I'm Moving to Wordpress

I've talked to a couple of people, and they all seem to really like Wordpress so much more than any other blogging software out there, and from just the limited use that I've had with it, I'm going to have to agree with them. The main reason why I choose blogger in the first place was because I literally googled the word: "Blog" and lo and behold, the first link was Google's own blogging software. So, without much thought, I just logged in (I didn't even have to create an account, as I've already got 4-5 accounts with Google anyway) and started writing blogs.

I didn't have much in the way of expectations, and so I didn't have much of a problem with it. My only complaint was the iPhone blogging software I had used wasn't so hot and compatible with Blogger, but that wasn't an issue with Blogger itself, so I ignored it. I just went about my business and whatever.

Fast forward a few weeks, and I find out that my girlfriend started her own blog for her summer job. Pretty cool, but she choose Wordpress instead of Blogger, so we can't exactly follow each other. No biggie I guess, but I wanted her to feel special, so I jumped straight over to Wordpress and got an account. I signed up to follow her blog and was all "Oooh! You've got a follower! Look at you being so cool!" sort of like what happened to me on here with my mom being my first follower. Well, she laughed it off, and I explored Wordpress.

My first impression was something like this: Blogger looks like one of those websites you'd make yourself using one of those "Site Builders" that all web hosting companies offer, while Wordpress looked like a several thousand dollar professional website for some global corporation. It was amazing! So, it wasn't long that I decided that I'd go ahead and make the switch, as their iPhone app is significantly better than what I had been using for Blogger, and there really were no downsides to switching (other than losing my mom as a follower).

So, this will be my last post here to inform everyone that I am moving to my Wordpress site:
http://theorwineffect.wordpress.com

I know, completely radical and out of left field isn't it?

My Live Nap Schedule

http://bit.ly/k2Jr2T

Take a look at the link to view my live napping schedule! I've updated it from the beginning of my experiment so that you can see exactly when I lay down to take a nap, and exactly when I get up. For anyone considering getting onto the Uberman sleep schedule, this is a good show of the dedication required to actually pull this off. Even if you aren't looking to be Uber, take a look anyway, as its still a lot of very interesting data.

How I Write Blogs

I wanted to write up a quick blog about how I go about writing other blog and such. I think its interesting how my mind jumps around from subject to subject, which is exactly how I write blogs. New ideas pop into my head and I quickly save whatever I'm currently working on, start up a new blog, and come up with a quick outline for what I want to discuss, just to make sure I remember why I started the blog post in the first place. There have been quite a few posts that I create just the title of and start out with a line like: "So, occasionally, I'll _____" (with the blank line in there), and the title of the blog will be something out of left field like: "When my Dreams Meet Reality". The first thing that pops into my head when looking it over again is "where in the world was I going to go with that?" So, I wanted to share with you guys my process of producing blogs, so that maybe it will spark your own set of procedures to go through for starting and maintaining your own blog.

Picking up the Exercise

So, yesterday, my roommate asked me if I wanted to go out on a walk with him. My first response was: "nah, its too hot out, and I don't feel like walking." I was more interested in hopping on my computer for a nice, long video game session. He asked again, and kind of guilt tripped me into it. "You know you should. You haven't been running in forever, and its good for you man. You can't sit around all day on your computer, its not health."

"Yeah, yeah, yeah." I reply. I still wasn't too enthusiastic about the idea, but I decided that instead of instantly jumping onto the computer, I'd do a little cleaning up around my room, just so he didn't have anything else to hold against me. I picked up my recycling and trash, took it out, and lo and behold, it was pretty cool out. I walked back inside, popped my head in the door and asked, "alright, when do you want to go?"

My First Blogger Follower!

Its official! I got my first Blogger follower today, and I'm so excited that I decided to devote this entire blog about this person. Its pretty exciting to see how this experiment is developing, and how much I am actually contributing to others. Well, the 2nd isn't very visible on here, but on my Twitter account (@ChrisOrwin), I've been having some really great... conversations? with a couple of others who are also transitioning to polyphasic sleep schedules. A big shoutout to: @filipevsm and @Mike_Rossetti. But that's neither here nor there, because today's blog is all bout my first follower: Stef!

