I’ve had a strange week

First things first, this is a throw away account. The likeliest cause of what is happening to me is I have gone insane. Don’t get me wrong I still think I’m making sane decisions but I think my inputs are screwed up and I’m not entirely in control of me. Assuming I am insane, I don’t want to announce it to the world. I’d prefer to do it quietly and anonymously.
The other thing you should know is I’m no writer. If it helps, think of me as an auto mechanic. It isn’t far from the truth but far enough so it won’t help people identify me.
I’ve had a strange week.
Sunday (1 week ago). I took a break from watching football. After I flicked off the flat screen, movement on the TV caught my attention. I saw the reflection of an old man shambling by the back of my yard. There is a walking path behind my house so this isn’t unusual. What caught my attention was he was wearing a carny hat (the kind popular in the 40s or 50s) and an overcoat. He appeared to be staring directly into my house. I turned my head to take a look at him but no one was there. I assumed that I miss-judge the angle of the TV and thought nothing further of it.
Tuesday. About 6:30 PM, this is just after sunset (it goes down early up here) but there is still some residual light, I get a knock at my backdoor. This is unusual, I have few visitors and they all come from the street to the front door. My backdoor is mostly a window with a door handle and as I approach I see the man in the carny hat. He is a well-dressed older gentleman dressed more for the 1950s than today but the look is stylish. His eyes are bloodshot and weepy like he is in pain. His lips are moving, mumbling, trying to say something.
I figured he was stroking out or having a heart attack. As I reach for the door, my dog makes a whining, growling noise and I grab for her collar to get her under control before opening the door. When I look back up the dude is gone…vanished. I open the door and step outside thinking he had fallen of the deck in the fraction of a second I looked away, and I see nothing. I release my dog, thinking she will find the guy and she bolts back into the house. The dog isn’t brave on the best of days but this isn’t one of her better days.
I scan the back yard…nothing. He couldn’t possibly have left my backyard in the brief instance I looked down at my dog but I scan the walking path and I think I see him 30 yards down the path to the left but in the dusk light I can’t be sure. I am way too freaked out to go off into the dark alone but I think he wants me to follow him. I have no idea how I know that or why I think I know that.
Wednesday. I wake up sick… crazy sick. I went to bed feeling fine. I wake up and my lungs are on fire. I curl up into a fetal ball every time I had to cough and I cough often. My body also aches from every muscle. I called in sick to work. This is one of the rare times I’ve done that when actually sick… unions are great.
Thursday. Worse. Far worse. I called in sick again. Lungs are better… body is worse. I’m ravenous which I take for a good sign. A hot bath has me feeling normal.
Friday. I think I’ve got this thing licked except…I’ve begun sleep walking. I woke up Friday morning at about 3 AM. I was up the street about a hundred yards from my house, on a route me and my dog normally walk. This sleep-walking thing has never happened before… that I know of. I was dressed for the weather (which isn’t how I sleep, of course). I had a jacket, gloves and an earmuff on. I’m freaked out. This has been a crazy week.
I felt great today, physically. There was some residual pain but it wasn’t debilitating. I went back to work.
I might be getting paranoid. I’ve begun to think the sleep walking thing isn’t new. I recall earlier in the week an unlocked door in the morning when I was pretty sure I locked it the previous night. I wish I had someone to talk this out with but it is all so insane.
I have a cheap motion sensitive camera. I call it the critter camera. I had something living under my deck last year. I thought it might be a rabbit; it turned out to be a skunk. Skunks and dogs are not a good combination but, I digress.
Once I got home, I decided it was a good time to dust off the critter camera. I plugged it in and put it on a chair and pointed it so it had a good view my front door (from the inside, of course). If I was sleep walking, this will confirm it.
Saturday. It didn’t seem possible for things to get any weirder but they did in a big way. Yes, I am sleepwalking. I watched to video footage of me leaving at about 1AM and I didn’t see the half-lidded zombie I expected. I was alive. I was more alive than I’ve been in years. I was happy. I was wearing an ear-to-ear ****-eating grin. I looked directly into the critter camera, winked and shot it 3 times with finger guns. “Pow, pow, powâ€, I mouthed. The critter camera does not record audio and I don’t read lips but, it doesn’t take a genius to figure it out. I then throw my head back and silently laugh. I grab my winter jacket, slid on my shoes and exit through the front door.
My subconscious is having way more fun than I am. I’m actually jealous. I’m not depressed, or anything, but I’m not throw-my-head-back-laughing kind of happy, or ever have been.
I return a little over 2 hours later. The smile has faded slightly but I manage a quick wink at the critter camera and a salute before removing my coat and exiting the scene.
I think about this video for a couple hours and then decide to go shopping.
First stop, liquor store. A case of beer isn’t going to fix anything but I doubt it will make things worse. Second stop, Running Room. I bought a GPS watch. I intend to wear it tonight and return it tomorrow. These ****ers are expensive. The lady that helped me gave me the you-are-no-runner look. I wonder if she practices that in a mirror on her breaks. She is really good at it. **** her.
I drank too much and went to bed very relaxed.
Sunday (i.e. today). Woke up feeling like **** again. It is a mix of hangover and muscle fatigue. The two mix together seamlessly and I can’t tell where one starts and the other takes over.
I synched the watch up to the computer and then things got weird. 10,000 ****ing steps since I went to bed… 9,874 to be exact. 8 ****ing Kilometers! I’m panicking. My heart is pounding like a jackhammer. I don’t have a clue what is going on. It takes me a few minutes to get my **** together and then dig deeper into this Garmin web page.
Good news! I’m not sleepwalking. The bad news is, I’m sleep running. The first part of my journey, according to Garmin was 6.45 minutes per kilometer. I don’t know if runner would consider this a good pace, nor I don’t really care. Walking speed according to Google is about 10 minutes per kilometer, if that can be trusted. The last part of my journey was 8.04 minutes per kilometer. Clearly my couch potato training has left me unable to sustain my new running pace. This does explain why I have been feeling like **** lately. One mystery solved and a new one to consider.
To explain to the non-runners, the Garmin webpage shows the route you ran overlaid on what appear to be Google Maps so you can see almost exactly where you went. It is very cool. I’m impressed.
With all that Garmin webpage magic, the middle part of my nighttime journey is still hard to explain. My pace slackens to 13.46 minutes per kilometer and I go round-and-round in a very small circle. I can’t really judge the size of the circle from the map but I’d guess the diameter of the circle to be between 10 – 20 feet. I apologize for switching between metric and standard measurements but that is how my brain thinks.
I’ve printed the map off and me and the dog are going to go for a walk. The path leads into a nearby Provincial park which I’m familiar with. I’m not sure if I’ve been to the exact location of my circular spinning.
I will let you know what I find.


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