A revision of my previous position on that whole bedbug business
OK, you know what, I’m gonna have to analyze that old adage after all. I thought I could refrain from doing so, but I can’t. I’m just not that strong. I have to face the facts: I’m part of the problem, I will always be part of the problem, and I might as well accept that and try to work within the system.
At first I was puzzled as to how the people who made this saying thought we could stop the bloody bedbugs from biting us when we were already unconscious. Then I realized that the problem was that most adage analysts, myself included, had always focused on the final section “don’t let the bedbugs bite,” while virtually ignoring the “sleep tight,” assuming—incorrectly, as it turns out—that it served little purpose in the saying other than to provide a catchy rhyme. My friends, nothing could be further from the truth. Sleeping tight (i.e., inebriated) is in fact the key to the whole puzzle, and once we understand its true meaning, everything else falls into place.
Actually, the key to the whole puzzle is the sleep apnea that results from going to bed drunk; “sleep tight” is more of a clue that leads us to the key, like a note that says “The key’s under the doormat.” The doormat represents the rest of the saying, that’s keeping us from seeing the key, and it’s really my groundbreaking analysis of the adage that’s analogous to the note, which enables us to cut through the bullshit and see the key. So the next piece of the puzzle is the fact that bedbugs locate their prey by detecting carbon dioxide produced by the respiratory process, which you may recall was disrupted earlier by the alcohol-induced sleep apnea--but would that be the lock or the door?
OK, this whole thing is starting to unravel—let me start over. Sleep apnea, which prevents us from breathing, is the key, and “sleep tight” is still the note that leads us to the key, but now the key is inside the house, under a vase of flowers, and the note is a yellow sticky note on the fridge reminding us where we put the key, which makes a lot more sense, cause what kind of damn fool would go to the trouble of hiding a key under the doormat—which would be the first place a bedbug would look anyway—and then leave a note on the door telling where the key was. So now we’re all indoors except the bedbugs and “sleep tight” has reminded us that sleep apnea is under the vase of flowers, so we take sleep apnea out from under the vase and put it in the lock, which represents our breathing, thus preventing carbon dioxide emissions (the door) from opening, and with carbon dioxide emissions closed and locked, the bedbugs are stuck out in the front yard, so all they can do is go bite somebody else, or go to sleep themselves.
Oh, for God’s sake, I forgot the alcohol! I’m going to try one more time and if that doesn’t work I’m giving up. OK, so now “sleep tight” is the note that leads us to the alcohol, which is the key under the vase, and we use the alcohol to lock sleep apnea, which prevents carbon dioxide emissions from opening, thus keeping the bedbugs locked out in the front yard. (The whole distinction between breathing and carbon dioxide emissions was contrived to begin with—I had to do it because I had forgotten about alcohol and didn’t have anything left to be the door. This is much nicer.) Then we take alcohol out of sleep apnea and put it back under the vase, and finally we can go to bed (bed doesn’t represent anything—it’s a real bed) and get some sleep. I don’t know about you, but I am exhausted.
I blame myself for this oversight and all the needless suffering that has resulted from it; however, many adagologists who are less willing than I to accept personal responsibility for screwing up insist that the misdirection was intentional, and that this cryptic saying was the means by which a secret order of Bugnoscenti communicated their arcane knowledge to their followers around the world, while concealing its true meaning from the masses. The purported purpose of the deception was to protect this ruling elite from the deleterious effects of bedbug attacks, while keeping the general populace itchy, scratchy, sleepy, dopey and docile. For centuries, according to a paper recently published in American Adagology, “this Secret Order of Bugnoscenti has ruled over an obedient, phlebotomized population of insanguinary indolents, toiling zombie-like in the stinking moneypits for their pitiless puppetmasters.”
