomniac – the eye circles, the greed – those prescriptions really add up.)     

 Other Ambien enthusiasts awake to find they’ve eaten all of the food in their kitchens, empty cartons of Crisco and Funfetti frosting are strewed about, peanut butter is trapped under their nails, and a used spit with rabbit remains might have found its way into the living room.   

  While I don’t sleep eat, sleep drive, or even sleep bone – as a shocking number of people on the drug do – it turns out I do something far worse. As if I am the insane fifth member of Abba, I…sleep disco dance.    

   I awoke this morning with a nebulous recollection of having seen a disco ball pulsating vibrant illuminations about the bathroom. The left half of my spare tire and my right pointer finger felt tired and sore. I just figured Brian had gotten really lucky.  

  But then, when I got up and went into the bathroom to brush my teeth, I saw it. The evidence to support my disturbing theory.  

There it was, the throbbing green light that indicated his electric toothbrush was still charging. I sat down on the toilet seat to ponder whether or not it had all been a dream, but from that very position, a flood of memories came back to me. Queue the xylophone and wavy dream sequence special effects….  

 I was sitting on the toilet, my eyelids at half mast, Shaggy Boombastic style, when flashes of green swirled by. I started to hear a beat, I could feel the bass, the rhythm of the night. What came next is unconscionable. I stood. I lifted my right arm. I pointed northwest. And I began…to dance. I don’t know how long I danced and I don’t know why, I only know that I shook my groove thang, alone in my bathroom between the hours of 2 and 4 am and I have the sneaking suspicion it’s an alibi my neighbors can corroborate.