Sleep Deprivation + Overwork = Forgetfulness of the worst kind.

When I read the story in the Merc about the guy who forgot his baby in the car (the baby died,) I was reminded of the situation where the University of Irvine professor did the same thing a few years ago. This is really, really awful stuff.

….Like many, the Warschauers were a two-career family. Mark Warschauer is a professor at the University of California, Irvine, a leading expert in the field of technology and learning. Hirata is an award-winning political-science professor specializing on Japan and East Asia. The morning of Aug. 8, 2003, Mark Warschauer was tired and stressed out. His wife was trying to wean Mikey, and he’d gotten up at 3 a.m. trying to get the bright-eyed 10-month-old back to sleep. When he drove to work that morning, he was “on automatic.” Mikey had fallen asleep in the back, dozing quietly in his rear-facing car seat. Instead of going to day care, Warschauer went straight to campus, parked his car and went up to the office……

Not only is this sad, it’s scary as hell. Kind of “I-think-I-just-dozed-off-while-I-was-driving-scary.” It’s scary because this level of busy-ness can happen to many people. Many good people. We can all have a long night. Perhaps even do an all-nighter with a little one and then go to work dead on our feet, totally sleep deprived. We can forget things. Important things. THE most important things.

Today I saw the ChildMinder system on Gizmodo. Yes, it’s sad to need it. But it is needed. If my girls weren’t too old now, I’d have this.

BTW: You’ll see this standard on cars soon enough. Just watch.

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