Who WAS that harridan?

Ok. I admit it. I am not a morning person despite being an early riser. In fact, and MBH will whole heartedly vouch for this, until I have been up for about an hour AND (this is the most important part) had my first cup of coffee, I am frankly unbearable. Most mornings I grumble, stagger around running into more things than usual (grace is definitely NOT my middle name), and am generally just this side of cranky. But this morning I surpassed cranky. I was a down right termagant. I guess the fact that I have been sick for over ten days now probably contributed to some of my pissiness but I am sure the major reason was that until 2am this morning I was wide awake.

We live in a quintesential Boston triple decker. The building is divided into three separate apartments and we live in the middle one. MBH and I are early to bed, early to rise people. On most nights at 9:30pm we are in bed reading and asleep by 10:30 at the latest. We also are up and out the door most mornings by 6:30AM. Our neighbors on either side of us unfortunatley are exactly opposite. The folks above us are prone to moving furniture, doing their laundry (their washer/dryer is directly above our bedroom), and generally tromping around on the hardwood floors at all hours of the night with the most activity seeming to be between the hours of 1AM and 3AM. The folks below us like to have friends over after 10pm until at least 1AM three nights a week. Their living room is directly below our bedroom. We cope with these opposite life styles by having a lovely, soothing background noise CD of waves that acts as a sound masker at night so we can sleep.

Last night however, the forces of the neighbors came together and all the sea waves in the world were not going to block out the noise. From 11pm until almost 2AM both neighbors were as active as busy bees. Upstairs they were literally hauling furniture up and down stairs (who HAS that much furniture??!!). Downstairs, our neighbors had two couples over at 10:30pm who, in addition to playing some movie with lots of explosions at max volume, had small children running and screaming through the house until at least 1AM. Finally, just when I was about at my wits end and was going to become one of those neighbors you read about in your morning newspaper, the house settled down. By 2AM, I could finally fall asleep. MBH, being the type who would sleep through an explosion, of course was peacefully snoring next to me as he had been when he fell asleep at 10pm.

Poor MBH, he was at the receiving end of my crankiness this morning. He woke up at our normal 5AM all bright eyed, bushy tailed and ready to greet the day. I, on the other hand, was jerked out of my first sound sleep of the night. Needless to say, I was more than peevish. I was in a crabby, cross, disagreeable, grouchy, grumpy, ill-humored, ratty, snappish, tetchy, and down right ugly and foul mood. I snapped at MBH for being in a good mood. I growled at LB (our cat) for demanding his breakfast half an hour earlier than normal. I stormed to the bathroom to make myself presentable for the coffee shop and then flopped into bed pouting that I had not had enough sleep, my head was still stuffed up, and excoriating our neighbors and landlord. MBH rightfully declared he did not desire my company at the coffee shop this morning and left me to my own devices.

Now, three hours of sleep later, I know it is going to be an expensive trip we take to the New England Mobile Book Fair. I think I owe MBH big time...