Poll

[meanfreepath]

Which two nights of the following should I stay up all night: tonight, tomorrow night, or Thursday night?

I have a bunch more 111 problems to solve and a presentation to do (meeting w/partner tomorrow afternoon). I am hideously behind on Math 49, for which there is a problem session tomorrow, which means I should have attempted all the problems before hand. I am approaching being 2 weeks behind in Shakespeare reading. I have not done the follow-up problems for 112 this week. I have not looked into getting funding to go to the APS-DPP conference (although the business of this semester makes me think that perhaps I ought not to go at all).

I am also scheduled to take a physical tomorrow morning for joining the fire company. I am already in not-so-good health from lack of sleep and exercise.

I'm probably going to need an all-nighter, or close to it, on Thursday night to get the math and 112 done before Friday, as did rose_garden last year. If I pull an all-nighter tonight, I can probably get most of the 111 done, catch up in math, and perhaps even do read some Shakespeare. On the other hand, an all-nighter before chorus will mean being out of it vocally, and making all manner of stupid rhythm and intonation mistakes I wouldn't make if I were fully awake, again. I am reluctant to do an all-nighter both Wednesday night and Thursday, for I shall be struggling to stay awake in seminar then. Plus there's colloquium on Friday and two all-nighters in a row seems to be a surefire recipe for falling asleep during colloquium.

How does one get through junior year succesfully? I almost feel like I'd have to work every moment of every day to get everything done to perfection, for which I always aim. I know MIT people who do all-nighters every other night and sleep 5 hours the other nights. Perhaps I should adopt this model.

Part of this stems from going to Philly with msarcher on Saturday night and being inefficient last night due to laundry/picking up bike. Also, being utterly exhausted at the end of the week makes it hard to be doing homework late every weekend night.

Can one survive without sleep by using things like No-Doz?

sildra, if you don't mind, I know you're probably swamped with graduate physics, but I think I could really use a chat with you... email me or something and I could call you back if you don't mind.

Comments

[indecisionwins.livejournal.com]

Can one survive without sleep by using things like No-Doz?

I'd recommend chai over No-Doz, or maybe coffee if you really don't like chai. (I've never tried No-Doz, but...it really seems like drinking good-tasting things with caffeine is much better than taking pills with caffeine. Plus I know that chai works really well for me when I have ridiculous amounts of work to do.) I actually have my own stash of the chai they use in Kohlberg now, so I can give you a couple if you think you may want it when Kohlberg's not open. (Or, if you want, I can sell you more than a couple for $1 a piece...)

[gerbilicious85.livejournal.com]

caffeine is not a substitute for sleep! plus, if you start using it and develop a dependence, when you try to quit for your health you'll have to deal with withdrawal symptoms of more tiredness! really, all it does is speed up your heartbeat and do other things to create the physical symptoms of high stress, which then makes you feel mentally like you're under too much stress. however, there is that short-term boost in thinking ability, which could help if you're too tired to think when doing a problem set or something, but would be inadvisable in situations where you shouldn't have the mentality of a small child with ADHD. or maybe that's just my reaction...

[sildra.livejournal.com]

I think caffeine should be a last resort, and even then, only in relatively low doses. But then, I don't use it (I don't even know if it has an effect on me).