March 2023
Intermediate to advanced
528 pages
22h 46m
English
Your stomach is in a knot, you’re sweating, turning, tossing, anxious. The room seems hot. How can that be? You got up ten minutes ago to turn down the thermostat. A glance at the clock reveals that it’s 2:00 am. At this rate, you’ll never get to sleep.
What’s going on here? Is a bad meal keeping you up? Has a lumpy hotel mattress worked its magic on your back once again? Has a case of jet lag thrown off your circadian rhythms? While any of these is possible, it’s much more likely that your sleeplessness and anxiety are caused by the greatest among human fears: the knowledge that you have a speech to give.
CBS News journalist Charles Osgood posed the question this way: “Have you ever been driving ...