oh crap

The movers came on Monday. So of course I stayed up Sunday night til 6 AM. I purged, cleaned stuff off (don't want dust in your shipment---nothing worse than hordes of dust mites feeding on your dusty household goods), packed some items myself, sorted and organized. Now you may be wondering why I was doing all this the night before the movers arrive, instead of weeks in advance, which would certainly be easier and make more sense. Well, it just happens that I am a master procrastinator. I am so skilled at putting things off that I am now working on New Years resolutions from 1975. At work I often find that by the time I get to the things in my "to do" pile, they no longer need to be done. (look at all the time I save NOT doing meaningless tasks!) See---procrastination is actually a time saver. Anyway, I digress. This is not about my perfected art form of doing everything at the last possible moment. It's about something far less interesting----cat crap.

So..back to the story---I stayed up til 6 AM preparing for the big move. I crawled into bed. When I say I crawled in bed, I mean that literally. My cat has diabetes and kidney failure so he can no longer jump up onto the bed. Therefore, the mattress is now on the floor in order to accommodate him. The litter box and his food are also in the room to accommodate him. After crawling onto my bed-on-the-floor for my one hour of sleep, I then had to fight that giddy high that you develop when you are completely exhausted. The one where you have adrenaline pumping through you, keeping you from relaxing and falling asleep.

Then...just as I arrived at the brink of sleep, just before falling over the edge into my subconscious, I suddenly felt myself being dragged back to alertness. No! No! No! my mind began pleading. But it was no use. It was the wicked, nose-burning, make-me-want-to-gag smell of cat crap, just feet away from my head (remember...litter box is in the bedroom for his majesty. And his majesty is usually above kicking the litter over onto his own crap in order to bury the smelly crap). So I found myself desperately fighting that feeling of drifting back to wakefulness. I had mere minutes left to sleep! I did not want to wake up! Yet ---that smell! So, you see, this is what I am reduced to these days---a mental self-debate at 6AM....precious minutes of sleep on the one hand (tinged with stomach wrenching cat crap smell) or wasting precious sleep time getting up to bury the crap, ensuring that I would be jolted back to a state of wakefulness and would probably not get back to sleep at all. It was a big dilemma. And not one I took lightly.

I am sure by now you are on the edge of your seat wondering...Did she fall back asleep, all the while inhaling that foul odor? Or did she drag herself back from the depths of restfulness to get up and flick litter onto that large (and let me tell you it was huge) cat turd? Well, I won't keep you in suspense any longer. I decided that sleep was more important and meaningful and I simply endured the stench as I drifted back down to have a few REM moments.

Now this story would seem to have a happy ending. And it would have... except for the fact that I went on to dream that I was lost in a sewer and that I was sinking in a cesspool of stinking fecal matter. I can't imagine a more disturbing reality seeping into my dreams. Maybe tomorrow night I will spray the room with cinnamon air freshener and I can dream that I am swimming in a large pumpkin pie. The scent of Thanksgiving would be a nice change.