I don’t know, I think they’re being a bit paranoid, or maybe they’ve been hitting “the key” a little heavy, if you know what I mean. But even if such things were going on during the middle, old, bronze, or dark ages, nothing like that could happen now. Could it? I mean, who would go to that much trouble to get a bunch of pasty-faced, bug-chewed zombie minions when they could just buy modern, high-tech zombie computers for like a nickel apiece, that’ll toil in the stinking moneypits 24/7 as long as they have an internet connection.
Anyway, the joke’s on them, cause what we now know that the ancient Bugnoscenti didn’t, is that sleep apnea has been linked to high blood pressure, a major fear factor for heart disease and stroke, so probably you’d be better off to just let the darn bedbugs bite you and drain off a little of that blood. And it might not hurt to reevaluate your plans for world domination, which sounds like it would be very stressful, and would pump your blood pressure up even higher, and before you know it you’d just pop like a big red balloon.
Or you might prefer to go with leeches, which are enjoying the renewed interest of the medical community these days, and are so much more fashionable than bedbugs. They come in a wide variety of sizes and colors, so there should be no problem in finding a leech suited to your individual needs and decor. Medical-grade leeches have a low incidence of sexual side effects, as long as they are removed before the initiation of intercourse. So ask your doctor if leeches are right for you. Who knows, it may turn out that the bedbugs were right for you all along. Wouldn’t that be something, after all the trouble I’ve gone to?
Wow, we’ve really learned a lot here today, haven’t we? The one thing I hope everyone will take away from this session is that sometimes those hoary old saws are replete with a profound and timeless wisdom, even if they sound dumb as hell. This same principle applies to my writing, by the way, so keep your eyes peeled and perhaps you’ll be the first to discover the deeper hidden meaning (cryptonificance) in what at first glance might appear to be a pithless parcel of persiflage. Sorry, there’s no prize, just the personal satisfaction of a job well done. Hey, that’s more than I get out of it.
At first I was puzzled as to how the people who made this saying thought we could stop the bloody bedbugs from biting us when we were already unconscious. Then I realized that the problem was that most adage analysts, myself included, had always focused on the final section “don’t let the bedbugs bite,” while virtually ignoring the “sleep tight,” assuming—incorrectly, as it turns out—that it served little purpose in the saying other than to provide a catchy rhyme. My friends, nothing could be further from the truth. Sleeping tight (i.e., inebriated) is in fact the key to the whole puzzle, and once we understand its true meaning, everything else falls into place.
Actually, the key to the whole puzzle is the sleep apnea that results from going to bed drunk; “sleep tight” is more of a clue that leads us to the key, like a note that says “The key’s under the doormat.” The doormat represents the rest of the saying, that’s keeping us from seeing the key, and it’s really my groundbreaking analysis of the adage that’s analogous to the note, which enables us to cut through the bullshit and see the key. So the next piece of the puzzle is the fact that bedbugs locate their prey by detecting carbon dioxide produced by the respiratory process, which you may recall was disrupted earlier by the alcohol-induced sleep apnea--but would that be the lock or the door?
OK, this whole thing is starting to unravel—let me start over. Sleep apnea, which prevents us from breathing, is the key, and “sleep tight” is still the note that leads us to the key, but now the key is inside the house, under a vase of flowers, and the note is a yellow sticky note on the fridge reminding us where we put the key, which makes a lot more sense, cause what kind of damn fool would go to the trouble of hiding a key under the doormat—which would be the first place a bedbug would look anyway—and then leave a note on the door telling where the key was. So now we’re all indoors except the bedbugs and “sleep tight” has reminded us that sleep apnea is under the vase of flowers, so we take sleep apnea out from under the vase and put it in the lock, which represents our breathing, thus preventing carbon dioxide emissions (the door) from opening, and with carbon dioxide emissions closed and locked, the bedbugs are stuck out in the front yard, so all they can do is go bite somebody else, or go to sleep themselves.
