October 27, 2005

Sometimes Dan and I are sharing a couch.

As we were a few nights ago, bored with an episode of Gilmore Girls. So bored, in fact, that one of us pretended to be asleep, head thrown violently back, throat full of sound.

DAN: I know.
PAM: Seriously.
DAN: You know, some people snore really loudly.
PAM: They do. Lot of apnea in my life.
DAN: Uh-huh.
PAM: Is this where our relationship has taken us? We're now finally getting around to discussing snoring?
DAN: We could finish this Gilmore Girls.
PAM: So, apnea. All kinds of sleep masks and mouth grips.
DAN: Really?
PAM: Not me, or stee. But [NAME WITHHELD] used to have night terrors.
DAN: Oh, my God. What does that mean?
PAM: It means he'd be like, "Zzzzzz....... AAAAAAUGH!!!!!!....Uh, uh, oh, oh, ummm....zzzzz."
DAN: I... I...(giggling)
PAM: But without that part in the middle where I was laughing. That was me, not him. I've never done an impression of night terrors before.
DAN: Do it again. It's hilarious.
PAM: Not at the time. Only now. This is the first time I've ever realized how funny it was. He'd just wake up from deep sleep, shout, try and punch something in the air, and then fall back asleep.
DAN: Oh, my God. And what did you do?
PAM: Try not to get hit. It didn't always work.
DAN: And then he tried to wear you as a hat?
PAM: More like that footage we've all seen of the man in bed chasing his wife because he thought she was a tiger.
DAN: Yikes. And I was just mad about loud sleeping keeping me up.
PAM: My dad was one of those snorers who was in full denial, so we'd tape record him snoring in his chair and play it back and he'd accuse us of faking the tape.
DAN: My mom would snore so loudly that we'd smack the mattress right next to her, screaming, "STOP DOING THAT!" And she'd be terrified, sitting up going, "What? What's wrong? Who's dead?" And we'd feel bad for point three seconds that we'd just about given her a heart attack --
PAM: And then you'd laugh --
DAN: No, then we'd go into the other room. And then we'd laugh. And then she'd start snoring again.
PAM: One night Eric almost killed Chris. Five years ago, when we were driving out here, we were at a hotel in Albuquerque. It was the middle of the night and we'd been driving for like, eighteen hours that day in two different cars, and Chris was so loud. Eric jumped out of bed, grabbed his pillow, and stopped inches from Chris' face. I shouted, "You can't kill him, E." And he goes, "We're in a hotel room in the middle of nowhere, and nobody knows we're here, and most people don't even know he was coming with us to Los Angeles. We could kill him, leave his body here, and just keep going to California."

DAN: It's just so loud, everybody understands why you'd have to kill. Why is snoring so KKKHHHHAAAAAAAAAHHHHH?
PAM: My favorite is this one: KKKKHHHHAAAAAAAAAARRCH.... (smacking sounds)
DAN: Yes, what is that, with the smacking?
PAM: The snore's so damn good, they just start enjoying a little dream sandwich.
DAN: Dream sandwich!
PAM: Well, what would you call it?
DAN: I'm making everyone call it that. KHHAAAAAAAA... Little mustard and a pickle... KHAAAAAAHHH! Oh, and then there's this quieter snore: HHAAAAAaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhh. HHHHHAAAaaaaahhhhhhhh. I can almost sleep during that. But I'm still going to end up sleeping on the couch. With my hoodie for a blanket. And I'll be snoring tears.
PAM: And you want to say to the person, "You see, when we depict sleeping, we use the letter Z. There is no K, G, R or C-H in there. Make a Z sound. Make a Z!"
DAN: Nobody makes a Z sound.
PAM: You get so mad at them, even when it's apnea, which means that snoring sound is their bodies struggling to stay alive.
DAN: They're suffocating and you would rather they stopped breathing entirely.
PAM: Oh, the precious seconds when they've stopped breathing! Right when you can fall asleep. It's amazing how we know they need help, they can't breathe, and we're just like, "DAD! Fucking QUIT IT!" If he was on the kitchen floor struggling for breath, we'd administer CPR.
DAN: But if it's someone you love on your couch, or next to you in bed, you're like, hitting them, kicking them, jabbing an elbow in their sides.
PAM: "Fucking breathe or shut up!"
DAN: And don't you think at this point we'd be better than snoring? It's really very silly and leaves us quite vulnerable. You'd think we'd have evolved past that.
PAM: You're right. Our bodies have all these other ways to deal with air--
DAN: -- as an instinct. The sneeze.
PAM: When we need more air while we're awake, we yawn.
DAN: But no, when we sleep, our bodies just fight for life. "KKKHAAAAAGGGHHHHHAHHH!"
PAM: We need a new instinct.
DAN: It's so easy, too. All you have to do to not snore is go [ROLLS HEAD TO THE LEFT, TONGUE PROTRUDING] "Mmmllaaaah."
PAM: OH MY GOD.
DAN: Don't you think? "Mmmllaaaah."
PAM: I love the head turn. "Mmmllaaaah."
DAN: It's so gentle. Soothing. "Mmmllaaaah."
PAM: I love it.
DAN: I call it the Sleep Sneeze.
PAM: "Mmmllaaaah."
DAN: I employ it after I eat a Dream Sandwich. And you determine on what side of the bed you sleep based off of which way your partner faces to Sleep Sneeze.
PAM: How can we make it instinct? You've saved marriages and lives with this thing.
DAN: Maybe you just have to teach babies how to Sleep Sneeze and you'll grow up knowing.
PAM: No, it should be instinct. You'd have to start with newborns. Go wake up tiny, tiny babies and go, "Mmmllaaaah."
DAN: That will not work.
PAM: How did we get instincts before? All the stuff we have, like how babies have that monkey paw instinct?
DAN: It's weird that I know what you mean when you didn't really say anything at all just then.
PAM: That gripping instinct, they lose it after a certain point. Because we don't climb trees. And we develop instincts to keep us from dying, right?
DAN: I... don't know that we do that anymore. We seem pretty set in our human ways.
PAM: But snoring kills, Dan. It's what gives people heart attacks.
DAN: You are really passionate about this!
PAM: You've invented the cure to snoring!
DAN: Snoring really doesn't have to be so inefficient. And then everybody could just get some sleep.
PAM: Check it: "Mmmllaaaah."
DAN: It's pretty when you do it.
PAM: We have to tell everyone about this. We have to call sleep labs and brain clinics and --
DAN: Couch schools?
PAM: Shut up! I'm celebrating your genius.
DAN: Well, let's save the world tomorrow. Right now, I'm fixing to make myself a dream sandwich.

Posted by pamie at 9:18 AM