So, I was just loggin into Blogger to start up a new blog or keep working on the half dozen or so works in progress, and I happen to notice this little icon off to the side of my dashboard:

It was pretty amazing, if I do say so myself. I eagerly clicked the link to find out more about this newly acquired stalker. Ah, Stef! Hello Stef! Its nice to meet you, but who are you really? What's your name? Do you have a blog? The exciting questions kept rolling in until I read the first 4 words of her profile: "I am a veterinarian." Instant loss of excitation levels. Ah, that makes sense now. Hi Mom.

Oversleeping and Undersleeping

Both are extremely bad and should be avoided at all costs. Well, the undersleeping and sleep deprivation are kind of necessary evils in order to adapt your body to the Uberman sleep schedule, but I was more specifically referring to trying to cut your nap times even shorter. I haven't been on this experiment for an incredibly long time, so I can't comment on the absolutes of either of these, but I can mention the experience I have with them and how they've affected me. This is most likely a topic that I'll return to later on after I've fully adapted, where I can give a better view of what happens when you are on the full cycle.

Relationship Rules - Sleepy Style

There are a few "rules" that I "choose" to follow when I'm with my girlfriend as appose to when I'm not. Obviously, manners and courtesy are among them, but there are a few other things that I do that concern sleep, or the lack thereof.

Getting to Sleep Quickly

This is something that I struggled with when I was sleeping normally (or what most of the world calls normally anyway). I would lay down in bed at night and let my mind wander. I would think about the current day, what tasks I accomplished, which ones I still needed to do, what I could have done differently. I think about the next day, what I've got planned, what homework I should have done instead of playing video games, whether or not I need to attend class in the morning. I then also think about random things, what should I get my mom for Mother's Day in 3 weeks? What's something special I can plan for my anniversary in 8 months? What would it be like if I could control fire, and had a pet velociraptor? What would life be like if I were a midget that could breathe underwater? You know, weird stuff...

Breakdown of my Day

I want to breakup my day and split it out into it's sleeping/non-sleeping components, and make a few comments on how I feel, how my body is responding to those periods and what I'm doing.

Why the Transition

I get asked this a lot, not by blog readers, as I don't believe I have any at this point, but by my friends and family. There is a, in my opinion, very good reason for wanting to do a transition period prior to jumping straight in, especially given my situation. I believe that this question is best answered in two parts.

Exercise and Sleep

Ask any trainer, and they'll say that the key to recovering from exercise is sleep and rest. The only problem, is that the amount of time my body will be at rest during the day will only be 2-3 hours, as appose to the 6-8 hours that people normally get. This was an issue brought up by Steve Pavlina in his blog, which is something that I'm going to have to figure out how to handle. (The blog linked is his resulting decision)

Transition Period - 5/12

This was originally posted on 5/12/2011 at 2:32 PM, but my phone seems to have deleted it from my blog, so I am reposting it here:


So, I think that I've decided to try to smoothly transition into the Uberman Sleep Schedule, rather than jump straight in head first. I had "accidentally" gotten into the habit of taking midday naps a week ago or so, during my final exams, which, at the time, was very bad for my studying, but I found that after a couple days, I started to really fall asleep quickly, and stay asleep until my alarm went off. I also had a really cool dream a time or two. I'm not entirely which stages of sleep you can dream in, but I know in the fourth stage, REM, you are supposed to have real vivid dreams and such, and when you wake up straight out of that stage, you have a very good chance of remembering them. Now, I'm not saying I made it to REM sleep, but I just find it kind of cool that I was able to dream, having only been asleep for 5-10 minutes...

Disruptive Naps

I'm already beginning to see how having to take naps during the day is going to complicate things for me. There are 3 main areas that concern me with switching to this sleep schedule. My family and friend interactions, my girlfriend and the summer vacation trip that I've got planned. These are not necessarily in any particular order of importance, because I didn't feel liked trying to edit the line on my phone to put them in a specific order, yet typing this has proven to be more of an effort than if I had just reordered the line to begin with. Though, that's how I tend to do things.

Too Busy To Nap

Well, yesterday was quite a busy day, full of problems for my transition into the Uberman Sleep Schedule.

Statement of Objective

So, I had a blog once before, and I made a few posts (like, 4), but I was terribly inconsistent. I think I made the first 2 posts within the same week, and I told myself: "You know, I'm going to start a blog about whatever comes to my head. Nothing interesting ever really happens, but I'll do what I can." Well, that didn't work, but now I AM doing something interesting this summer, and this blog post will be explaining exactly what that is.