I may have been burgled. Or maybe there's a man from the future hiding in my apartment. Or a cat. Or I'm crazy. I realize that these are not mutually exclusive options.
It happened like this:
Last night I ate dinner while watching some of Grosse Pointe Blank on DVD. Dinner was leftover spaghetti, eaten right out of a tupperware container. Yes, I live the high life. It's okay to be jealous.
So that's the scene to keep in mind: me sitting on my couch, eating spaghetti and drinking water while watching a DVD, with a small stack of books beside the couch. The Best of Robert Benchley on top, deservedly. Can you see the scene clearly? Good.
What you can't see clearly, because I haven't mentioned it yet, is me not finishing the spaghetti and setting it and my glass down in front of the couch. I then let the movie run as I worked on the web site design for my upcoming podcast.
It was late, and it continued to get later. Once the movie finished I set aside my laptop and picked up Benchley. He made me laugh. Later turned into very late, and I eventually set Benchley back down and went to sleep right there on the couch.
So that's the new scene to keep in mind: my laptop, two remote controls, an empty glass, and a bowl of unfinished spaghetti on the floor before the couch; Benchley's best bits at the summit of a paperback pile; and me, curled up on the couch asleep. Still clear? Excellent, you're very good at this.
Four hours later, I woke up. That might not sound like a lot of sleep, but it's pretty typical for me. Even so, it felt like I had been awoken by something rather than just waking up naturally.
Just as I woke up, I thought I heard the sound of a door. It's not a rare sound in my apartment because the long curve of a hallway leading to my door is a very echoey one, and the doors in this building don't have those "slowy-downy" things that stop them from slamming. My first thought when I awoke was that I'd heard the sound of my neighbor's door closing across the hall.
My second thought was: hey, where's the spaghetti?
On the floor beside the couch was a pile of books. In front of the couch was my laptop, two remote controls, and the empty glass. Beside the empty glass was not a bowl of spaghetti.
I concluded that one of five things had happened:
Somebody broken into my apartment, stealing my spaghetti but leaving my laptop and wallet because he is insane.
In the future, complex carbohydrates have replaced gold as a world monetary standard. I invent a time machine, and I start dropping back on myself to yoink away my sauce covered wealth. I probably figure I owe me, and I'm probably right.
At night, the C.H.U.D.s attacked. It was only the fact that I'd set out a "sacrificial bowl of child intestines" that soften their hearts to my plight such that they delayed until this evening my painful death by gnawing. The big cannibal softies.
A neighbor's pet, such as a cat or a different cat, had become locked in my apartment. The tasty spaghetti treat and my obvious asleepedness brought it out from hiding, then it yoinked away the rest of my dinner like some time traveling carb thief.
Same as number 1, except instead of being insane he's just really hungry.
I searched my place thoroughly for the spaghetti, or for the cat from #4. No dice. No spaghetti, either. I looked in the garbage, in case I had been sleep-cleaning (though why I'd clean up the bowl but leave the glass I don't know). I searched the cupboards, the closet, the sink and tub and desk. I searched under and around and in the couch. I searched in and under everything I owned, but that bowl of spaghetti was definitely gone.
The only trace I found was the lid of the tupperware container, sitting beside the microwave where I'd left it the night before. It still had traces of sauce, so perhaps I can expect my time traveling future self to snatch it up as pocket change. Or maybe the C.H.U.D.s will baste me with it. Who knows?
So that's my maybe burglary. Did someone come in my apartment, stand right over me as I slept, and then take away the spaghetti as a trophy or a clue? Or did I sleep walk all the way down to the basement to toss it in the building's garbage bins?
Strange times in Carringtonland. If the C.H.U.D.s get me, tell the world my story.
