My dearest friend, you have no idea how I suffered last night! I must have only managed to catch a couple of winks all together. My sleep was almost winkless. It had been a very busy day, and as I circled and re-circled my resting nest, I had great hopes of a full and restorative snooze. I had disbanded with the usual high necked, long sleeved cotton nightdress (it demonstrates my shy and modest nature) due to the heat and gave in to a little night time nudity. Dreamsville, here I come!

This sadly was not meant to be. To add a little background information to help set the scene for you, Spindle Towers is situated next to a field, and the field in question has just been harvested. The windows have been tightly closed so we wouldn’t be deluged in crop dust and wheat dander, but now that all was cut and calm, they had been flung open in a bid to invite cool air to circulate the bed chamber. This of course meant that it had also become a welcoming aperture for every known critter, keen to investigate our peaceful haven. I was having a rather splendid dream about my continuing domination of the side car racing championship, when I was jolted awake by an insistent flapping around my tail area. I prised open a heavy, confused eye to inspect for what was causing the unaccustomed updraft around my exposed nether region. 

It was a moth that had made its grand debut, dancing and skitting its way towards any source of light to be found. Why it thought there would be light around my tail is anybody’s guess. Annoying yes, but really not that distressing in the grand scheme of things. I swished at it in what I hoped was a gentle reprimand and settled back down. I gathered Teddy Edward towards me for extra moth protection and off I went again. Alas, sleep was not to be as there was now a really annoying high pitched buzzing reverberating around the room. Thankfully, a quick peek reassured me there was no  furtive rustlings from the bed. It would seem we had a problem with air traffic control in the room. 

Muttering some rather spicy thoughts to the heavens, I scrambled up and patted the floor until my paw made contact with my trusty torch. I couldn’t turn it on as it would disturb Mater and Pater, but I could at least wave it about at my foe in what I hoped was a menacing manner. All hail Spindle, vanquisher of whizzy pests. As I had said, the window had been left open to try and let in some cool nighttime air, which didn’t work as there was no cool air anyway. What it did do however was let in ALL the great and the good of the insect world. A mosquito had now entered into the fray and was insisting on strafing my ears, which I did not care for one bit. I think they are the most vexatious of all nocturnal zooming visitors. I flapped at it with my paws and by this point I had become quite fractious. As well as having the annoying fizzing of the mosquito I could also detect a strange boinging noise. With some trepidation I again slowly glanced at the loons but thankfully they were still sound asleep and were in no way responsible for the boings. I really could not identify the pinging that was going on around me and I felt that there was no choice, the torch would have to be activated! I fumbled with the switch and it shot out a retina burning beam that lit up one corner of the room. Well, at least I now had a contented moth. After much searching and waving the torch about I found the noisy reprobate. I could not believe my sleep dust encrusted eyes. There was a grass hopper, minding its own business, perched on the wardrobe. I must admit that I had not been introduced to these creatures face to face before and I did think it was a dried up bit of twig before it shifted its position. It looked at me. I looked back at it. It seemed quite a friendly little fellow so I gingerly reached out to shake paws with him. Startled, Gershwin, as I named him, shot off the wardrobe into the air. Goodness me! Steadying my breathing, I resettled my limbs and bought the torch back under proper control. 

It was then that I looked over to the bed and saw two pair of disgruntled beady eyes squinting at me, a naked hound, wielding an usherettes torch. Bugger. In my defence, I had been trying to protect all of us, as I tried to reason as we later sat together outside, sipping tea, ironically invading the insect worlds space as a mark of impotent revenge.

As we contemplated all of this, something hopped by. I like to think it was Gershwin, bidding us farewell as he made his way back to his home.

I do hope it will cool down soon my friend, I do not think that I suit nighttime nakedness.

Farewell for now.

The morning after the night before…