Waking the Dead

It is 2:56 in the morning as I write this blog. No, I am not a productive early riser, I am a person who cannot go to sleep because my husband has broken his C-Pap machine. Just to put this in perspective for those of you who think I'm being fussy about a few snores now and then... Dan used to be married to a lady he met in Korea. She was completely deaf. He used to wake her up. Dan can wake a deaf woman up out of a sound sleep with his snoring. I swear to you I am not making this up. This man was a captain in the army and they wouldn't let him sleep where he could give away their position. I am currently wearing a pair of Sony headphones and have Train cranked up on my computer sound level at 71%. I am going to permanently damage my hearing and I can very clearly hear his snores over the music. The sudden monster snorts are especially startling. I am bopping my head singing “When you move me everything is groovy, They don't like it sue me, Either way SNNAAARRKKK Holy crap! What was that?!” Do you remember the Looney Tunes cartoon where that little puppy would sneak up behind that cat and go BARK BARK BARK BARK BARK? And that cat would flip out and grab ahold of the ceiling with nothing but it's claws? That would be me. He hits one of those especially adrenaline producing snorts and I find myself suddenly clinging to the ceiling with my fingernails and my hair standing straight on end. I gently let myself down into the bed and realize I am shaking like I'm on a three day caffeine high. Gently I look over at his helpless sleeping form and realize how very easy it would be to kill him so I could get some sleep.

I have tried everything I know to pass the time. I have been working on a book that I've been meaning to finish for a while now, and I have managed to get several thousand words added to it tonight. I took a break from that and ate some frosted mini-wheats forgetting momentarily that I have become lactose intolerant. I remember it now as my stomach is bloated to the point that it looks like I am in my third trimester of a pregnancy. Then I decided to amuse myself by snoring with him, so every time he made a huge snore I would try to copy it with him. Now I have a sore throat and for the life of me I cannot figure out how he does that without making his throat feel like raw hamburger meat. After a while that lost it's charms so I found a new amusement. As he would let out his snore I would quickly squeeze and unsqueeze his nose so it sounded like SN—SN—SN--SN--SN--SN--ORE--ORE. Kind of like a tiny snoring machine gun! That was actually fairly entertaining for a while. You can do it to tunes like “Row Row Row Your Boat” or “Twinkle Little Star” or “Old MacDonald's Farm”. The giggling makes it a little dangerous but he never really woke up enough to figure out what I was doing or for that matter to figure out what he was doing. I have now put on the headphones and started writing this blog. I have a feeling it is going to be a long night. He gets up at seven a.m. and it is now three twenty six. I have three and a half more hours to kill before I can go to sleep. I actually recorded him at one point tonight just because I had reached that point that I had to either laugh or go stark raving mad. I have three minutes of what sounds like a moose being fed through a wood chipper. My eyes have now reached that stage where they are permanently open. I no longer blink, I just stare wide eyed at the illuminated computer screen looming out of the darkness. I think I am drinking out of a water bottle beside my bed, but it seems like I've been drinking out of that bottle for a while now. It could be a bottle of perfume and I probably wouldn't have any idea at this point. One thing I've noticed about my mind on no sleep is that the music that I am blasting through my brain is being listened to. I put my iTunes on the Train album California 37, and my sleep deprived brain is really listening to this music. I mean deeply paying attention to the words that are being said and I just keep thinking “What the hell am I listening to?” I really like Train. I think there's like me and one other person on the planet that does, but I went to their concert once and listened to Patrick sing Marry Me unplugged and it was one of the most amazing experiences of my life. I know that sounds ridiculous, but listening to him sing that song to a silent arena full of people, just using his voice, no mics, nothing, was beautiful. It was overwhelming to the point of bringing me to tears. When I got home I immediately downloaded their last two albums and have listened to them on and off for a while, but I never really listened to them. I babbled whatever words I thought sounded right as I sang along, but some of these lyrics are just weird. No one can ever say the man doesn't have the voice of an angel, but he could give Neil Diamond a run for his money as far as bizarre lyrics go. So, this has been my night. Amusing myself with the terrible snores of the sleep depriving snark monster lying next to me, bloating myself beyond all reason with a bowl full of milk, damaging my hearing for life and trying to make sense of senseless lyrics. And look at that! Only three hours and fifteen minutes left to burn.