Maybe it is something to do with age and not exercising enough, but as the years pass and my hair becomes more grey sleep is a problem. It's like sleep deprivation and grey are correlated statistically. I can prove it hell look at me. Not so great is the fact it takes longer to look good. Or should I say to make the best of the assets I've got, the charmingly good looks are a shade less charmingly good looking. With lack of sleep the bags under my eyes seem to have moved from small handbags to large longhaul, overnighters. I got to be careful I don't trip over them. Being a man I can't get away with extra make up, there is no additional layer of plaster over this craggy face. However, probably the worse thing of all in age related insomnia is when you realise it is nothing to do with yourself. It is everyone else around you. Like they have formed a small secret society, have a log book of my sleeping habits and coincide their activity so they hit me right in the middle of a REM sleep. Induced insomnia that's what it is. Just as the old git is about to enjoy a dream about chocolate or cheese someone goes to the toilet. This time it was my neighbour. At 4:28 a.m. I could hear the echo of a toilet roll as it was pulled from it's holdler, the little wheel it was on squeaked round and round. At first though I didn't recognise what it was, it just plane woke me up.
So there I am laying in bed gradually coming around because there was a noise. It is somewhere in the back of my conscious mind, in the bit between sleep and wake, it's kind of pressing on my brain because the noise could of been anything. I also realised I was hot. Bloody old age and hormones were now kicking in, they both were hitting hard. If I'm not getting up in the early morning it's crying like a baby at youtube videos of rescued dogs. The normal sleep mind now was evaporating, I could see it like water in the sahara desert, just disappearing. I changed position, I removed some covers, I altered the ear plugs which are nearly permanently in my ears. It didn't work. Thoughts strayed as to what the hell the noise was which woke me up. It was almost like the roof tiles clattering when pidgeons used to wake up with the morning sun, but the room was dark. At this moment a saying came to mind, something Sherlock Holmes said:
"...when you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth..."
I thought to myself, shit Sherlock you can work out what the noise was, now lets just think about it. Of course the thing is sometimes all the possible solutions are not thought of, then it is the one you could not figure out which is the answer. I came up with the following:
1. A mouse
2.A rat.
3.A pigeon
4. A fox.
I examined them in detail, we only just had a mouse and mice make a scurrying around noise as the tread lightly but noisily over things, and scrape them. As for a rat I sure hoped it wasn't one of these but the noise was actually louder than what a mouse makes. I thought if there was a rat then I'd of heard this earlier so it was unlikely to be a rat. The pigeon was a good option but it was still dark out and I know they come out when it is light, there would of been a hell of a lot more of tile clatterings as well. A fox, now this was possible but it dawned on me the noise was internal. So my list had eliminated four possibilities of which it was none in all likeliness. I lay on the bed having removed th ear plugs just being still listening and hoping in part the beautiful princess of sleep would come and kiss me gently. She obviously didn't because she must of thought that old bugger looks a bet rough, must be the bags under his eyes. Then I heard another noise. It was the neighbours. The always shouting at his kids neighbour must of got up to evacuate his bowels. There was movement as the thud of footsteps through our waffer thin walls went down stairs. If only this house were built in the 1920s then it would of been propper quiet. But it wasn't. I heard him go out the front door and then drive off. It was about 5:30 a.m. when I did decide to get up. So in all I've had about four and a half hours sleep.
I now know why old men are generally called grumpy old men, because nobody will let them get a decent night's sleep!
No comments:
Post a Comment