Chinese insomnia

What was chinese about it?

MSG.

I love chinese takeaway. But, Lord, the combination of salt and MSG leaves me with an overactive a)thirst and b)mind at 3am. So I'm awake.

Very, very awake. Thinking about tomorrow's dinner, three seperate dayjob problems and fantasising about selling a book at the same time awake.

There are also four cats on the bed. Husband has already given up and is nowhere to be seen. Minnie is attempting to compress my ribcage, Pippi is ejecting me from my own pillow* and Cleo and Chrissy have curled up in a little kitty ying and yang thing, their sleeping, smiling heads pillowed on each other's flanks. Between my knees.

So I extricate myself from the kitty bed (and to think, I used to think it was ours), go and get a drink (Hooray! No mice and/or slugs in kitchen!**) and return to bed with Fangs because I've finished the Christmas anthology. Amnesiac vampires. What more could you ask for.

Apart from sleep.


*Yes, yes, yes, I know I let her get away with murder. But sitting up all night with her in a room that stank of blood, while she whimpered and struggled for breath, while she tried to knead my lap with crushed paws and purr through a shattered jaw.... well, she's earned special status since her car accident, you know? I stand by my cosseting. (And she's fine now. Blind in one eye, minus a toe and some claws, and EXTREMELY aware of her special status, the manipulator!)

** Yes, we have four cats. Yes, we have mice. Because they're LAZY cats. Or cunning mice. We're not sure which. Although we daily expect the kitchen mouse to leave a gourmet cheeseboard selection and a calling card with a black silhouette of a mouse on it, and the words, And all becase the lady loves... Daa DAAAA da-da-daaaa-daaaaaaaaa!