Weird Night

I usually sleep pretty well. Oh, I'm not one of those folks who completely conk out and would sleep through a Flock of Seagulls concert -- No, I'm what they call a "subconscious environmental awareness processor" sleeper. What that means is that I allocate a small segment of my giant brain for monitoring night noises to provide a "night watchman" function so the rest of my system can rest comfortably.

For example, if someone was using my microwave to prepare a delicious cinnamon Pop Tart, the brain cells monitoring my nose would signal me to wake up and enjoy a tasty meal. Similarly, if a lumberjack walked into my bedroom with a running chainsaw, the scent of two-stroke engine oil would alert me to the fact that something fun to watch was about to happen. If the neighbors were arguing about which of the Monroe brothers was Alf and which was Ralph, well, I'd promptly wake up to provide them with the correct answer. You get the idea.

Most nights, the only things that trigger this reflex is when my idiot neighbor yells at his idiot dog at 1am, or when my discomfort monitor alerts me to the fact that I probably shouldn't have drunk so much liquid right before bedtime. I'm able to successfully ignore the other non-critical stimuli (refrigerator compressor cycling, cars driving by, smoke detectors going off, albino ferrets fighting badgers outside the window, etc.) But last night, there was a nagging sound that persisted long enough that my alertness module finally decided to bring me to full consciousness.

At first, I couldn't figure out why I had awoken. There were no enticing aromas, no voices talking about Star Trek trivia, and no tarantulas wandering across my forehead. What was it?

It turned out there were two separate anomalies. The first (and loudest) was that my toilet was gurgling and moaning like Jabba the Hutt after eating a state-fair chili dog. And I could swear that I heard the very faint sound of a neighbor's phone ringing. The first problem was easy enough to solve, just lift the tank lid and push down on the float until the water was high enough to keep the valve fully closed. But the other problem was a little tougher.

The sound was just barely audible...in fact, I wasn't sure if it really was a neighbor's phone ringing, or just some artifact of alien mind-probe rays that are constantly assaulting those of us who don't wear tinfoil hats to bed. I could almost convince myself that it was either imaginary, or just a ringing in my ears that remained as a result of all those Blue Öyster Cult concerts I attended in my youth. But it occured at the exact regular intervals that a telephone ring would. And nobody was answering.

And you know what that does to your brain in the middle of the night, right? You start thinking, "What kind of moron would make a call and let it ring over and over again without hanging up?" It had been going on for at least 5 minutes at this point, and maybe a lot longer. But then you think "What if it's somebody who knows the person is home and is trying to wake them up due to some sort of emergency? Maybe something serious is going down, and I should really get up and investigate?"

But then you think, "No, it's probably just some stupid auto-dialing fax machine or something, and I really need to get back to sleep." This goes on for another four or five minutes, and then your brain starts thinking about some old Don Knotts movie and you wonder why he and Doris Day were never in the same film, and that there really should be more movies about astronaut kitty cats on venus, and...well, then you're already pretty much asleep again.

I'm not sure how long I was awake. All I know is that I'm not quite as well rested as I normally would be, so if appear to be incoherent today, please forgive me. I'll try really hard to catch up on my sleep tonight. Maybe I'll wear some earplugs. Let's all have a great night!