Bright Lights, Big City

Last night, I finished watching Monday Night Football (at like midnight. Do the games always go this late? It was the same way with the Cowboys game last week. This is what I get for starting to watch TV on Monday nights. Stupid enticing glowing box.) and decided it was time for bed.

I look around and realized that the promise I made to myself on Sunday to clean up the apartment tomorrow had gone completely unfufilled. I contemplated actually doing something to end the relentless horror of dirty dishes, clothes, and graham crackers everywhere, but in the end decided to just freakin go to bed, it's midnight, fool.

I go through the house and systematically turn everything off, lock the door and whatnot. I turn to head over to my room to get some sleep - hey, the light is still on in there! Jesus, I'm losing my mind again, aren't I? This is gonna be another butter fiasco, isn't it? Damnation!

So I go back into my room. No, the light isn't on. It's that there is a light so bright outside my window that it just looks like my light is on from the kitchen. I mean astonishingly bright. I have Venetian blinds on my window. In general, no light comes through during the night. This light, whatever it may be, can apparently penetrate opaque plastic.

I peek through the blinds. My apartment complex has decided to replace the cute little faux gas lanterns that line the sidewalk around the main office with huge, brilliant white flood lights. It's practically daylight outside. You could play sports or perform tricky surgery under these lights.

I try in vain to close the blinds even tighter. Now that my eyes have adapted, it just looks like the window is glowing. Better than any nightlight I ever owned as a small child. Brighter than my computer monitor. And, just for kicks, there is one strip at the very top of the window that is uncovered. So this one blinding shaft of light is painted across the opposing wall.

I am so doomed. I need intense darkness to sleep, these days. Once upon a time, I could manage to sleep with the television on and 3 roommates playing a rousing game of Halo less than 5 feet away. Now, the old man in me needs no interruptions, aurally or visually. I briefly consider commandeering the empty bedroom for my own needs, until I remember that I think it's haunted and rule that out. I briefly try the futon in the living room, but the lights get in there too, since I still haven't replaced the blinds on the patio door.

Doom.

My final solution is to use my comforter and my extra pillow as a blind against the light and sleep diagonally on the bed to minimize my exposure to the other wall. This is about as successful as you would imagine. I estimate the number of times I woke up due to blinding white beams of pure energy assaulting my eyeballs at 7. And somehow, I don't think tomorrow will be any better.

On a completely unrelated note, I've been looking for a new hobby lately. What do you think of the slingshot?