While I was drifting off to sleep last night, a short story idea seized my mind and refused to shut up until I scribbled down enough about it to ensure I didn't lose it during the journey to sleep and back to waking.
I got out of bed, made some barely-legible notes, and fell asleep rather quickly. About an hour or so later, the cats decided that it was time to play, which involves running around the house and across my bed at a speed and noise level that just shouldn't be possible for two animals whose combined weight is less than twenty pounds.
The first time the cats woke me up, I grabbed a drink of water and drifted back to a sort of twilight sleep, where the amorphous blobs of story ideas began to sharpen into ill-defined shapes. I got out of bed and made more notes.
This process repeated itself a number of times overnight, so though my body spent eight hours mostly in bed, my brain didn't get much, if any, rest.
Anne woke me up at 10. "You're going to sleep the whole day away," she said.
"Mrrzzbffgggmmmblllzzz," I said. But, having grown accustomed to dragging myself out of bed when I wanted to stay safely and comfortably wrapped in the covers, I did the same. This time, though, I walked into the kitchen and made myself a cup of coffee instead of stumbling into my office to scribble down notes.
That was about two hours ago, and while my brain is beginning to shake off some of the cobwebs, I still feel a little numb and stingy.
"Don't you hate it when you do something really funny and nobody notices?" Anne said to me about fifteen minutes ago.
"Um, yes?" I said.
She stood in the doorway of my office, rocking back and forth on her feet. "Yeah, it's like it's just killing you that you did something very funny but nobody notices."
"...what did you do?" I said.
"I kind of want you to just find it on your own," she said.
"That's probably not going to happen. I'm only forty percent here right now."
She looked pointedly at the wall above my desk.
"Even if it's, like, staring you right in the face?"
"Yeah, even if it's --" I followed her gaze and saw...
Click More, because the reveal is worth it.
"That's hilarious," I said.
"Why aren't you laughing?"
"I'm too tired to laugh. Inside, though, I'm rolling on the floor. That's very clever."
"And don't worry, I made sure the adhesive was almost all gone, so it wouldn't damage your Velvet Wesley Crusher."
"I appreciate that."
She leaned over and reached toward the moustache.
"Wait," I said. I picked up my phone and activated its camera. "The Internet needs to know about this."