Oh, for God’s sake, I forgot the alcohol! I’m going to try one more time and if that doesn’t work I’m giving up. OK, so now “sleep tight” is the note that leads us to the alcohol, which is the key under the vase, and we use the alcohol to lock sleep apnea, which prevents carbon dioxide emissions from opening, thus keeping the bedbugs locked out in the front yard. (The whole distinction between breathing and carbon dioxide emissions was contrived to begin with—I had to do it because I had forgotten about alcohol and didn’t have anything left to be the door. This is much nicer.) Then we take alcohol out of sleep apnea and put it back under the vase, and finally we can go to bed (bed doesn’t represent anything—it’s a real bed) and get some sleep. I don’t know about you, but I am exhausted.
I blame myself for this oversight and all the needless suffering that has resulted from it; however, many adagologists who are less willing than I to accept personal responsibility for screwing up insist that the misdirection was intentional, and that this cryptic saying was the means by which a secret order of Bugnoscenti communicated their arcane knowledge to their followers around the world, while concealing its true meaning from the masses. The purported purpose of the deception was to protect this ruling elite from the deleterious effects of bedbug attacks, while keeping the general populace itchy, scratchy, sleepy, dopey and docile. For centuries, according to a paper recently published in American Adagology, “this Secret Order of Bugnoscenti has ruled over an obedient, phlebotomized population of insanguinary indolents, toiling zombie-like in the stinking moneypits for their pitiless puppetmasters.”
I don’t know, I think they’re being a bit paranoid, or maybe they’ve been hitting “the key” a little heavy, if you know what I mean. But even if such things were going on during the middle, old, bronze, or dark ages, nothing like that could happen now. Could it? I mean, who would go to that much trouble to get a bunch of pasty-faced, bug-chewed zombie minions when they could just buy modern, high-tech zombie computers for like a nickel apiece, that’ll toil in the stinking moneypits 24/7 as long as they have an internet connection.
Anyway, the joke’s on them, cause what we now know that the ancient Bugnoscenti didn’t, is that sleep apnea has been linked to high blood pressure, a major fear factor for heart disease and stroke, so probably you’d be better off to just let the darn bedbugs bite you and drain off a little of that blood. And it might not hurt to reevaluate your plans for world domination, which sounds like it would be very stressful, and would pump your blood pressure up even higher, and before you know it you’d just pop like a big red balloon.
Or you might prefer to go with leeches, which are enjoying the renewed interest of the medical community these days, and are so much more fashionable than bedbugs. They come in a wide variety of sizes and colors, so there should be no problem in finding a leech suited to your individual needs and decor. Medical-grade leeches have a low incidence of sexual side effects, as long as they are removed before the initiation of intercourse. So ask your doctor if leeches are right for you. Who knows, it may turn out that the bedbugs were right for you all along. Wouldn’t that be something, after all the trouble I’ve gone to?
Wow, we’ve really learned a lot here today, haven’t we? The one thing I hope everyone will take away from this session is that sometimes those hoary old saws are replete with a profound and timeless wisdom, even if they sound dumb as hell. This same principle applies to my writing, by the way, so keep your eyes peeled and perhaps you’ll be the first to discover the deeper hidden meaning (cryptonificance) in what at first glance might appear to be a pithless parcel of persiflage. Sorry, there’s no prize, just the personal satisfaction of a job well done. Hey, that’s more than I get out of it.
posted by James Dandy at 2:44 PM
2 Comments:
You do realise that the phrase sleep tight actually refers to when ropes were used in place of box springs. Tight ropes would significantly impact the sleeping experience(no bondage jokes please).
Oh come on, Tracy! Surely you don't expect us to believe such a preposterous tale. Maybe you should seriously consider whether you really want to be part of the Conspiracy. Because I'm afraid you may not be Conspiracy material. I wouldn't be surprised if the Conspiracy Executive Committee was meeting in closed session to review your membership even as we speak, or as I type. You still have time to save face by resigning and pretending that it's you who are disillusioned with them.
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