For the past…. I don't know, several years now, I've been trying to find the ideal sleep monitoring/tracking system.

I've used apps like "Sleep Cycle", "Sleepbot" and "Sleep as Android" (which I'm currently using) to track my sleep, but I really don't like having to sleep with my phone next to me. Due to weird sleep behavior (mainly, I'm afraid I'll throw my phone across the room in my sleep), I place the phone under my fitted sheet so I need to work to get at it. This is a bit annoying every night, and in the morning when the alarm goes off (I use "Sleep as Android"'s smart alarm feature, so I'm usually awake or close to it when the alarm goes off, but it's still a hassle).

I tried using a cheap fitness tracker (the tracker itself was a disaster, but an entirely separate topic that I may post about later), but in the end, I kept envisioning creating a monitor/tracker that would stay on the bed.

Yesterday the Luna appeared on Indiegogo. It's a mattress topper that is basically what I wanted to create, and then some. It doesn't just track sleep based on movement, but also heart rate and respiration. It's wifi enabled, so I don't have to worry about manually syncing data or pushing buttons. It will also interface with all the smart light bulbs and thermostats that I don't have. The only thing I'm not a big fan of is that it acts as a heating pad, but that can be turned off (it does increase the cost for a feature I don't need though.

It's not cheap though. The "early bird" option is $179 for a full size mattress topper, but for the next 24-ish hours there's a VIP option that knocks a whole $10 (gasp!) off of that. You can check out the Indiegogo campaign at: http://igg.me/p/luna-turn-your-bed-into-a-smartbed/x/9742568

You know what's stupid? Biting your tongue so hard in your sleep that you wake yourself up.

Do you know what's even stupider? Doing it several times in the last month.

Ow! This is not something I want to see develop into a habit.

When morning rolls around, I don't think that there's anything that I despise more at that moment than the sun. It's like an alarm clock without a snooze button, and because of it I've been waking up between 5:30-6am every day for the last few days. It also doesn't help that I'm sleeping in an unfamiliar room. I just want to sleep until 7ish – 6:45am would be nice and give me plenty of time to get ready for work.

What I really want is a way to automatically control the amount of sunlight that makes it into my room that early in the morning. There are a few ways I could do this.

The easiest system would be to just completely block my windows and rely on my internal clock and an alarm clock to wake up at the right time. Unfortunately, I'm the type of person that will stare at a clock for an hour if I wake up too early just so I don't get jarred out of my sleep from an alarm. Which brings up the other obvious fault with this – alarms are a horrible way to wake up.

Another way that I've toyed around with in my head is to block out the windows like with the last idea, and create a light system that will go from off to completely on gradually over a given time period. The idea is to create an artificial sunrise on your own schedule, allowing you to wake up more naturally. The problem? Light and sunlight just aren't the same thing, and while it may be easier on the body than a horrible buzzer or radio turning on, the body won't react to it quite like it would to sunlight. Also, who really wants to have their windows covered all the time?

So what does that leave? Computer controlled window blinds. The system would be similar to the artificial sunrise idea, except rather than dimming lights, the system would slowly open the blinds. Besides the coolness of having things move on their own, this could be practical for other applications. For instance, if it were coupled with a couple temperature sensors, all the blinds in your house could close automatically during the hot summer days to prevent your home from getting crazy-hot – saving money and energy on air-conditioning.

I didn't sleep worth (insert the most offensive word you can think of) last night. There was less than a 2 hour span between the time that my eyes last looked at my clock and when I woke up to one of the most impressive rains I've ever seen.

I tried to fall back to sleep, but curiosity and some bizarre interest in watching rain prevented me from doing so. When the rain was at its strongest, I don't think I could even see 5 feet out my window. It was beautiful, loud, and not sleep.

I had a dream last night that I had a beautiful girlfriend and was completely happy. And then I woke up to a shocking reality – I really do have a beautiful girlfriend, and I really am happy. And I want a fedora.