give me a sign

Hyperbole aside, I will say that I very rarely sleep anymore, and almost never between 2am and 5:30am. Last night I listened to a whippoorwill for an hour or so. I should get up and do something, but I'm always convinced that any minute I will fall back asleep, and I don't want to miss my chance. I do hear things, though, that I might not hear if I was a normal person who slept at night. Last fall I had an owl friend. Hopefully whippoorwill will visit again.

But this is not much of a story, so I'll tell you how I got a deep discount on a nice dress. (I decided that it was critical that I have a little-black-dress and with a couple of events coming up, and no respectable dress, it became a pressing issue, and thus, off to the mall at 7:30pm last night with a credit card and a goal.) I was suffering the usual anxiety and failure that I usually experience when clothes shopping and was in the last store in which I intended to look before slinking back home empty handed. I was standing there, looking at a wall rack holding a dress that not only came in my size, but looked like something that might work. Could it be? Just then, out of the clear blue florescence of overhead mall lighting, a big four feet by four feet sign fell off a high shelf over the dresses, the edge of it landing smack in the middle of my head. I bent over in pain and sort of moaned. The young salesperson ran over and started cooing around and saying she was very sorry, although I really think she felt no personal responsibility. I think she half expected me to start yelling that I would sue, or something. She ran to the sales desk and presented me with a twenty percent off coupon as the lump on my head swelled and throbbed. I was determined to still try on the black dress, and it was an ok dress, so I bought it and I got twenty percent off. I'm not made for this whole shopping thing, but despite the lump--which has gone down some today--I pretty much scored big.