Dreams the Cat Interrupted

The Meezer decided she wanted to go out at 1 AM last night, which meant I had to spend the hours between 1:01 AM and 5 AM watching Cracker, the 90s Brit TV thriller that launched Hagar's career.

It's actually a very good show. Ditto for Wire In the Blood, another Brit thriller of approximately the same vintage. Watching them is not time ill spent in, say, the same way watching 4 year old episodes of Law & Order: Sexual Victims Unit is time ill spent.

And yet.

And yet…

What did people do to fill in all those holes in the time before the advent of home-screened TV and movies? I lived back then. I should remember. But I don't. That was before I was prone to insomnia.

I suppose some people read. Problem with reading is that it requires a certain degree of concentration, which is often impossible at such times.

I have fantasies, of course, of being productive during such times, which is impossible (of course) because I just can't be productive during such times. It's dark. It's cold. I'm feeling sorry for myself. I want to be asleep, goddamit. I like being asleep. I'm the only person I know who consistently remembers her Very Interesting Dreams.

Last night, for example, before the cat woke me up, I was having a Very Interesting Dream in which I was discussing why harm reduction doesn't work as a social philosophy with a group of Enlightened Beings who appeared as shimmering, shining pillars of dust – kind of like Yahweh in His various business meetings with Moses.

"The problem with Harm Reduction," said these beings – they did the Speaking With One Voice thing – "is that it destroys the possibility of evolution. You see, it's the people who attempt the stupid, impossible things that are actually the vanguard of change. Because every once in a while, one of those people pulls it off. And if you don't let them have the opportunity to pull it off then you're closing the possibility of that evolution –"

I was just about to ask how that fit into Mayor Bloomburg's desire to ban 72 oz sugary drinks when the cat woke me up.

###

So 35 years ago the crazy Israeli neighbor was a beautiful girl working in a Tel Aviv bank. And one day this American businessman walked into the Tel Aviv bank. And he looked at her and fell instantly in love.

These things happen.

The woman – or man – in such cases is always a blank screen on to which the male is projecting some Romanticus Interruptus version of True Love that first happened – oh, a billion years ago. Back when he was a boy. Back before he had to start doing the slimy things that catapulted him to whatever position of prominence he holds now. The prototype looks like the original person who sparked inchoate yearnings long ago.

No slouch she, the crazy Israeli neighbor saw this as her ticket out. She was a divorcee with a young daughter. Her Xhusband was a Romanian confidence man who still came around and beat her and didn't give orgasms.

So the crazy Israeli neighbor worked and schemed and plotted, and eventually got out of Israel, married the businessman. Made his life miserable.

And then he died.

And now she's doing a modified Lady Macbeth number. She didn't really kill him. His ticker gave out.

Every year she builds a new addition on to her home. The Winchester Mystery House method of dealing with grief.

Ooops – time's up! Off to productive work.