Consumer Reports

Have you ever hiked along the Appalachian Trail ? This National Scenic Trail is within a day’s drive of two-thirds of the U.S. population, and four million people hike it each year. At 2,175 miles, it’s one of the country’s longest trails, going through 14 eastern states. It mostly winds atop the Appalachian Mountain range, which are among the oldest mountains on earth. While 40 percent of the trail is on National Park Service lands, it goes through more than 75 different federal and state forests and park lands. Like many people who have hiked on this legendary trail, I have had some pretty memorable experiences on it. I’ll never forget camping with my husband off the Appalachian Trail in Shenandoah National Park in Virginia. There we were in the remote mountain woods, 3,000 feet above sea level, listening to a quiet radio while setting up camp for the night. “How nice to get away from it all,” I thought. I was really amused, then, when a commercial for my workplace— USA.gov —came on the radio. A few weeks ago, my husband and I, with our toddler in a carrier, were hiking the Appalachain Trail in the Catoctin Mountains in Maryland. We were fortunate to encounter two of the hundreds of people each year who attempt to hike the entire trail from Georgia’s Springer Mountain to Maine’s Mount Katahdin. The hikers had just celebrated passing through Harper’s Ferry , West Virginia, which is the trail’s halfway point. Apparently it takes five to six months to hike the entire trail, so these guys had been hoofing it for at least a couple of months already. Because the Appalachian trail is mostly atop a mountain range, there are many spectacular views on and off the trail. I’ll never forget seeing the hazy New York skyline off the Appalachian Trail on Bear Mountain in New York. But the best view I’ve had is the 360-degree view from the Washington Monument. Yes, there is a Washington Monument in Maryland’s Appalachian Mountains! The stone structure was erected by local citizens in 1827. Last month, Jess blogged about National Trails Day, created to encourage people to get out and explore trails. Have you hit the trails this year? Have you been on the Appalachian Trail?

The other night, I was awake the whole night. I haven’t had a night like that in a long time, but it reminded me of my past issues with insomnia . I was pretty young when it dawned on me that I didn’t have the same sleeping patterns as my sisters. I had frequent episodes of getting very little, or no, sleep 3-4 times a week. While my sisters were sleeping, I was awake for hours thinking, thinking, thinking. I would think about happy things, things that worried me, or sometimes I would ponder world problems. One night I didn’t want to eat my stew. My mom told me that children were starving in Africa and they would love to have that stew. I stayed awake the whole night thinking about it. I was only 8, but it seemed impossible to me that anyone would want to eat my mom’s stew… no offense Mom! I spent the rest of the night plotting how I could send those kids my stew. Around 3:30 am, I came up with the idea of borrowing my dad’s thermos on Friday night and, when my parents weren’t looking, filling it with the stew. I could take it to the post office on Saturday to mail it to those hungry, African kids. As long as they got the thermos back to me by Sunday night, my parents would never know. Around 4:30 am, I figured out I could probably ship them my mom’s liver, spinach, and beets too! My parents would take us to drive-in movies. While my sisters were zonked out after the first movie, I secretly watched the rest of the movies with my folks. One movie had zombies in it. The zombies roamed around at night and they didn’t sleep. Hey, that was my problem! Oh no, I was becoming a zombie! Of course, zombies also had sharp teeth and ate people, but I figured it was just a matter of time before I started snacking on arms and legs. For a while, I spent sleepless nights not only pondering those hungry, African children, but feeling my teeth to see if they were becoming pointy. Despite the fact that I outgrew my zombie fears, to this day, I still have this mental association with sleep disorders and being a zombie. These sleepless episodes followed me into adulthood. At some point I understood that I was experiencing insomnia. I read up on insomnia and tried various things to help myself. Nothing really seemed to help. I signed up for a relaxation class and was surprised to discover that it helped me a little, but the truth is that the “real cure” for my insomnia was… to develop severe sleep apnea . Yeah, isn’t that a kicker? I no longer had trouble falling asleep, but while I was sleeping, I would stop breathing 100s of times a night. In order to keep living, I had to wake myself up to breathe. Oddly, I didn’t even know that this was happening to me. It took me years to get a sleep apnea diagnosis, but eventually I got help. Sleep disorders impact a person’s life in many ways and they are quite dangerous to have. If you suspect that you or a loved one may have a sleep disorder, you may want to check out these additional resources: Brain Basics: Understanding Sleep How Much Sleep Do You Need How Well Are You Sleeping Insomnia Podcast Restless Leg Syndrome Sleep Studies Sleep Walking Teacher’s Guide: Information About Sleep

When I was in college, students, who had a little too much to drink, were always pulling the dorm fire alarms in the middle of the night and then running off. These alarm pranks had become a real problem in my dorm and seemed to be happening weekly. I considered myself lucky that I lived on the ground floor and sometimes I would be a little slow evacuating my room. I assumed it was always just another prank. I had a friend in the dorm who took the fire alarm very seriously and she would come bang on the door to make sure we were getting up and going outside. She became upset with my slacker attitude about evacuating my room every time the fire alarm went off. I found out why. She lost 2 brothers in a house fire. Her family lived out in the country on a farm, and frequently used a space heater during the winter. Her parents woke up in the middle of the night to flames and smoke. They were able to get my friend and her sisters out of the house, but the little boys were upstairs in a back bedroom and fire blocked the way. Her father had loaned his ladder to a neighbor, so when he couldn’t get up the stairs, he ran outside to their bedroom window in an attempt to get the boys to jump out the window. The boys were afraid and wouldn’t jump. Her father ran to the neighbor’s house to get the ladder, but by the time he got back, the heat and flames kept him from getting into the bedroom. The fire department came, but it was too late. The boys’ bodies were found huddled together in the closet. Across the country, stories similar to this one happen all too frequently. In the District of Columbia alone, 9 people died in home fires in January of 2009. January and February are typically the busiest months of the year for firefighters. Firefighters will tell you that a small fire can become an out of control fire within minutes. Plan ahead and practice escape routes with every member of your family. Knowing what to do and doing it quickly can save your family. Check out these resources and learn more about preventing home fires, steps to take to survive a fire, and what to do to after a fire: FEMA’s Fire Hazards FireSafety.gov Saftey Tips: Winter Fires U.S. Fire Administration’s Website