Barefoot, blind and barely awake

I have these neighbors who can't seem to figure out their car alarm. They're always setting it off accidentally, especially early in the morning. I am used to this. Which is why I shouldn't have been suprised or disturbed in any way when it went off the other morning — weeeee-ooooo, weeee-ooooo, weeeee-oooooo. The problem was, I was deep, deep into a dream in which I had a really fun little scooter. And when the car alarm sounded, I thought, someone is stealing my motherfucking scooter, noooooo! So I leap out of bed and barrel out the door without fully waking up. Of course, as soon as I get out there I realize that a) it's the neighbor's car, b) I do not own a scooter, and no one has scooter alarms anyway, and c) my front door has just locked behind me. I am in my pajamas and not wearing my glasses. This is where I should mention that I am blind as a bat. Without them, I am like Velma, feeling around some creepy cave going, "Oh no! My glasses! Where are my glasses? Jinkies!"

I panic for a brief moment, then I remember the little hide-a-key turtle I keep on the deck in the backyard. No problem, right? So I go back around to the deck, and I'm looking and looking, and guess what? No turtle. How is this possible? I'm thinking. Where the hell does an inanimate hide-a-key turtle go? I think that it must be there, I just can't see it because I'm so blind. So I crawl around on the deck for a while, looking everywhere. Still no turtle. Then I come up with the brilliant idea of kicking in one of my basement windows. They're shutter-style, and the locks are weak. So I give the window a few good kicks before deciding I would rather not risk having a huge shard of glass lodge in my bare foot. On to another idea. My dining room window looks like it's unlocked, so I pry off the screen. Of course, it's locked, and I'm an idiot.

I walk around the front yard for a little while, cursing and generally looking like a crazy person. Have I mentioned that I have no clue what time it is? It's about sunrise, but because I never get up early I have no idea when that is. So I knock quietly on a neighbor's door for help, but I bail because I'm paranoid that it's insanely early. (Turns out it was 6:30ish, so, good call.) I decide to assess the situation with the basement door. While I'm under the deck checking that out, I see something. The turtle! Apparently it fell off the deck. It broke apart in the fall, so of course, no key. I drop to my hands and knees and blindly paw around for a while, digging for it among the dirt and rocks and groundcover plants. That goes about as well as you might expect.

I give up. You win, forces of the universe. I happen to see a gardening tool I had left out the night before. One swift swing and one broken door pane later, I'm back in the house, filthy and with a squinty headache. Moral of the story: Don't keep important stuff in a plastic turtle.