My sleep has been tormented this week...

...tormented by animals and their annoying noises.

First it was the dog. I was having this dream in which I started out all Indiana Jones going over these 3 waterfalls. Then ended up in this shack with Jack and Juliette and Sawyer from Lost. Who wants to be interrupted whilst dreaming of Josh Holloway??? But then I kept hearing this dog whine and whimper. In my dream the dog was in the shack with us in a crate. Everyone kept yelling at the dog to shut up, but it just wouldn't quit. I remember getting more and more irritated at this dog, and yet nobody would do anything about it. Then I woke up and realized that it was MY dog that was being so vocal. This dog has done plenty of annoying things, but dragging me out of sleep and away from Sawyer...well now she's just gone too far!!

Then last night I was dreaming that some kid was staying overnight with us. This kid came to our house upon his bike. Somehow the bike ended up in the bedroom with this kid and my oldest son. On this bike was some device that made a very loud chirping/beeping sound whenever the back tire moved. I start hearing this sound, knowing the boys were supposed to be asleep I charge into the bedroom and find my son messing with the bike. I unleash my wrath upon him and think its over. But then I hear it again. This time, its the kid. I remove the bike and put it outside the bedroom. And I hear the sound again. And again, and again. Move the bike outside. And I keep. hearing. the. sound. Somehow I think something must be vibrating the ground making it go off, so I turn it upside down. No idea why I think that would make any difference... And the flipping sound keeps going! By this time I am absolutely livid and going completely out of my mind because of this noise that won't go away. Again I am suddenly woken up. It takes a few moments for me to realize...I am hearing a really loud chirping noise that keeps going and going and going and going...

I look at the clock, its about 2:30 am, I wake up C and ask him "what is that sound???" He reluctantly gets up and looks out the window. He beats on the wall and it stops. He says "there's a bat on our house" like its a common occurence. A what??? Lets put aside the idea of bats on or in my house freaking me out. Why would it be making THAT racket, WTH, is the thing dying?

He gets back in bed. And of course, the noise starts AGAIN. So he gets dressed, arms himself with a flashlight and a tennis ball and heads out to check it out. We hear this screech and he ducks and is looking around like something is about to dive bomb him. He couldn't see what was on the house, so he chucks the ball at it.

And out flys this huge white bird. Neither of us could really tell what it was, but we're assuming maybe it was an owl. Until we were finally able to sleep again we could occasionally hear, very faintly, the thing making its horrible noise at someone else's house. I don't know what would possess an animal to do that, unless it was trying to annoy the shit out of the screeching bird to get it to go away. But seriously, do that at someone else's house, next time we might throw something a lot bigger than a tennis ball!

The dream state is an interesting thing... You know, my kids can make a noise during the night when I'm asleep and I instantly wake up, whether I'm dreaming or not. But some non-stop annoying animal makes a noise, and I incorporate it into my dream.