You can keep your hat on

The problem is twofold, snoring and dampness. On a sailing boat the cabins are small and if chance has it you might land it a cabin with a mighty snorer. It is usually big men on their backs that can snore up a storm.

You just might get to sleep if the snoring is as regular as a cross-cut saw. If it has a rythme to it, you can imaging a clock ticking, or sheep jumping over a hurdle, and you just might be shepheded ito the sweet pastures of slumberland.

But if the snoring is vaugely reminicent of a misfiring motor bike which keeps having intermitant backfires then you are kept awake listening for the engine to run smoothly. It never does. At its worse the engine stalls and there is complete silence, and you wait and wait, wondering If it is going to kick into life again, and of course it does just when you are begining to doze off. I bought earplugs to help me get to sleep, but they kept falling out, and hence were of little use.

On the night after the storm we walked in the village of Poros, and I wore my wollen hat. We went into a resturant and I took off my wooly hat and I imediately felt cold. Someone said to me that 50% of the body heat is lost through the head, so I put the hat on and felt much warmer.

Now the beds in the cabin were damp after the storm and I had difficulty getting to sleep because of the cold and dampness, so I decided to put on my hat to see if I would feel any warmer, and it did seem to help, and in addition with the hat pulled well down over the ears, it stopped the ear-plugs from falling out.

So the wooly hat solved three problems for me. It kept me warn, It stopped my ear-plugs from falling out, and it added extra soundproofing so I was able to ignore the snoring and get some sleep.

Now here is a poem that mentions sleeping snoring and moorings

Being Boring

If you ask me 'What's new?',
I have nothing to say
Except that the garden is growing.
I had a slight cold but it's better today.
I'm content with the way things are going.

Yes, he is the same as he usually is,
Still eating and sleeping and snoring.
I get on with my work.
He gets on with his.
I know this is all very boring.

There was drama enough in my turbulent past:
Tears of passion-I've used up a tankful.
No news is good news, and long may it last.I
f nothing much happens, I'm thankful.
A happier cabbage you never did see,
My vegetable spirits are soaring.
If you're after excitement,
steer well clear of me.
I want to go on being boring.

I don't go to parties. Well, what are they for,
If you don't need to find a new lover?
You drink and you listen and drink a bit more
And you take the next day to recover.
Someone to stay home with was all my desire
And, now that I've found a safe mooring,
I've just one ambition in life:
I aspireTo go on and on being boring.

— Wendy Cope If I Don't Know (Faber & Faber)