What is your sleep like?
Sunny Side Updates with TBIN || Week 38
Sleep has been such a fascinating topic to me that in undergrad, I took quite a few courses spanning different disciplines (e.g., psychology, physiology, etc.) just to learn more about this interesting phenomenon.
Part of the fascination comes from just being someone who, uncharacteristic for the modern world or my generation, sleeps quite a lot. I’ve always clocked 8–10 hours, even in undergrad.
It wasn’t until grad school, when I ran my first series of sleep labs with EEG (e.g., monitoring sleep waves through placing electrodes all over your head). I had one supervisor joke about how sleep researchers all had poor sleep, which is why they study it in the first place.
Ironically, this is the reason why I shifted to another research topic — I just loved sleep too much to lose sleep. Sure, at the beginning it was nothing to pull all-nighters to gather information about how someone else slept, but I certainly couldn’t do it now — there’s just too much of a toll on my body.
That era of my research aside, sleep is still fascinating to me, and I like to read books about it, discuss it with people all the time.
Which brings me to this week’s survey question & shortform prompt: What is your sleep like?
The results of these responses will be released with next week’s newsletter / Sunny Side Updates!
Shortform Theme of the Week
This week’s shortform theme is: Sleep! What is your sleep like? How has your relationship with sleep changed over your life? Do you nap? Do you feel like you get enough sleep?
Submit your shortform piece (<150 words) now to share your thoughts! (For prompt-based pieces, you may exceed the 150 word limit, but aim for 150 words if the idea of a longer piece overwhelms you!)
This is just a guideline for inspiration! You may submit shortforms related to other concepts if other ideas come to you! :)
📈 Survey Results from Last Week
Last week, I asked: Do you want to write a book one day?
You answered:
It’s so interesting that no one definitively declined the idea of ever writing a book, and that’s so interesting to me!
✍ July Interview Challenge
Come join me in the monthly interview challenge! In this challenge, I’ll give you 5 reflection questions, 5 “name your faves” and 5 “prompts” to promote your articles!
Excited to get to know you as writers and overall cool human beings!
This challenge ( #July2021TBINInterview ) is open from now until July 31, 2021.
🌠 Ongoing Adventure Fiction Series!
I’ve finally launched a project that my child self has always wanted to do: create a collaborative never-ending story with branch-offs into multiple different storylines!
I’m so excited to see what direction this story will take so please don’t be shy on submitting!
Here is chapter 1!
The Brain is a Noodle*
*This is factually incorrect. Please absolutely do not go out and eat brains.
🍜 Piping Hot New(dle) Pieces of the Week
Challenge: *highlight* the ones you bookmarked/ read and make sure everyone gets highlighted at least once! ❤
🧠🍜 [1] RIP Unfortunate Foodie by Jennifer McDougall ‘Ridiculous word = gravicheesedeath’
🧠🍜 [2] Cooking Rice by Laurie Perez ‘The Chinese character, 氣 Qi has evolved over time into its modern form. An early, artistic pictograph conveyed the image of steam rising from a pot of rice cooking on the boil.’
🧠🍜 [3] Moonboy I by Luke DeLalio ‘Moonboy was still in diapers when we discovered him staring up at you, and then he became moonboy’
🧠🍜 [4] So You Want To Know More About Me — #2 June by Giulia ‘I have tons of ideas, but I’m not properly good at keeping up with them. Reading, news, tv, chats with friends, sudden thoughts… they all contribute to stories.’
🧠🍜 [5] Weather Gods have spoken by Warren Brown ‘The weather Gods have once again spoken, As the watered earth is deeply soaking. The spell of dryness and heat is broken, A gift of rain is a heavenly token.’
🧠🍜 [6] Life Lessons, Culture, Writing, Inspiration by Niru ‘I love Interview Questions- it’s fun, forces reflection and contemplation; raises self-awareness, and personally, makes me feel like a celebrity! (How’s that for honesty?!)’
🧠🍜 [7] My Third Book Will Be About Dance by Bingz Huang ‘Now, by making dance a daily habit, both as a workout and as an intuitive creative outlet, I’m finally feeling how nurturing, stress-relieving, and freeing this is. Dance carries so many different meanings for me.’
🧠🍜 [8] Thought Balloon by Luke DeLalio ‘Any morning you wake up alive is a hell of a lot better than a morning you wake up dead m’I’right?’
