I Did Something Silly at 4:00 am Today

Last night I did something rather silly at 4:00 am, though at the time I felt quite responsible and mature.

Here’s what I thought happened:

At 4:00 am, I woke up to the sound of one of my cats heaving up a hairball on the floor near the foot of my bed. I briefly considered going back to sleep and dealing with it in the morning, but I convinced myself that one of the roles of being a cat-father and condo-owner is to take care of these sorts of things right away.

So I slumped out of bed, tore off a piece of paper towel, and made my way through the dark bedroom towards the hairball. I carefully covered the hairball with the paper towel, leaving it to soak up all the juices so I could easily throw it away a few hours later. I then went back to sleep.

When I woke up at 7:00 and walked across my bedroom in broad daylight, I realized that this was actually what happened:

Hairball, awake, responsible cat-father, out of bed, etc. Paper towel in hand, I made my way over to a large rubber band (one of Biddy’s favorite toys) and carefully covered it with a paper towel. Pleased with with my success, I walked back to bed, barely missing the full-exposed hairball on my way.

When I woke up to find the hairball soaked into the carpet and the rubber band securely protected under the paper towel, I had to laugh. I have 20/20 eyesight, but apparently my 4:00 am night vision isn’t great.

The hairball has since been cleaned up, but for the record, here’s the rubber band:

And here’s Walter (hairball cat), wondering why his papa can’t see in the dark:

What’s the silliest thing you’ve done at 4:00 am?

5 thoughts on “I Did Something Silly at 4:00 am Today”

  1. Well this isn’t necessarily silly, and I didn’t look at the clock, but I woke up t from a dream last night in which I had (excitedly) finally been able to get a copy of Wingspan. After lying in bed for a few minutes, I realized that wasn’t actually true and was sorely disappointed. I fell back to sleep knowing this would become a reality soon enough.

    Reply
      • We have a friend who works at a game distributor, so hopefully we’ll be getting it through him once the stores they supply get their copies. I’m so excited, but I can wait; plenty of games on our shelves to play in the interim… 🙂

        Reply
  2. In hotel on business travel and got SICK. Meds and early to bed – 4pm early. Woke out of a dark sleep to morning birds chirping at 7. “Oh my god I’m late” speed shower/dress/run past the breakfast bar for a nibble while I drive.

    They were cleaning dinner service… I slept 3 hours.

    Reply
  3. With two young kids, I’ve seen 4AM more times than I want to admit over the past 3 and a half years. I actually function pretty well at this point. One time before I had kids, I couldn’t sleep because my job was stressing me out, so I applied for a job in the middle of the night with a company that I thought was really cool. I had to update my resume and edit my cover letter, and I did it all while sleep deprived. In the end, two interviews later, they offered me a job. I ended up turning it down because the commute would have been 45 minutes but it makes for a fun story.

    Reply

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