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Oono WeekIl'imes,WeesaDcmr16198-I) Arthur Black I THINK I'LL SLEEP ON IT I love sleep because it is both pleasant and safe to use... sleep is, death without the responsibility. Fran Lebowi tz Well, who doesn't like sleep? t is Nature's narcotic. A chance to slip the bonds of the work-a-day world and nes- tle in the bosomn of sweet obliv- ion. Unfortunately, like most narcotîcs, it can be habit-form- ing. In the case of an unlucky few -- extremely habit-formning. There's even a medical name for sucli a condit ion. People addicted to sleep are said to be suffering from Oblomov Syndrome. The name comes from Ilya Ilyich Oblomov, a character in a Russian novel who suddenly quits lis job, says good-bye to his famiily and . ..goes to bed. For the rest of his life. Oblomiov was a creation of fiction, but the condition is appallingly real, and no respecter of one's status in life. Doctor Herbert Sieveking was a successful physician and the founder of the Victorian Hospital in Cairo, but he spent the last seven years of his life in bed. Why? Because, he said, he.was simply "fed up with buttoning and unbutton- îng.", Oblomov Syndrome can strike without warning. Twenty years ago this month, a man by the naine of Presley Bishop came, home from work in Littleton, Colorado. Confessing to feeling "a tad depressed" he laid down for a nap. He was still there three years later, having lost nearly 40 kilo- grams,' grown a beard down to bis navel and wom a hole right through his mattress. Bishop got out of bed, but only because his sister called the cops -- and just long enough to check hîm- self into a nursing home. As far as 1 know he's still there. In bed. He'll have toý do a lot more sack time to match the record of another Oblomov Syndrome sufferer, Hilda Matthews., Hilda, an English, teenager,, went upstairs for a snooze in 1934. She was still up there when she died, fifty years later. She spent a haif a century in one roomn. ýýTwo years before Hilda put her hiead on her, pillow a Russian girl, also living in England, came down with a slight case of the 'fiu. Her doc- tor toldher to stay in bed until hie returned to check on her. She dutifull-y complied and waited for the doctor to return. another doctor seven months to get the victim back on her feet. The ali-time Oblomov Syndrome record-holder? That dubio.us honour faîls to yet another Englishwoman (what is it about England -- the weath- er? Prince Charles?) who took to her bed after her father refused her permission to marry a local bloke. That would have been in the suffimer of 1845. The woman died in'her bed -- without hav- ing left it -- near the end of World War 1 -- seventy-two years later. The most famous victim of Oblomov Syndrome? Florence Nightingale, believe it or flot. The Lady 0f the Lamp was a fitful sufferei who, 1between bouts of feveflsh activity, hit the sack for exipnded perîods of time. She did this frequently over the last flfty years of her I ife. 1 know hoW she feels. 1 had a brush with the syndrome back in my high sehool days. During Easter Break one year 1 was so termintliy bored 1 situ- ply went to beti -- and coulIdn't think of a single reason to get up again. Fotufately for me, two and a haif tlays in the hori- zontal position proved to be even more borIflg than the ver- tical alternative, so Igot up. But I suppose Oblomov Syndrome could strike at any time. In the middle of a long, Canadian winter, say, with the prospect of watching and lis- tening to Joe Clark or Jean Chretien or a hockey game between the Nashville Predators and the Carolina Hurricanes. Phew. Ail this writing has me tuckered. Think l'Il go and: lie down for awhile. *Complete Car & Truck Repairs eDiesel Engines a Cummins, Detroit & Cat. a Radio Dis patched Tow Trucks a eMobile Mechanical Service Trucke R.R. 1, Orono LOB 1iMO (905) 983-9151 4 Miles North of Hwy 401 on NEWCASTLE FUNERAL HOMIE 'Tunera(qDirector -Carf Good * Personal, professional, affordable service. Genesis Bereavement Resource Centre on-site to serve the community. Informative funeral home tours are welcome. 386 Mili Street South, Newcastie Oiust nordI of1401 -~oParkig off 9pert.sftuet) (905) 987-3964