My husband snores. My dogs bark at animals that come too close to the house at night. Owls are loud. All of it wakes me up. I still manage to sleep but it’s often irritating sleep. So I was thrilled to try out the cute, cozy Sleep Phones ($40 in black, grey, or lavender.)

It’s a simple idea: A fuzzy head wrap with earphones built in. Connect it to a smart phone, iPod, or whatever you have. (There is a wireless version for $100, too. I tried the wired ones.) So it plays whatever sounds you choose to calm you into a blissful slumber and block out the all the sounds that might wake you. It works. I snoozed right through all the usual disturbances when I wore it at home. And it was even better when I was traveling. It’s a comfy way to block out airplane noise. And, if you don’t mind sliding the wrap over your eyes, too, it serves double duty as an eye mask. On a plane a caught a few winks. In a hotel, it brought familiar sounds instead of the unfamiliar and made sleeping easy. Unlike earplugs, I can hear things if I want to. It just moves the sounds to the background.

So, mission accomplished. And the solution wasn’t even expensive. (Especially since the company sent me a pair to try.)

But these cute little ear pajamas went a step further and  opened up a new area of listening choice for me. What is the best thing to listen to while sleeping, I started to wonder? The company offers an iPhone app that plays calming sounds like the ocean or restful tunes. But it got me wondering about language tapes, audio books, dream-altering music and stories. Could I enhance my dreams? Teach my subconscious Icelandic? I have only just begun my exploration of sleep listening but I will say this: Listening to James Joyce’s Ulysses while asleep delivered amazing dreams. I slept soundly but when I woke felt as if I had traveled into a strange version of Dublin. It very much made me want to listen to Joyce’s Finnegan’s Wake while sleeping. That book is notoriously difficult for the waking mind to grasp as it designed to represent the thought processes of the nighttime mind. Would my sleeping mind enjoy that? Unfortunately I could not find a recording of it. My search continues.

When I’m busy, I rely on my smart phone. So it’s always on a super busy day, that it decides to start demanding a charge at around dinner time. But I don’t want to stop and charge it. I want to take photos. I want to make phone calls.  I want directions. I want to use that time while I’m waiting for my daughter to finish her tennis lesson to catch up on the emails I’ve been ignoring all day. Or I want to use it to tether my tablet to my smart phone’s Internet connection to some of that. So I am a huge fan of the in-purse backup battery. At the moment, I am sporting this adorable iGO Power Trip 4700 ($60) in purple.

When my battery starts to die, I get it out, plug my phone into it and keep on going. It’s a cute personal accessory and it doesn’t tie me to a power outlet.

Bonus: If I am out with friends — or my two teens — and someone starts lamenting a dying phone, I can be the picture of grace, preparedness, and good manners and plug their phone into my battery. There will plenty of power left for my gear.

Tip: The iGo Portable Battery 4700 is cheaper in black at TheNerds. Click on this link to see.
 

I have two teenagers. And sometimes I walk away from conversations with them wondering if one of us insane. My daughter has become known for her proclamation, “I am supposed to act crazy! I’m a teenager.” Is all the crazy just drama then? I do know that this is a phase like many others that preceded it and that they will eventually grow out of it. It’s hard to remember that because they look so much like adults. It seems like they are done and should be acting like adults. So I enjoyed spending a few minutes with the graphic above — from the folks who inspired me to write this post as well — for a reminder on where all that crazy is really coming from.