Just passing through…

As a matter of interest, I suffer from insomnia! I can hear you all saying, ”Nothing wrong with that, it happens to all of us from time to time.”

I am glib enough to believe that it`s this hyper-active brain of mine working overtime. Others say that I have a guilty conscience.

Usually it`s a late supper and too much wine at the table.

Take the other night for example. It had just struck one (in the morning) and my wife is murmering softly in her sleep while I am positively awake. Pounding my pillow for another position, I draw my legs up to my chin, lay left side, lay right side, back, front, all ways. No matter how hard I try I just cannot seem to `get off’.

“Take a couple of sleeping pills,” says the Missus, coming awake.

“I thought you were asleep Lovey?”

She turns over and yawns, “Sleep?” “ That`s impossible with you moaning and groaning, tossing and turning, take something that`ll put you out.”

“Sorry……..I think it was that savoury mince.”

My wife suddenly sits up in bed, “Savoury nothing, more like Sauvignon Blanc!”

Of course, she was probably right, but anyway, I fumble around in my bedside cabinet drawer where I keep a bottle of Eazysleep, tip out a couple, and without turning on the light, pad off to the bathroom for a glass of water.

Getting back to my warm bed, I throw the plls into my mouth, swallow the water and presto! I`m asleep.
But wait, there`s a horror part of my story.

My early morning cuppa Java is always welcome. Every morning at 6.30 sharp, I hear my darling wife place it lovingly at my side, and I smell that rich aroma wafting on the breeze.

“You only took one of those tablets.” She said casually.

I`m half asleep of course. “One tablet?” I think back. “ No I took two.”

“Well there`s still one next to your glass.”

“What?”

I immediately get the shivers. All that tossing and turning last night made a button come off my pyjamas, and I placed it carefully onto the top of the bedside cabinet.

“Oh Lord Lovey!” I announced, feeling green around the gills, I must have swallowed down my pyjama button instead of a pill.”

Without a sign of remorse she say`s quietly, “It got you off to sleep all right.”

Inside five minutes I can actually feel the darned button, pressing against my small intestine, and it`s causing untold pain.

“No breakfast for me Lovey, I`m feeling a little off colour,”

“Green you mean?”

I nod, “Yes dear, the same colour as the button.”

The terrible cramps in my gut are getting worse now, and I`m sitting humped up in a corner of the lounge, still in bedroom slippers and gown.

“I think I`ll call the doctor.”

My wife laughs, “Whatever for, it`s only a smooth round button with four tiny holes and……..there wasn`t any thread attached to it was there?”

“Thread?”

“Yes, you don`t want to get tied up in knots inside!”

That did it. I tore across the room and grabbed the telephone.

“Doctor, I`m in trouble, I think I have swallowed a foreign body.”

There is a long silence, “Nationality?” he asks.

“No no, doctor, I have swallowed a pyjama button by mistake, I thought it was a sleeping pill.”

My doctor always was non-commital “ I don`t think there`s anything to worry about, it should pass through by evening.”

“How will I know?”

Another long silence. “You won`t…..unless.”

I hang up the `phone in disgust.

By mid-morning the cramps in my stomach are so bad that I decide to go back to bed. Ten minutes later, my wife arrived with a bottle of castor oil and a tablespoon.

“Open wide Ducky, this`ll open you up!”

I gulp the revolting stuff down and wait for relief. What happened next almost made me throw up again.
“Are you sure you didn`t accidentally tip out three tablets instead of two last night?” she queries.

I think back, “Why Lovey?”

“I found this under your side of the bed this morning.” she said, opening her cupped hand.

There it was all right, the small green button that came off my pyjamas!

I shot out of bed. “When did you find this?” I screamed.

“Making the bed.”

“But…..but that was hours ago!”

Screwing the top back onto the castor oil bottle, my wife gave me a sly grin. “I thought it was time you had a good clean out my lad!”