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ASMR The New Way to Fall Asleep

The word is ASMR

Autonomous sensory meridian response

Lick, lick, paw over nose. Repeat until nose is clean

More licking, 

paw behind ear, 

repeat until ears are pristine.

Lick, lick, pink rasping tongue across every inch of fur, 

Lick, lick nibble and chew

and purr 

purr 

purr

I'm sinking into the gentle rhythm of the licking and purring, eyes closed as Njinsky, commonly known as Jinx, stretches out each back leg, nibbling and licking along the entire length of one leg, then the other, until he's satisfied that each little whisper of fluff has been scrubbed clean with his raspy little pink tongue.

I read somewhere that the tongue of a lion is as rough as sandpaper. A lion could lick the skin off a human, if it wanted to did you know that? I imagine just eating you would work just as well, for the lion I mean.

As for my little miniature lions, well, technically they are domestic tigers because they're stripy, well, orange AND stripy so I think of them as miniature tigers, they don't need to lick anything more challenging than dust off their coats. I am amazed that their little feet are often so black from playing in the sand that I wonder how their stomachs must feel after all the swallowing of it, but apparently the enzymes in the stomachs of cats are different to other creatures. They can handle a whole rotting carcass and not die from it! This is why leopards drag their prey up a tree and leave it there for a bit before they eat it. Not my two tigers. Their pellets remain untouched the day after if I don't refresh their bowls. Truth. It's not that I actually go out and catch their prey, so maybe the fact that the pellets have been technically "dead" for a long time means something, although I'm not sure what it means. Their bowls have to be washed once a day or Jinx throws up. I've reminded him a few times that he was rescued from a drain where he ate scraps with other feral cats, but he seems to have forgotten that part of his life.

Where was I? Ah yes, ASMR 

Now that I know it's a thing, because I thought it was just me, I've discovered there's an entire sub-culture of ASMR out there that I never knew about. And how did I find out about it? Believe it or not, I went looking for hair dressing videos one evening for whatever reason which evades me now, and discovered there are people called ASMR practitioners! Yup, they make videos that you can watch to help you unwind and relax and some of them are quite addictive. Take Maria The Gentle Whisperer, who has thousands of followers and a very high profile in the genre of ASMR. She is fascinating and her skill as an ASMRtist (yup, that's a word now) has made her a very very rich woman.

Personally, I love Maria's work. I find I can play one of her videos if I'm struggling to fall asleep and in no time, I'm relaxed and drifting off, much the same as many people find listening to a purring cat or white noise or soft rain. 

It's super weird watching one of her videos during the day for some reason and it might not appeal to everyone but if you want to try some of it out, here's a link below which might work for you, or not. Or you could just listen to your fur baby grooming and purring 

You have been warned though, do not try and watch these videos in the cold light of day. They make no sense if you are not an insomniac 


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X8Ney22MLpk&t=253s

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gf_MqDBBMPI&t=1566s


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