🧠🍜 [9] Sad Mouse Sonata by Luke DeLalio ‘Sad mouse of a man Drifting through the audience Alight with opinions and non-stop commentary’
🧠🍜 [10] The Inner Workings of My Creative Mind by Tarun Gupta ‘There is no one place where I get my ideas. I get ideas in all sorts of places. It is like my mind is always on autopilot to observe and capture ideas.’
🧠🍜 [11] June Interview Questions with The Brain is a Noodle by Sahil Patel ‘I talk to myself. Yes, you read it right. I talk to myself and it inspires me to write more. Positive self-talk encourages you. Appreciate yourself. Sometimes, I walk alone and always carry a journal with me so it can be easy for me to capture all those ideas.’
🧠🍜 [12] Survivor’s Guilt by O.M. Fernandes ‘Trickling out of me drop-by-drop Thoughts that cannot be stopped’
🧠🍜 [13] Little waves of laughter by Las siete y más ‘Do you have a child or a young nephew/niece?’
🧠🍜 [14] So… what do you want to know? by Ashlea Morgan ‘I think my writing “career” is just beginning. But, I’ll give myself the advice I’ve read everywhere: Stay consistent. Keep going. Writing is hard, but it’s a muscle that is worth working out. The more I do it, the better I’ll get.’
🧠🍜 [15] How Grey’s Anatomy Has Reminded Me About Breaking Ice And Mental Health? by Yan Huang ‘Give yourself a pat on your shoulder. You made it past 6 months of 2021 — a year of extreme summer heat, new virus mutants, and getting somewhat used to the new norm (or not). Not to mention, you and I also rode through the ups and downs of the series of changes here.’
🧠🍜 [16] July Q&A with The Brain is a Noodle by Rachella Angel Page ‘This is a step out of my comfort zone, which is something I’ve been exploring lately. Last month as part of my 20–20–30 challenge, I joined the publication The Brain is a Noodle and I’ve been enjoying reading and writing there.’
🧠🍜 [17] Poetry Shapes Me by Thalia Dunn ‘I grew up on hotdogs, hamburgers and Robert Louis Stevenson;’
🧠🍜 [18] If Your Life Expired Tomorrow — How Would You Taste it Today? by Emily Wilcox ‘Some snacks outlast others, some even taste better with age, but eventually the sun will implode and all life on Earth will cease to exist. Including that Saint Agur blue cheese spread in your fridge.’
🧠🍜 [19] Haystack Road by Anthony Jackson ‘William the farmer, that is he Expecting the return of his family But what a mess he has done The farm has turned into a haystack road’
🧠🍜 [20] Holidays- Traditions or Spirit by Niru ‘Celebrating a holiday You do or you do not. They are a binary fact. But what causes debates hot.’
🔊 Voices to Amplify
We don’t have to leave it to the algorithm to suggest our favourite pieces! Here are some of my archived faves!
Thank you to Maya L, M.A., Aditi Ramaswamy, Michael Burg, MD (AKA Medium Michael Burg), Sherry McGuinn and Jennifer Clinehens for these pieces!
The Eggcademic Corner
🥓 Quick brEGGfast Bites
What I’m watching: Still Grey’s Anatomy!
What I’m reading: on a reading hiatus :/
What I’m listening to: Playing with Fire by Blackpink
S🍳mething to chew over
🎊 Top 3 articles of the week
Celebrate with me!
😭 Flop 3 articles of the week
Give these a little love, will ya?
🧠🍜 Thank you to the Noodle Team!
challenge: pick 3 writers you haven’t met yet and get acquainted with their pieces!
