Englewood Cliffs, NJ

I couldn't wait to get out of Taipei. I don't know if Taipei has gotten toxic for me, but I was anxious and stressed and just didn't feel well, and things hadn't been that much better in the weeks leading up to leaving this past Tuesday. It's possible that alcoholism is coming to a head. I could feel my body reacting differently to alcohol. Maybe more intolerant, maybe something else.

True to script, it started pouring rain right when I was planning to leave for the airport, but actually everything turned out fine. I caught a cab quick when someone was dropped off right where I was waiting for one, and then I was just able catch the airport bus. Smooth, but not necessary as I had plenty of time.

The flight was hellish getting a feeling several times that I "wasn't going to make it". Not sure what that meant. Pressure in my gut typical of gut problems that have become regular in Taiwan. Then it would ease off and I'd think I'd be fine if it stayed that way.

Overall the whole travel had its hitches but I finally got to where I needed to, albeit an hour and a half late. But an hour and a half late on travels that felt too long from the start.

The gut issues continued for maybe the next day and a half and then completely abated. The weather here is just God's country compared to the blast furnace heat of Taiwan. I was so sick of looking at daytime temps in Taiwan reading: temperature 93 degrees; feels like 103. Here it's: temperature 83.6; feels like 84. The first night I was lying in bed with the windows open, listening to the crickets, a light breeze caressing me, I felt like I was in the countryside.

I didn't sleep at all on the 14 hour flight. The times when I was so exhausted that I lapsed into sleep lasted only seconds and would increase my body temperature uncomfortably to the point that I would avoid even the respite those lapses kinda held.

Sleep continued to elude me for several days. Just quick lapses for very short periods before I'd wake up, and they quickly started becoming accompanied by vivid and stressful if not violent dreams that were increasingly full of foreboding and dread. I started being jarred awake or wrest myself out of them.

Periods of sleep increased slowly and the dreams started taking on apocalyptic qualities; serious end of the world, but as a cosmic math equation! Mind you other than these concepts, I remember absolutely zero details. The lack of recall was almost immediate upon waking. There may have been a fraction of a second of recall, but then even that dissolved even if I tried to hold onto them.

I'm still having some issue with body temperatures. As sleep times increased to over an hour, I'd be waking in cold sweats or I'd pull a blanket on and boil or throw them off and start freezing. Early on I'd wake up shaking (not shivering) for a while, but I think that had more to do with the near complete sleep deprivation at the time.

After realizing how much worse I was feeling before and after alcohol while I was still in Taipei, I have been cutting back while here. I toyed with the idea of going cold turkey, but that's not really realistic. The plan is to dole out shots and not drink freely. I don't expect that to hold all the time, though.