Sure, today is worse than yesterday. But at least it’s better than tomorrow!

Reject humanity, return to prokaryote.

I’m a light sleeper with a loud mind, as well, so this kind of thing has always been a problem for me. The two main things I find helpful may not do the trick for you, but here goes:

First, trying to force myself back to sleep always just ramps my brain up worse and makes it more difficult than it already was to fall back asleep. I stopped trying to force the issue, which has counterintuitively sped up the time it takes me to fall back asleep. I don’t get up or engage my mind with anything significant, but if I’m awake, I’ll put soft music on my earbuds or scroll on my phone set to the dimmest setting. I may not fall back to sleep immediately, but I’ve found that lowering the pressure on myself to fall back asleep makes it happen more readily than when I spend 2 hours and 45 minutes being like “if I fall asleep right now, I can still get another 3 hours. go to sleep. fall asleep. sleep will happen… now!”

Second, I’ve increased my oversell magnesium intake. I know you said no substances, but I feel like this is different. There have been a few studies–popular science type stuff, nothing peer reviewed that I know of–indicating that magnesium improves sleep quality and the ability to return to sleep if woken up. Might be the placebo effect, but I don’t care because I’ve noticed an improvement.

Sorry you have to deal with this flavor of insomnia, too. Super sucks.

I’M HIT

powpowpowpowpowpowpowpowpowpow

Thanks for clearing that up.

Tough but fair.

When I’m really stressed out, I’ll put on repetitive beep boop music and draw floor plans on graph paper.

A story as old as time.

I love their recipe for no bake cookies, though! Just 12-15 minutes at 375°, and you’re good to go.

Born and raised in Minnesota. Plan to die here. I can confirm this is 100% accurate.

Then I’m not interested.

I was kinda hoping that in the current era, political scandals would get a new suffix. Watergate happened 50 years ago, so popular first-hand memory of it is waning.

There was a moment when I thought we could transition to [scandal]-a-lago, but it never happened.

SEALEDforYOUR P R O T E C T I O N

I hate it when someone with these lights is in the passing lane behind you, and their lights reflect off your side mirror directly into your eyes. The worst is when they’re only going like 102% your speed, so they linger there unless you adjust your own speed to change their placement relative to you.

Was that a dig at Totinos party pizzas? If so, we can’t be friends anymore.

And there’s no other way to eat those than folded over like a taco!

Prison. Immediately.

Decent quality automatic cat feeders.

We have 3 cats, and I resisted getting autofeeders for 5 years because it felt silly to buy what amounts to three $75 food bowls.

They paid for themselves the first weekend I didn’t have 3 razor sharp dickheads screaming at me to feed them at 5:15 AM. I should have bought them years ago.

All three will also usually contain >3 grams of iron.

I feel the complete opposite!

It stresses me out to feel encumbered on a plane. I don’t mind waiting at a carousel for a while to get my luggage if it means I can board with nothing but headphones and an overpriced pretzel.

If they lose my bags, I’ll get them back eventually. It’s not like they don’t have stores at [insert destination].

Add to this that the child is also made entirely of rubber and could easily withstand the train’s impact and experience no measurable hardship. However, the impact of Superman halting the train caused wreckage to fly all over the place and damage the surrounding infrastructure… which in this case is a metaphor for literal fucking infrastructure.