New writers: O.M. Fernandes | Beth Nintzel | Barbara Dalton
George Cloake | Nhi Diep | Tarun Gupta | HerPrivateLife | Sohrab Khandelwal | Nerissa Talique | Gracia Kleijnen | Betsy Denson | KSHernandez | Luke DeLalio | Rachella Angel Page | Teressa P. | VV Valentine | Bhavya Mehta | Suntonu Bhadra | Noah Levy | Suzy Hazelwood | Ashlea Morgan | LS | Jessie Waddell | Dave Logan | Candy Marie | Himanshi B | Zihan | Elle How | K.S. | Sherry McGuinn | Diana Dee | Rambling Rose | Doran Lamb | Avi Kotzer | A.M. Radulescu | Laurie Perez | Paul Mansfield | B.R. Shenoy | Nada Chehade| Coco Joan | Bingz Huang | Shreya Badonia | Kimberly Carter | Las siete y más | Warren Brown | Trista Signe Ainswort | Kyomi O’Connor | Kay Bee | MaggieLaFae | Alex Godley | Haider Jamal | Josie Elbiry | Anthony Jackson | Hannah M. Moore | Michael Hollifield | Yana Bostongirl | TC Hails | Orla Kenny | Samedra Carter | Tatum Hamernik | Thalia Dunn | Nia Simone McLeod | Josie Elbiry | Keegan Roembke | Noorain Hassan, BMS | Humaira Iqbal | Zachary Burg | Bob Pepe | Will Hull | Jason | Courtenay S. Gray | Sahil Patel | Meenal Gupta | Amy Lee Kite | Evan Wildstein | Hilda Carroll | Chloe Hill | Paola Perez | Matt Ray | Wolfie Bain | Dena Ogden | Tasneem Kagalwalla | Yan Huang | Tree Langdon | Stuart Englander | Jennifer McDougall | Aaron Kemp | Rachel Ramkaran (she/her) | LS | Lori Welch Brown | Nicole Jiang | Crystalclearcandace | Em Unravelling | Jupiter Grant | Elle Beau ❇︎ | Suman Sandhu | Adam Deitsch | Mia Z. Edwards | David Majister | JF | Zach Neuman | Chris Mooney-Singh | Toya Qualls-Barnette | Karen Lappa Haas | Alan Henley | Michelle Bonfils | Zach Klebaner | Anna | Deepshikha Bhagat | Carlos Garbiras | Katrina Bos | Lisa Bolin | Sohaib Roomi | The Dozen | Malik Bellamy | Olivia Th | Shaista Malik | Emily Wilcox | Brajendra | Eva Rotolo | Bhavna Narula | Shannon Hugman | Ryan DeJonghe | Ryan DeJonghe | Dennett | Swagat Choudhury | Vivian | Mark Tulin | Arslan Mirza | Amber Carlson | Urfa | Whatsinanaim | Amy Pierovich, Ed.D. | Carolyn Riker | Tally | Shivangi Patel | Giulia | ScienceDuuude | Rachael Ann Sand | Divina Grey | Sarah Paris | DISHA GARG | Jen Kleinknecht | janny’s heart | Penofgold | Blank Voice | Kele Mogotsi | Jessie London | Indubala Kachhawa | Radhika Ghose | Mil H. | Zeno Faber | Maziar Ghaderi | Julia Appa | Campbell Christensen | Allison Gaines | Lori Lamothe | Tima Loku | Kim McKinney | Baye Amina | Tom Fenske | Johannes Mudi | Kasun Ranasinghe | Just a Slytherin hissing | Dr. Fatima Imam | Ntathu Allen | Somsubhra Banerjee | Veronica Georgieva | Life is Amazing with Books and Writers | Dandy Lioness 🌻 | Mindsmatter | Michael Ranjitsingh | Anjali Samaraweera | Krupesh Raikar | Rusty Alderson | Dr. Preeti Singh | Punch Drunk Cola | Melissa Speed | Ntathu Allen | Denise G | Carolyn Hastings | Tej | Vijini Mallawaarachchi | Amy Marley | Jac Gautreau | Erivaldo Ricardo | Roz Warren | Melissa Bee | Pretheesh Presannan | Daniel A. Teo | Anuradha Wickramarachchi | Niru | Priyanka Mane | Em Hoccane | Synthia S. | Alexandra Forsyth | R. Rangan PhD | Jacobo the First | Connie Song | Fathiyah Zb | Not quite Steve Fisher | Amna Asif | Aimée Gramblin | A Fresh Pot of Coffee | Rebecca Stevens A. | Imad | James G Brennan | Mary Keating | Jay Avery | h.a wadi | Pablo Pereyra | Isaac | jenine bsharah baines | Rochelle Silva | Jade-Ceres Violet D. Munoz | Ruchi Thalwal | Clare Almand | Dana Sanford | Naomi Leilani Acosta | Dr. Jackie Greenwood | Fathiyah Zb |
Ps, if any of these links are outdated, please leave a note to let me know!
🧠🍜 Join us at The Brain is a Noodle! 🧠🍜
Last but probably most important
Hop on the jumbo thread!