Sleepless Night

A Long and Sleepless Night

         The hallway was silent as I made my way to the bathroom for the first of my frequent nighttime visits.  A soft nightlight, strategically placed midway down the hallway, revealed a kitty chase ball, obviously left by one of the cats – I think they get some sort of cheap (at my expense) thrill to trip me up.  I suspect they were watching from some hidden corner as I would often be caught by their pranks and stumble, yelp or otherwise make me feel foolish.  Other than the cats, no one else was around to witness their pranks or my reactions but I still felt foolish when they would catch me unaware. 

         The nightlight in the bathroom allowed me to find my way to the commode without incident.  As I sat feeling relief from emptying my full bladder I glanced up and noticed a bug of some sort on the ceiling.  I finished my task, flushed the commode, and, keeping an eye on the bug, walked over to the sink.  As I washed my hands I could see in the mirror above the sink that the bug, which I now realized was a dark colored spider, was on the move – heading over to the sink where I stood!  Egad, I hate spiders!  They’re fine as long as they stay outside and away from the doorways but I cannot abide them in the house.  I quickly dried my hands and moved back toward the doorway, planning on getting the swatter and a step-stool so I could dispatch the spider before returning to bed and return to sleep with an easy mind.

         I went to the pantry, took the swatter off its hook, grabbed the step-stool and headed back to do battle with the spider in the bathroom.  On the way I saw a catnip stuffed mouse was now in the middle of the floor; I kicked it to the side, went to the bathroom and turned on the light.  Looking up I couldn’t see the spider.  I searched high and low to see where I might have gone.  After closing the bathroom door I used the step-stool to look above the wall cabinets and noticed a healthy layer of dust, ugh, but no spider.  I went over to the tub, shook out the shower curtain and liner to see if the spider was hiding on or behind between the two.  Nope, no sign of it.  I lifted the rug, looked under and shook it out; not there either.  Where could it have gotten?  I knew if I went back to bed I wouldn’t be able to fall asleep with that spider lurking about somewhere in the house.  It couldn’t have gotten far, I wasn’t gone long enough for any extensive travel on its part.  I noticed my reflection in the mirror and saw I looked as totally frazzled as I felt.

         Leaving the bathroom light on I opened the door, turned on the hallway overhead light, eyed the ceiling corners and along the baseboard and carpet edge in the hallway.  The only thing I saw was that the stuffed mouse was back in the center of the floor.  Right, thinking, 'those little buggers, I know I kicked it aside before,' I may be half daft but not all the way daft yet!  I think their plan is to make me think I've gone completely off my rocker.  I continued toward my bedroom doorway.  My room was dark so I turned on the light.  Both cats were soundly asleep on my bed, or at least they appeared that way.  Far-cool, the orange tabby, was stretched out at the foot of the bed.  He raised his head and sleepily peered at me with his amber eyes, then stretched out his right front paw and struck his noble (king of the jungle) pose.  Kia, the black cat, remained curled up next to my pillow with her tail tucked up around her nose.  As I entered the room Kia rolled her head so she was chin up, opened one of her green eyes and glared at me for intruding.  I looked all around the ceiling near the door but didn’t see any sign of the spider; however, there were dozens of places it could hide in my bedroom.  I started my search at the doorway from the hall.  I pulled the hamper out from the corner, nope, not there.  Examining the space between the wall and my triple dresser and tilting the mirror forward, I saw nothing of the spider.  I knelt down and looked underneath the dresser, and pulled out a couple more cat toys but saw no spider.  By now, both the cats were giving me the stink eye for disturbing their slumber. 

         I went over to the foot of my bed, lifted the bed skirt and peered underneath, then  pulled out the under-bed boxes, dusted the tops with a soiled tee shirt I had pulled from the hamper next to the closet, but I didn’t see the spider.  Before I rolled the boxes back under the bed Far-cool cat decided to help so he crawled under the bed and stretched out on the floor, right across where the bed boxes belonged, and looked at me.  “Thank you so much, Far-cool.  Now come on, get out of there.”  All he did was blink his eyes at me.  I had to go find one of the fish on a rod toys to coax him before he would come out.  He fell for the ruse so I tossed him back on the bed.  He wasn’t happy with me, but at least he didn’t jump down and dart back under the bed.

         I eyed the closed dual closet doors on the next wall.  There were openings of about a half-inch at the top along the door glides were and another half inch below at the floor level.  I prayed I wouldn’t have to search through the closet.  Next I looked at the drapes behind my bed headboard.  Since that was on the wall opposite the hallway door I thought it unlikely the spider would have gotten there so quickly.  I realized this was not likely to be a very restful night.

         Having checked the easiest and most likely places, I headed back down the hallway towards the bathroom.  I checked floor corners and along the baseboard more carefully now, while simultaneously looking up, eyeing the corners and edges along the ceiling again.  Drat, not a sign of the spider anywhere!  Far-cool followed me back to the bathroom where I had another sit down.  Far-cool jumped up on the counter and meowed for me to turn on the water.  That cat will only drink fresh, running water directly from the faucet.  I finished my second task of the night, flushed, and went to the sink. 

Far-cool wanted his drink immediately but I made him wait until after I washed up.  I glanced at my bleary-eyed self and splashed cool water on my face.  Far-cool had his drink while I grabbed the hand towel and dried my face.  When I went to hang the towel back up I noticed something dark along towel’s the bottom edge.  EEP!  I tossed the towel down, the spider jumped from the towel to the counter and darted up underneath the bottom of the mirror.  Far-cool watched with interest, ears pointed forward, tail twitching with interest or agitation.  Yes, he may be on this hunt too.



         Drink forgotten (for now at least) Far-cool started nosing around the bottom edge of the mirror.  I quickly removed the towel, toothbrush holder, rinse cup and holder and put those in a drawer, safely moving them from the possibility of the cat knocking them down or the spider falling into them.  My helper cat began pawing at the mirror, trying to knock the spider out?  I didn’t know.  However, I got the brilliant idea to flush it out by pouring water over the top to run down behind the mirror.  Ah ha! That should work… I did, and it did.  The spider came out along the side of the mirror, dashed down to the counter, cat in hot pursuit tracking the path.  Snatching up the swatter I vigorously whacked away and got it!  Yahoo!  Far-cool sniffed, but I pushed him aside and turned on the faucet to let him have a fresh drink.  Easily distracted, that cat is; I cleaned up spider remains and gave it a suitable sewer burial. 

         That night time escapade wasn’t nearly as bad as it could have been.  Only another half hour or so to clean up the water mess off the counter and floor and I could head back to bed… and sleep easier… I hope.