What Makes a Great Night? (Writer's Workshop)

I am talking about sleep here, not a night out. Some may think a great night is when we sleep soundly all through without waking up and have pleasant dreams. For me, that's very good, but not great.

Last night I had a great night's sleep! Yes, I slept well, dreamed of playing softball which I always enjoyed doing and felt some whiskers against my face. My cat, Spunky Doodle, came by to visit me.   She kneeds the pillow and walks around a bit.

I love when she comes to visit me during the night!  Lately, she has been coming on the bed and lying next to me, letting me pet her real nice for the whole night!. Her fur is so soft and she just lays there still, letting me pet her. She settles in against me and I doze off with my hand on her. She used to stay about an hour, but lately she's been staying the whole night! I don't mind it at all. She doesn't come every night, at least I don't wake up every night, but when she does, it really makes me happy!   Manny has been coming every night too, sleeping either on my legs, between my legs or next to my legs.  Sometimes I get trapped and can't move without disturbing them, but fortunately, this is rare.

Sometimes she'll even sit up and pet me too!

Pleasant Dreams!

This is one of my favorite things!

Joining Mama Kat's Writer's Workshop:  Write a post inspired by the word "night."

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Wordless Wednesday: Sleepy Bunch

All ready for bed Sunday night

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AWW Mondays and Monday Mischief: PJ Party

You're gone all day mom, I need time with you too!

I only got 3 ½ hours of sleep one night because our dog, Abby, kept me awake. I felt like I was at a pajama party! She sat by my side of the bed panting loudly and putting up her paw. I didn’t want her jumping up on the bed because of her arthritis in her knees and hips so pet her up and she calmed down. As soon as I stopped petting her though, she would start up again. She acted all nervous like when it’s storming, but the weather was clear. I don’t know what to make of this, other than she just wanted my attention because she wasn’t tired and I didn’t give her a belly rub before going to bed like I usually do.

My "thunder shirt"--Karen's not-so-bright idea

The day before, she had her usual walks and even an extra one in the evening which she normally doesn’t have. I thought for sure she’d sleep well, but nope, she did not even want to lay down, which she usually prefers to sitting. My hubby slept on, pretty much oblivious to what was going on. I tried putting one of my sleeveless shirts on her, thinking maybe it would serve as a “thunder shirt” and calm her down, but it didn’t work. It slid around and after about 20 minutes, I took it off. Around 3:00 I decided to try sleeping down on the floor with her. She did lay down then, letting me gently stroke her but I still couldn’t sleep. After about an hour of that, I went back on the bed and she stayed quietly on the floor till it was time to get up. By then, I had a hard time getting to sleep, knowing I had to get up in just an hour.

What a night! Abby was ready to go on her morning walk as usual and didn’t seem tired at all. This is unbelievable! I love you Abby, but I need my sleep!

Do your pets keep you awake?

See more Monday Mischief and AWW Mondays

Visit today's Olympic Events:
DE Stuffing ~ http://k-9katastrophie.blogspot.com/
Synchronized Peeing ~ http://beagle-home.blogspot.com/
Wrestling ~ http://housecatconfidential.blogspot.com/


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5 Things We Learned This Week (animals, sleep, repairs, NFL)

Friday Fragments is hosted my Half-Past Kissin' Time for bloggers to post a list of short things on their minds that aren't really enough for a whole post. Here we go:

Napping Together

1. Turkeys

   Turkeys can swim--just ask Mountain Woman.

2. Cat Olympics (and doggies too)

   We were too late to enter the Synchronized Snoozing and Competitive Napping events. There were lots off good entries.  This is the picture we would have entered of Spunky Doodle and Manny Boy napping in our computer chair.
   

3. Sleep

   At twitter@OMGFacts I found out that if it takes less that 5 minutes to fall asleep it is likely linked to sleep deprivation. A healthy sleeper takes about 15 minutes. I am so glad I am a healthy sleeper again!

4. Repairs
   

   One of our inside doorknobs keeps falling off so I called Mr. Handyman (found in the Yellow Pages) who gave me a quote for $138! I thought this was outrageous, which my Facebook friends confirmed, and told him to forget it. Too bad Mountain Man doesn't live close by--he said he'd replace the whole door plus for that.

5. 

   
   Football--Browns and Patriots

   Pete Prisco, a NFL columnist, predicts the Browns will go 1-15 this year and the Patriots, 16-0. Guess I'll be wearing my Patriots shirt more this season than my Browns stuff unless they prove him wrong.

(We are donating 50 cents for each legitimate comment we receive on all our blogs during June and July to The Wounded Warrior Project which helps wounded warriors and their families returning from current conflicts.)

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I Can't Believe I Did That--Thank God For Night Secretaries!

I really need to get more sleep but there just isn’t enough hours in the day to do all I want to do after work such as spending two to three hours reading and commenting on blogs in addition to tweaking my own and posting, checking out Facebook and Twitter, and watching a TV show. Oh, and let’s not forget supper and cleaning the litter boxes!

