Day 18: An Assessment

Temporary bout of amnesia aside (I knew I jinxed it yesterday!), I think need a better plan. Or rather, a plan, of any sort, to replace my current nonexistent one. I've been stuck in a rut ever since snow trip, and this needs to change.

Major Development: I am considering the Everyman schedule.

What is the Everyman schedule?
The main difference between Uberman and Everyman is core sleep. That is, under Uberman, I should never sleep more than 20 minutes at a time. On an Everyman schedule, there is a core sleep (sometimes two) of at least 1.5 hours, in addition to naps throughout the day. It is based on the fact that one normal REM cycle is 90 minutes long. A monophasic sleeper getting 8 hours (really 7.5 hours) a night is getting 5 REM cycles. The idea is that a nap can replace a core sleep REM cycle, by compressing the non-REM stages of sleep. Everyman is the classification of any schedule between Uberman and biphasic that involves a multiple of 1.5 hours of core sleep, and the corresponding number of naps (4.5 hrs + 2, 3hrs + 3, or 1.5 hrs + 4).

Uberman vs. Everyman, a comparison
Uberman: more waking hours, more rigid schedule, more severe sleep deprivation to adapt, more difficult adaptation, shorter adaptation phase
Everyman: (the differences between this and Uberman grow more pronounced with longer core sleep/fewer naps) fewer waking hours, more flexible schedule, lighter sleep deprivation to adapt, easier adaptation, longer adaptation phase
One blogger who has done both (I forget which, but I think it was Puredoxyk), summed it up nicely: On Uberman, you adjust your life to fit your sleep schedule; on Everyman, you adjust your sleep schedule to fit your life.

Uberman or Everyman?
Other than satisfaction of curiosity, what I hope to get out of a polyphasic schedule is more awake time. We already know that once fully adapted, the quality of my waking hours should be equal to, if not greater than they were in high school or last quarter (I was chronically sleep-deprived in high school). But I want a few more hours, too, mostly in my weekdays (I don't mind hibernating on weekends). I know that I can survive and be functional on about five hours of sleep on weeknights. I'd say, therefore, that totaling any more than four hours a day isn't worth it, because there wouldn't be an increase in waking hours. Thus, the Everyman schedules I'm considering at the moment are 1.5 hrs core + 4 naps (total sleep = 2 hrs, 50 mins) and 3 hrs core + 3 naps (total sleep = 4 hrs).
It appears that I have been unintentionally adapting to a 3 hr core + 4 naps schedule. Not quite Everyman (one nap too many), but just about. The easiest course of action at this point is just to cut one nap and finish adapting to this. But I don't want to settle for easier (never have, and never will). Recall that one of the main attractions of Uberman is its maximal efficiency. The only real appeal of the 3hr + 3 schedule is its flexibility; once adapted, I would be able to swing naps +/-1 hr, whereas on the 1.5hr + 4, I would only have +/-30 min leeway. Still, compared to Uberman, +/- 30 minutes is divine; the rigidity of the schedule is starting to wear on me. I think I'll wait until the end of week 3 (day 21) and see if the situation improves before I decide if I want to switch.