Ever wonder while your driving down the road just how many drivers around you might actually be asleep with their eyes open?

 I was reading a little blurp about MICROSLEEP.    Microsleep is a five to ten second episode where your brain is effectively asleep while you are otherwise up and about.  Microsleep can occur at any moment any where.  It can happen while your driving your car!!!  And in fact it does!!   And we keep hearing about cell phones.  We got some very dangerous conditions out on the highways.  Traffic on the streets is a very dangerous situation that requires alertness.  But a large number of people on the road are not alert due not getting enough rest.   They are experiencing this microsleep mode frequently as they drive.

 

Microsleep comes on a person while their eyes are wide open!!  Microsleep is the way the body attempts to compensate for under-sleeping.  IF one does not get enough sleep at night the body will throughout the day go into these brief 10 second moments of sleep.  This sudden drowsiness comes in waves.  One moment a person is alert the next they are drowsy and not knowing the difference. 

 

If one dares to think about it-it's frightening.   A tired bus driver with a full load of passengers headed down the highway going into microsleep mode repeatedly as he drives.  A truck driver going into mirosleep as his big rig is racing down hills hauling a load of hazardous chemicals.   Tired mothers transporting their babies!!!     The most common cause of this microsleep occurrence is lack of a good nights rest each night.        Please everyone try to get a good night sleep!!   If you can't try to find the reasons why.  Some may need to check with t doctor.   But for your safety and all those around you please get the needed rest. 

  Last blog entry I talked about the woman's handbag as an effective germ spreader.   Well that hand bag is not the only spreader of germs.  I only mentioned it because it was to me a surprise when I heard about it.   There are plenty of other ways to get contaminated with unwanted germs.   

 

 The only good defense against such an endless attact by the disease bearing type of the microbes is to adopt a few defensive practices.  Here are a couple of them:

 

 1.)   Experts now like say that washing one's hands a few times a day is not enough.   THey now tell us it needs to be twenty times a day!    Now I don't know it that is allways necessary.   Seems hands could end up looking like dried raisins.    I suppose also it depends on how much your hands are exposed.  One has to use some common sense here and perhaps get a good moisturizing hand lotion for after washing then can put moisture back into the skin.   One thing is for sure he hands touch a lot a germ infested surfaces during the day.  Door knobs,  telephones, shopping carts, money,  shaking hands with people who don't wash there hands when they should, the list is long.   So washing hands very frequently is important.

 

 2.) Disinfecting surfaces under our control is important.   This can be done safely and effectively.  In Japan they found that when bacteria was exposed for 30 seconds to a water with a pH of 2.5 that  99 % of the bacteria died.       Interestingly a few drops of vinegar in a cup of water will lower the ph that low.   So you see your grandmother was applying old wisdom when she used vinegar to wipe down the kitchen table.  It was not just an old custom.  It really does something.   Just put about a table spoon of white vinegar in a cup of water and then put that in a small atomizing spray bottle.    Then just spray this atomized vingear water on a surface.  The low 2.5 pH (acid) will kill the bacteria.  The spray bottle must be an atomizer type. 

 

The reason for the atomizer is that it of course atomizes the water into a very very fine mist so that the surface sprayed is covered well.  This is important   A regualar spray makes too big of dropplets that do not cover all the surface.    In japan they use an ionized low pH water to disinfect resturaunt kitchen surfaces and in some hospitals the are using it now.   Being ionized increases the effectiveness.     It's safe for humans and it kills baceria very effectively.    Of course cleaning a surface is very important as well.   So first clean the surface then after cleaning a surface then a spray of atomized 2.5 pH water on it can kill the bacteria left behind.  

 

By the way, computer key boards are very big source of germs.  Especially if shared with more than one user.    A Q tip and some rubbing alcohol works well to clean and disinfect.  Alcohol draws moister out of an microbe and it dies.   They die from a quick dehydration.    Yes even the microbe world needs water to live.  Alcohol takes that away.  Rubbing alcohol also emulsifies the oils that are on you key board.   The oils came from you skin.  So just dip the Q tip into a very small amount of rubbing alcohol and then use the tip to wipe around and on the keys.   Be careful not drip any down into the inside of the key board.   Nice thing about the alcohol is it evaporates quickly which again pulls water from bacteria killing them.   Powerful stuff.  One can clean telephones in the same way.   Remember to be careful to not inhale the vapors of isopropl alcohol or get too much on your skin.  It drys your skin out just like it does bacteria.   And it's bad for you body to inhale isopropl alcohol vapors.  Also don't work with it close to any source of heat or else POOOOFFFFF- bacteria will be the least of your worries.    

 

So you can defend your self from the exposure to all these bacteria covered surfaces you touch each day.  Not a hundred percent  of the time but still enough to reduce your chances of getting a stomach bug or nasty cold at those times it could  be avoided.