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Predictably we had a terrible night’s sleep. I felt too poorly to go with the family to Bewilderwood, which was the whole point of the trip. I stayed in the hotel room and tried and failed to sleep and did a bit of research for tomorrow’s RHLSTP. It was an utter disaster, only compounded by the fact that I had another night of shitty sleep to get through. Followed by a double podcast record. I may not make it to Monday.
All in all it would have been better for everyone if I’d stayed at home. With only three people in the room it might have been easier for the adult to sleep (the kids slept fine, once they were down, even Ernie who’d gone on the floor and had his head resting on the base of a table - probably how they did things in the 19th Century) and I might have recuperated and even done some efficient work. I felt like I was doing the right thing for the family by coming, but in hindsight (and a reasonable person’s foresight) the right thing would have been to leave them to it.
In one of my brief moments of sleep I dreamed that my ear fell off. Not for any reason, it just dropped off. I did what I assume I’d do if this happened in real life and immediately tried to press it back into place, hoping that it would somehow stick and take and the problem would be solved. But again, very true to life (if you ignore the bit about the ear just falling off for no reason) the ear stuck for a moment before sliding off again. I can’t imagine why I’d be dreaming of losing body parts. I guess if I have a pair of something I am just destined to jettison one of them.
When the kids were back from their fun day out I took them on a walk round the hotel to give their mum a moment’s rest and then when Phoebe was bored, I did a second lap with Ernie alone. I wondered if he’d recognise any of the rooms from his time with Sweetcorn and Fishfinger. We found our way into some kind of function room on the first floor, which was empty. Ernie claimed to recognise the very 20th Century temporary stage at the end of the room and got up on it and started singing what sounded like an improvised song about sunshine. “I used to sing this with my brothers,” he claimed before adding that he had to do his best because he couldn’t pronounce “sunshine” properly as he was too little. He’s either a reincarnated Victorian (from a pretty weird family) or has a very fertile imagination. For his sake I hope it’s the first one. I hate to think of someone I love so much having to go down the same path as I did.
A mildly disappointing and expensive dinner in the hotel to end our brief stay, before going to bed again with a mixture of exhaustion and dread. I fell asleep very easily (and so did our knackered kids) but woke up after a couple of hours and felt claustrophobic and hot. I had the genius idea of sleeping in the bath (with a couple of pillows serving as a mattress). It was at least cool in there, but I didn’t sleep. At 6 am my son had got up from his crazy floor bed and was sleeping next to his mum. I tried sleeping under the table and found it was actually pretty nice down there. I got a good ten minutes before the kids woke up.
How do so many parents get through this without dying?