If you know me or have been reading this blog for some time, you know I do some pretty stupid things sometimes, but nothing serious. But a week ago I got a “wake-up” call when on my way home from the bus stop at 6:00 p.m., I realized I sent a court filing via UPS to the wrong place! I even specifically looked at the label before I put it into the mail slot and it didn’t register that I had it wrong. How could I be so stupid? YIKES!!!

I kept saying, “This is awful!”

“How could I have done that?”

“I have to call [to let the attorney know}, I hope she is still there.” (She was there and was very nice about it.)

“I can’t believe I did that!”

“I could lose my job over this!”

Fortunately, we have night secretaries that I called who said, "The UPS stuff is still sitting in the hall." I was SO relieved to hear that! One of them hunted down my erroneously addressed UPS envelope, canceled out the old label and created a new one with the correct address. The only logical explanation for this that I could think of was lack of sleep. I really am NOT an air head!

Thank God I thought of it soon enough to get it fixed before it actually got sent! I do not normally give work a second thought once I’m out so can only attribute this to God watching out for me. I was literally only five or six houses away from home when I finally realized what I did. Thank God for night secretaries! I wonder how many other crises they prevent from actually happening.

I am definitely getting to bed before 9:30 p.m. on work nights—no more excuses for me! I aim for 9:00 to make it by 9:30 p.m. So, to all my Facebook friends, please, please, please if you see I’m on there past 9 p.m., send me to bed! Does anyone else have a close call to share? Has a night shift crew ever helped you out? Do you see God involved in your everyday life?

(I debated if I wanted to share my stupidity with the world, especially since it was at work, but think it may help warn others to get enough sleep and no harm actually occurred.)

Related post of other people's stupidness for a laugh, it made me feel better:  Hodgepodgespv Spew Alert

Somebody Is Sleeping In Our Bed

This is the first Manny went in under the covers. The bed was made and he just crawled in for his afternoon nap.

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4 Things I Learned This Week--Part 39

Sleep Is Good

In Tuesday's CLEVELAND PLAIN DEALER there was an article about building up your immune system to fight off colds by getting 8 hours of sleep a night. Does anyone do this? Read Get Your Sleep To Help Fight Off Colds that I posted earlier this week.

Breast Cancer Fighting Foods

At Get Moving with mountain Woman and Tahtimbo, I found this list of Cancer fighting foods that were listed in Shape Magazine that Mountain Woman shared: Artichokes, Broccoli, Cabbage, Cauliflower, Pomegranates, (Pomegranates have been shown in clinical trials to halt the spread and recurrence of cancer), Swiss Chard (use instead of spinach), Bok Choy, Tomatoes and Purple Grapes.

One thing mentioned was if we all ate our daily dose of 5 to 9 servings a day of fruit and veggies, there would be 200,000 fewer cancer deaths a year!

Take Along A Flashlight

Gerard learned this week that it's wise to bring along a flashlight on his morning walk with Abby because it's so dark early in the mornings now. Check out "Poor Gerard, It's All My Fault" on Abby's blog for details.

My Treatments

The good news is that I do not need Chemo and will start my radiation treatments on Tuesday, October 6.

Click here to find more Friday Fragment posts.

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Get Your Sleep To Help Fight Off Colds

I know when I get a cold, the best thing to do is sleep. I just want to sleep when I don't feel well. In THE CLEVELAND PLAIN DEALER, there was an article that said eight hours of sleep can build up your immunity and might be the best defense against getting a cold.

According to the article, in a recent study, some

scientists followed 153 men and women for two weeks, keeping track of their quality and duration of sleep. Then, during a five-day period, they quarantined the subjects and exposed them to cold viruses. Those who slept an average of fewer than seven hours a night were three times as likely to get sick as those who averaged at least eight hours.

It seems sleep and immunity are tightly linked The question is, how do I get eight hours of sleep a night? If I go to sleep at 9 p.m. and get up at 5 a.m., that would do it, provided I sleep all through the night and do not wake up with night sweats, or have to go to the bathroom or my cats coming on the bed and waking me up. Sometimes I do sleep all the way through the night, but more likely than not, some of these things happen.

I have to get up at 5 a.m. because I take Levothyroxine which should be taken the same time every day when I first get up and for work I have to get up at 5 a.m. so even on the weekends, that's the time I get up. The hard part is going to sleep at 9 p.m. I usually can get to sleep by 9:30 if I'm not wound up from losing my bet on a football game. Since I'm currently off work on short-term disability, I can do this but when I'm working, that doesn't leave me much time for my blogging. I used to try to get up at 4 a.m. to give me a couple hours of blog commenting time before I leave for work.

With the weather changing, this is the time of year when I usually catch a cold. I guess I just have to decide what I'm going to sacrifice, my sleep time and my health or my blogging time. I think my health is more important, so I'm really going to shoot for the eight hours of sleep and maybe I'll actually get at least seven or seven and a half. What about you? How much sleep do you get? Anywhere close to eight hours?

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