I have not been sleeping much lately. It's not like I don't try to go to sleep. I climb into bed and set up the bedclothes but something always stops me from sleeping.
After an hour or so, I turn the light on and read a little. This usually gets me tired, and so I turn off the light and try to sleep. I get cozy and begin to drift off to sleep when \EEEEEEEEEEEEE!"" the radiator will scream in my ear. My eyes will pop open and I lose my relaxed state.
This is incredibly annoying and at first I tried to deal with the problem by hitting the radiator as soon as it whistled, to sort of teach it a lesson. This was an incredibly stupid idea. Not only are radiators hard metal objects, they are also incredibly hot. The radiator would scream, I would hit it and then I would scream, holding on to my burned and bruised hand.
Then I noticed a little knob on the side of the pipe. My roommate told me that if I pried at the knob with a butter knife, I could adjust the settings on the radiator. It turns out she was right, I can adjust the settings on my radiator anywhere from ""really annoying whistle"" to ""blood-curdling scream."" Needless to say, that was not exactly a big help.
I would not mind the whole thing so much if the house was cold. Unfortunately, the radiator does not seem to care about the weather. It just turns on whenever it feels like it. One night, I sat down and patiently explained to the radiator just what it was and what it was supposed to do, but it just sat there, hissing at me. Bastard.
Eventually, I decided to give up and let the radiator win. After all, who needs sleep anyway? I mean you hear stories about people going insane because of lack of sleep, but I am pretty sure those are just stories. And besides, Madison has a lot to offer between three and five o'clock in the morning. I go on walks. Long walks. Or I go to the bars. Very often they are closed, but it is still fun. Even hanging around outside of an empty bar is more fun than lying in bed, listening to the radiator.
Really, though, even this is a poor way to pass the predawn hours. Ordinary folks get to sleep and I have to say I am jealous of them. So I devised a simple plan to get back at them. It's simple. Every night I dress up as a cat. I head over to one of my neighbors' windows and begin meowing loudly. After a few minutes of this, someone will usually come down and pour me a saucer of milk.
And then, instead of drinking the milk, I pour it into a flask and save it. And then??well, actually that's about as far as I have gotten on the plan. But I am pretty sure that the next step will involve doing something mean spirited with a large quantity of milk.
Maybe I could make cheese. Unless I fall asleep first. Ah??sleep??*yawn*??but no! The radiator! I can feel it staring at me, just waiting for its chance. I am on to you radiator! You hear me buddy?!?
