Wake Up Call.....

Well, the last couple of  years I have started having dreams that seemed real.  Not like scary real, but just every day real.  Sometimes after waking up, I have a hard time figuring out if something that happened in my dream really happened or not. 

I've even had to ask Hal some embarrassing questions like, "Did we invite your mom over for dinner tonight?", or "Did I really talk to my aunt on the phone yesterday?" 

Things that don't really matter, (well, I guess it would matter if I'd invited my mother-in-law over for dinner, but couldn't remember for sure and didn't make enough food!)  but I just wanted to verify what was real and what was not.

Well, Friday morning, my dreams crossed a line.  The line that kind of borders on sleepwalking, which (to my knowledge) I have never done.

I was awakened from a dead sleep by our neighbor, who drops his daughter off at our house in the mornings, about an hour and a half before she and my son need to leave for the bus.  He usually knocks 4 times, quite loud.  (He used to ring the bell, but we finally dared ask him NOT to ring the door bell at 6:50 in the morning.) 

This neighbor works at Pepperidge Farms and had picked up some cookies that we used for a community event that Morgan and I had helped with the night before.  I hadn't paid him yet for the cookies, but I had the money by the front door in an envelope and I was worried that if Hal answered the door he might forget to give him the money.  (Like it was a big deal - he lives next door.  I'm sure I would have seen him very soon - like even the next day.  But, I didn't want him to think that I had forgotten to pay him.  I hate it when people owe me money and conveniently forget.)

So, back to my story:  I heard the knock on the door, sprang out of bed and raced to the front door.  I hurried and turned on the porch light because it seemed darker than usual.  Something else seemed off, though I didn't figure it out for a while.  I threw the door open and they weren't there. 

Since it had taken me a minute to get to the door (like I said, I had been fast asleep) I figured they had gone back to their house, thinking we weren't home for some reason.  I quietly called out to them, calling them by name and saying, "Hey, we're home."  I walked halfway to their house, but they had already gone in, so I didn't catch them in time.

So the next logical thing to do would be to call them.  I knew their home phone number, so I found a phone and dialed the number.  About the time it started ringing, it started to dawn on me a little more what was wrong in my house.  Not only was it darker than usual for that time of day, there was nobody around.  Hal sometimes goes running in the morning so I figured that was where he was, but neither of my girls were up either.  It didn't make sense for them both to have slept in.  (Unless they were both sick, but I knew I would have known about it if that were the case.)

I finally glanced at the clock.  5:45.  As in  5:45 a.m., much too early for them to be coming over.  The phone had started ringing by then, so I quickly hung it up, still trying to figure out what was going on. 

I went back into my bedroom, where Hal had been in bed, fast asleep, the whole time.  I wondered how I had climbed over him (because it seemed like I had rolled across the bed and gotten out of his side) without noticing he was still in bed, and also without waking him up.  He did wake up when I got back in bed and asked me what in the world I was doing.  I said, "I thought I heard  Bruce knock on the door." and tried to go back to sleep, sorely needing that last hour of sleep.  Sadly, it never came.

When Bruce and Madelyn did show up (right on schedule) I asked him if I had awakened them when I called his house at 5:45.  He said he had heard something, but he didn't know what it was.

So, the only thing I can think is that I had dreamed up that knock on the door.  I must have been so worried about him getting the money I owed him that I had a dream about it.  I had also gotten some wasp spray in my face the day before, when I helped Bruce's son spray for wasps in the metal pipes of their basketball hoop.  They had a couple of big nests with lots of active wasps.  I didn't want him to spray it and get it all over himself and when I sprayed it, a wind kicked up the wrong way and it went right in my face.  I think the pesticide attacks the wasps' nervous systems, because that is exactly how it felt.  And I was already a nervous wreck to begin with.  The wasp spray certainly hasn't improved my situation any, that's for sure.

Anyway, my kids thought that was a very funny story.  Not sure how I feel about it quite yet, but I guess I'll get over it eventually. 

I always do.

The Day Our Printer Was Possessed

At one point we thought our printer was "possessed". 

One day Austin had a friend over to play.  They were on the computer and at one point Peter, his friend, fell against our printer.  It started making strange noises.

Now our printer has not worked well for quite a while, I think there is a short in something somewhere in it, so it has been known to turn on repeatedly by itself, and also make sounds like it is regenerating something on the  inside.  

So when Peter bumped into it, I thought that was probably the end of the printer, which frankly, isn't that old so I was a little annoyed (with the printer, not Peter).  I went over to check out what was going on.  That's when I noticed that the strange sounds were actual WORDS.  That's when it started to creep me out.  After a while I started deciphering what the printer was saying because it sounded vaguely familiar.  

It was saying "We love our bread, we love our butter, but most of all, we love each other!" in a low, slow and CREEPY voice - over and over.  At one point it started to get faster and higher, but it was definitely muffled as if someone was actually stuck in our printer.   I finally recognized the saying from the old Madeline shows my girls used to watch, but couldn't figure out why in the HECK my printer was saying it. 

I called the girls in from the other room to witness what was going on, so I wouldn't get hauled away and locked up if I told this story to anyone else who was half sane.

I FINALLY figured out that there was a toy in a bag on top of the printer.  Austin's friend had fallen onto the printer, jostling the bag and activating the toy.  It was a little Darth Vader head (borrowed from another friend)  that recorded sounds and then played them back either faster and higher, normally,  or lower and slower (and creepier).  Austin himself had recorded the phrase a while before and had forgotten about it.  (Because he was pretty creeped out too.)

I was glad when that particular mystery was solved, but I have to say, I was a little sad when we had to return the toy to his other friend.  It was kind of a fun one to play with.  (Not that I would know, wink wink.)