Tigers and Texting

This morning I woke up, after a long restless night full of dreams with tigers mauling people to death, and lying half awake trying to remember if I locked the door and if that noise was someone in the hall, or breaking into my apartment, or inside my apartment. Walking out of the bedroom and two feet to the bathroom was a trek of terror, because I caught a glimpse of my reflection in the full length mirror at the end of the hall, and my heart decided to break free and make a run for it, poor thing. 

My thought process is not the most clear in the middle of the night. 

But what I really want to tell you about is waking up. I turn my cell phone off at night to avoid late night or early morning calls, and also brain tumors. So this morning when I came to, un-mauled by shadow tigers or mirror men, I turned my phone on to check the time. (Not to sound my age, but there's not a clock in my bedroom.) 

The time was 8:30, and it was Saturday, and I was so happy and rolled over to go back to sleep. I figured another hour wouldn't hurt, since I had a traumatic night to recover from. Two minutes later, my phone beeped. An alarm? A phone call? Maybe my editor, with more contact info for the story I'd just been assigned, or, heaven forbid, maybe a source calling me back. 

My thought process is not the clearest when I am just waking up, either. 

I blindly groped for the phone and peered at its screen. A text message. From my little brother. The word 'fratricide' slid across my heavy lidded eyes. The all important query that the 14 year old felt he must know on a Saturday morning before 9: "So...sup?"

Fortunately, I didn't reply with exactly the words in my mind,  because our mother would probably not have appreciated it. I decided it was time to lay down the texting law.

I began by helping him to see the error of his ways, on his own: I asked him what time it was, and if he knew what day of the week it was? Sometimes, 14 year olds are a little out of the loop, and I wanted to be fair. 

But he knew, the child was fully aware: it is saturday 8:30

Me: Yeah, so why are you texting me?

14 Year Old Brother: lol i was bored? and everyone else was sleeping i figured you where a college student and would be up paaarrrtttyy

Obviously, he had such a warped view and understanding of life, college students, time, weekends, spelling and logic that there was really nothing more to say except to set up acceptable texting time parameters. 

And make some coffee, because there is nothing like being woken up by a 14 year old brother from over 100 miles away! Little brother, don't worry: there's not an app for fratricide. Yet.