for your amusement.

It all started with a cup of caffeine laden coffee at 8:30pm last night…

After chatting with the roommates until around 10:30pm, they head off to bed, and I head off for trash duty. Sunday nights we put the trash out. Problem is we forgot to do it last week. So this means the trash cans are overflowing. I forget this. The bin of recyclables has to be carried outside, downstairs, and around to the side of the house to be deposited in its bin. I think it’ll be faster to do it in one trip instead of two, so I carry the whole bungling load outside… then the wind picks up… next thing you know, plastic, cardboard and paper is flying in the air all over the place. Oh joy. I leave the flown pieces and go straight for the trash can to rid myself of the rest of the load. Problem: the recycling bin is nearly full. ARGH. This means I have to cram all this plastic and metal and paper trash in with my bare hands. Not very easy when undergoing high speed, whipping winds and when the trash can is almost as tall as you…

Second project (after earth-conscious me clean up the blown away papers and plastic that luckily our fence kept from blowing too far away…) was to break down this huge box with slabs of Styrofoam to put in the regular trash… I effectively precariously have to carry an armload of Styrofoam blocks and sheets, towering almost over my head, down our deck stairs. Inevitably a few pieces slide off and I have to stoop and pick them up as I go… not one was to be lost or left behind! I make it to the trash cans when all of a sudden – of course! – a huge gust of wind whips me in front, and the Styrofoam pieces are sent flying against our chain link gate. AHHHHH!!! I am being attacked by huge massive amounts of Styrofoam!!! The Styrofoam and I get pinned against the gate, but eventually I peel myself away so that I can quickly resume and finish my tearing, breaking, squishing of these pieces into the garbage. PHEW. Time to roll the cans to the street…

I go to bed after doing some reading and after recovering from my Styrofoam attack about 11:30pm. It is then I discover that drinking that huge cup o’ caffeine at 9pm on a Sunday night wasn’t the brightest idea. I toss and turn. I turn the radio on. I turn the heater on. I turn the heater off. I toss and turn some more. I turn the radio off. It is then I hear this strange knocking noise outside on the deck… thinking that the wind might be knocking the remaining cardboard box that was left on the deck (after all, there was NO way that sucka was going to fit into the trash can WITH the Styrofoam…), I go outside in the cold and drag this box indoors. Satisfied that perhaps sleep would be had yet, I retire once again to my basement bungalow.

The knocking continues. I get up and spy out my window. AHA! One sneaky piece of Styrofoam had snuck out of my arms unnoticed and was knocking on my door. I retrieve it quickly and come inside.

The knocking continues. I give up at this point on getting rid of the sound. Instead, I turn on a light and start reading. It is around 1:30am.

After finishing the book around 2am, I turn off the light, the heater, the radio, and try to empty my mind of my racing thoughts and tell my body to ignore the caffeine that is trying to keep it awake… I doze off sometime before 3am. Naturally, my alarm goes off at 6:15am… am I getting up? I don’t think so…. I lay around until 7:15am when I spring up realizing that I need to leave for work in 15 minutes. It’s a mad scramble to wash my hair, get dressed, take the dog out, pack my bag, grab something for lunch, grab something for breakfast, and run out the door. I do this in about 15 minutes. I run into my roommate who asks me as I am about to run/trip down the stairs to my car, “why is there Styrofoam all over the yard?”

Oh no.

Oh yes.

The wind was so forceful that it had knocked the lid back off the trash can on the street and strewn ever so annoyingly all the little Styrofoam pieces I had so careful smashed into the can all over our yard and who knows where else and in how many neighbors’ yards… that piece I found outside my door at 1:30am was no straggler that escaped from my arms… it was an omen, a warning, of what mischief the wind was working outside… Oh yes, I am sure my neighbors LOVE their new young neighbors. More evidence, perhaps, that I really do have blonde hair… ;)

What a stellar 12 hours this has been.