Four in the morning is no time for rational thoughts.

Last night was a rough one. While Jeff headed to work for a late night computer thing, Benevolent Dictator woke up at midnight crying and I had to soothe her back to sleep (it's amazing how 17 verses of Itsy-Bitsy Spider can calm a kid down) and get her an extra blanket for bed.

She then woke up at 3:30 a.m. crying, then calmed herself down. I thought I heard Jeff's voice talking and assumed he was rocking her back to sleep. Then after she quieted down, I headed to the bathroom (because apparently now, when you get me up at night, I HAVE to pee).

I took a glance at the library, no Jeff. So I assumed he wasn't home. Then I began to wonder about what I had exactly heard.

The thoughts you have at 3:30 a.m. are not rational thoughts. I thought about all the horror stories I had read as a kid. Like the urban legend about the killer who left the note, "Dogs aren't the only things that can lick," the opening to the Graveyard Book and my personal favorite: "Can't sleep. House will eat me." So obviously I can't sleep, and I'm trying to calm myself down thinking rationally. My daughter is safe. She calmed herself down. It's time to go to sleep. Then suddenly the room seems to have gone darker.

Which sounds weird. It's night time. It's supposed to be dark, but in this modern age, with all the glowing clocks, LED lights, etc, our house is never truly pitch black. So when a light dims, the house does get a little darker. My brain, full of worry, starts to get fearful.

Then I hear the toilet flush. In a house where I think I'm the only one awake. My daughter is not toilet trained and she sleeps in a crib. Now the fear is replaced by full-blown panic.

Mustering up my courage, I wander downstairs and while I rationally know it's Jeff, I haven't seen him yet or heard him. I don't know for certain that he's home. He could still be at work. So there's no proof that he's in the house. The bathroom light is on and the door is cracked. I push the door open.

And to my husband's credit, he didn't scream when he saw his sleepy, deranged wife open the door (when he thought she was sleeping). I would've screamed.

"What are you doing up?" he asked.

It's a testament to love that he listened to my insane ramblings about the house trying to eat me, serial killers and ghosts, hugged me, told me that he had come home at 2:30 a.m. and was talking on Ventrilo on the computer (which is why I heard his voice) and was waiting for another call from work. After calming down a wife with an overactive imagination, he came up to bed and with me snuggling up against him, we both fell asleep.

So yeah, today I'm not really coherent. I'm hoping to find my will to live in the pot of coffee. I'll let you know if I do.