I woke up this morning at 4:30am from a sound, deep sleep. I shot bolt upright, terrifyingly alert, because I smelled burning wiring. And it was strong, very, very strong. So I jump out of bed, bolt into the hallway and encounter my brother, also awake and alert because of the smell. No fire alarms were going off (and yes, we've got them on each floor, in the stairwells, because that's how smoke travels -- according to fireman brother) so we just trotted all around the house, trying to frantically sniff out the source before the alarms did go off.
We deduced it was the furnace. We shut it off as fast as fast could be, and then went back upstairs. Since I had to be up at 5:45 anyway, and adrenaline is bad for restful sleep, I just sat there petting Yoda and watching the news until I got dressed and went to work an hour early. Suck. But then I got to leave an hour early. Booyah!
Still. Data entry on four hours of sleep followed by an intense adrenaline surge (which doesn't tend to carry a body through the day as well as a high-fiber cereal) is...difficult. An today was a long day (9 hours; not the longest shift I do in the average week but bad enough), so as I started to crash around 2pm I gave in and had a cup of tea with the caffeine in. That plus the intense shock of this morning has started up the palpitations again, slightly. I'm starting to think it's more likely that the acid reflux I've developed from sitting on my butt all day is causing my esophagus to spasm or something. I have way more acid reflux than fast heart rate anymore. And my intake of Tums seems to be tied to the lack of flumpfhs behind my breastbone.
Sigh. As soon as I start to relax, some other crap goes on. I need to build up my tolerance to stress, you know?
So why do I call it an attack of fabulous good luck? Because the house didn't burn down -- wasn't in any danger of it, actually, the motor burned out, so what we smelled was something that happened inside a metal box and couldn't get to any combustibles -- and by leaving home early this morning, I got to a certain gas station that hadn't had the chance to raise its prices to over $4 a gallon and topped off my tank at $3.85 per (which is still rather usurious, but hey, whatcha gonna do?). So of course I bought a lottery ticket. We'll see how well that pans out. I also stepped on a blob of some gross person's, erm, expectorate. Which, my friend of Italian origins tells me, is very lucky, provided you don't catch their tuberculosis. Well, getting spit on is lucky (proving my father's contention that Italians are sorta weird) -- protects against the Evil Eye. Not that I'm worried about evil eyes right now. Actually, as a Polish-Irish person, I'm not even sure we have evil eye traditions. I think that's a Mediterranean thing, goes with olive skin and a tendency to tan. We didn't get that, either. Alas.
Well, I did, but most of my family burns like Thanksgiving turkey after the fights start. Heh heh heh.
Ahem. So, anyway, that's what I've been up to. More hysteria, finding good gas prices (which sort of makes up for it, really) and playing bad odds.
I can't wait for my dryer to ding so I can go to bed. I'm assured the smoking vents thing won't happen again tonight, and it damn well better not. I'm tired.
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