The soothing sounds of night...

Last night was the perfect night for sleeping. It was cool, crisp, perfect for snuggling up in blankets. I passed out 10 minutes after going to bed and was looking forward to my coma-like sleep state.

Well, nothing will ruin your coma-like sleep, or scare the bejesus out of you like the sound of your smoke alarm going off. Of course first I slapped the alarm clock. It was 1:30 in the morning after all, not nearly time to get up yet. Alan wakes up as well, asks me why things are beeping (while I am all knowing, I am not all knowing at 1:30 a.m.). I told him I have no idea. Then it dawns on me - it's the smoke detector. I fly out of bed in a panic and realize there is, in fact, no smoke. Which is a huge relief. But really batteries? Really? You're going to start to fade at 1:30 a.m. I am anal about a few things in life - brushing my teeth, checking on the baby every time I get up, testing the smoke alarm. But it dawned on me that in the spring I bought the batteries but never replaced them. So, to avoid hearing the smoke detector go off randomly through the night I was rummaging around in the kitchen for batteries to replace the ones going bad.

You will all be pleased to know I went back to my little cocoon and did not want to get up at 6:00 a.m. when the alarm actually did go off. So, I squeezed it out until 6:30. I figured I was entitled after getting up to replace the batteries.