The Geedas Chronicles aims to right wrongs and seek justice. We also like to raise a little hell and write the occasional sad and comical feature stories about life on the planet.
Wednesday, June 3, 2009
It's no fun being the family snoring champion
As the sun sticks around longer each day, flowers bloom and I'm awakened by birds chirping, I'm reminded to keep my windows closed at night so my snoring doesn't wake the neighbors.
I come from a long line of blue ribbon champion snorers.
My grandfather on my mother's side snored so loudly that my grandmother, who also snored, eventually went deaf.
Uncle Tommy Ryan, a barrel-chested Irishman, woke up one morning with concussionlike symptoms that his doctors attributed to the thunderous drumming of his uvula against his soft palate.
He also eventually lost his hearing and later became slightly cross-eyed, we thought from the tremendous suction of his massive lungs against his small windpipe.
My first experience with public snoring occurred shortly after college. My friends all gathered at the large home of one of our parents in the suburbs of Philadelphia for a New Year's Eve party.
We did this so no one group would be faced with a long drive home late at night.
The guys let the girls and kids have the beds, and we slept on floors and couches around the house.
I ended up sleeping on the floor of a walk-in closet in the master bedroom.
I was awakened about 9 a.m. the next day by one of my friends kicking my foot.
As I opened my eyes I saw my friend Larry standing in the closet doorway holding the hand of his 3-year-old son, who appeared to be crying.
"Kel, wake up," Larry said, turning the closet light on.
"What's wrong?" I asked, rubbing my eyes.
"You're scaring the kids," he said.
Alas, I inherited the snoring gene. But instead of the thunderous variety, my snoring has been likened more to the song of the humpback whale.
I had a sleep study done about 10 years ago, and the grad student doing it woke me up early and said he had had enough.
"So, you've collected enough data?" I asked.
"No, I just can't stand your snoring anymore," he said. "I've never heard anything like it."
Poor guy. The needles of his snore-o-meter must have been spiking all night.
I bring this up because my doctor is scheduling another sleep study for me.
Until then, I'll remember to keep my bedroom windows closed at night so my neighbors aren't out with flashlights looking for the source of that strange howling noise.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment