Last night, I found myself lying in bed waiting for sleep to arrive. As the minutes turned into hours, I began to realize that the Sandman had forgotten to stop by my house. Hey, we all make mistakes so I'm not holding a grudge against the guy. He has a very stressful job. He's held the position longer than any of us have even been alive. It must be hard times, because I've been seeing a lot of commercials for sleep-inducing medications as of late. Maybe he should try advertising--just a thought, one of the many I had in between tosses and turns last night.

Before it got so late that my helplessness was self-acknowledged, I started thinking about all the home remedies I've heard through the years. The first one that came to my mind grossed me out; the one where you drink warm milk. Who does that? That sounds so horrible. And then there's the thing about turkey. Everyone's heard that there's chemical in turkey that supposedly makes you sleepy. The chemicals name is Tryptophan and this chemical is related to sleepiness; however, there is not nearly enough of it in turkey to induce the alleged effect. We just have a hard time admitting on Thanksgiving Day that we practically chugging brown gravy and eating pie with our fingers. It's the overindulgence that makes you sleepy, not the turkey.

Now, let's get back to my restless night. I may have been burning the midnight oil against my will, but I was using my time wisely. With the little knowledge I learned in my college intro-level Psychology course, I had an idea that would help me to never fall pray to sleep deprivation again. It works on the same principles that Pavlov used in his classical conditioning experiments with a dog.

Probably like most of you, I feel the strongest urge to fall asleep as soon as my alarm clock goes off. I know this because every alarm clock in the world has a snooze button, even my cell-phone. What are some things that I could use to condition myself to be as sleepy when I go to bed as I am when I wake-up? The alarm clock was ruled out pretty quickly. The annoyingly bright morning-sun was too. Then it hit me: morning breath! No matter where I wake-up--whether it's at home, on a couch, in a bed, on the floor, or even a park bench--morning breath is sure to follow. I'm suggesting that if a company contained that stuff in some sort of a spray or maybe even a morning breath nightcap, then we could put the sandman and all those sleeping pill companies out of business for good.

I can see it now: (with Hit the Road, Jack playing in the background) the sandman comes peeking in a window to put someone to sleep and out of the nightstand they pull out Morning Breath. Then a voice-over says, "Morning Breath: were putting the Sandman out of commission..."