I went to sleep last night by ten, in a bed full of kids.  Nathan woke up around 2, coughing and complaining, so I brought him water and tissue and then got back into bed and stewed until 4.  I used to have insomnia when I was little; like eight and nine years old.  I remember being at my dad’s house, sleeping on the black and white houndstooth sofa bed and watching the digital clock over the television slowly make its way through the early morning hours.  It was always the worst on Sunday nights, when I knew I needed to sleep because I had school. 

Today when 4 a.m. arrived, I realized it wasn’t doing me any good to try and sleep when all I had going for me was tight muscles because of a mild sense of panic about the stuff I need to do.  I got out of bed and sent a few emails for work.  After about ten minutes, Sophie came to get me because she’d had a bad dream, and so I got back into bed so that she could sleep.

This is, I realize, a fascinating list of events.  I will give you a chance to click to greener pastures now, [GO] because I’m going to be an ass and blog the dream I had sometime between 4:30 and 5:45, when I actually did sleep.  Look, I know it’s wrong, but it’s the most interesting thing that I am willing to share at the moment.

So.  I am at the airport with Willow, who is an infant in a babysling again.  We’re waiting for a flight somewhere, and the flight attendant comes and finds me in the gate waiting area and wants me to come check out something on the plane before everyone else boards.  She somehow knows that I don’t like to fly, and she wants to make me feel better.  We walk down the jetway, and get to the door of the plane, where I can see the pilots in the cockpit, getting everything in order.  She invites me to get in the plane, and so I do. 

Next it comes to pass that it’s just me and Willow and Giovanni Ribisi in the plane.  Only, he’s not an actor, he’s like an airplane mechanic or something, and before I know what’s going on, the plane starts moving.  No one is flying it, though G does have headphones on and seems to be talking to someone.  I cry as the plane takes off and does a really unsettling turn over San Jose.

G is concerned with my reaction, so he takes off the headphones and tells me that it’s his job to make sure the plane is working right, and not to worry and that we’re going to land.  And, everything is on autopilot!  So, we do land, on 880 (a freeway that is right by the airport) and then he is driving the plane back to the airport along the surface streets, with me and Willow sitting in the seat next to him.  We are talking about his job and how much he likes it.  He says he loves the fact that he gets to fly planes, but doesn’t have to go far away and can still have a beer or five with his San Jose homies (that’s what he said, don’t blame me) every night. 

When we are almost back to the airport, I check my email on my iPhone and see a message from my buddy from work, Hoku.  He is telling me that because G didn’t respond to the control tower (because he had the headphones off to chat with me.  About his homies!) they’ve decided that the plane met a bad end and have sent out a DefCon4 Warning.  Or something like that.  And G was all, Whoops! Haha! Won’t they be glad to see us?