in order to tell you about it, i first have to give you a little background. last night mat and i headed over to our friends' graeme and todd's place to celebrate graeme's 27th with an impromptu dinner party. there was much drinking and smoking and eating and laughing, and i think we all had a pretty good time. so good, in fact, that it was after 1 a.m. by the time we left.

so mat drives me home, and on way there i ask him if before he leaves he would come with me to walk the dog, 'cause it's late and i live in a pretty shady neighbourhood. he agrees. so we're walking the dog, and we go around the block, and i get to my front door, and bang. no keys.

i am shitting myself. i *knew* that i'd brought them out with me (i locked the door, didn't i???) and now i had come to the almost extreme certainty that i'd dropped them. somewhere. in parkdale. in the dark. at two in the morning.

we look all over the place. can't find them ANYWHERE. we even dump the trashcan that i put my dog's shit in. it was a fucking nightmare.

i am panicking. i don't want to knock on my landlord's door, 'cause other people live in the house with him, and it was, after all, 2 a.m. ... so i turn to mat and say, "i have two choices. one: i can bang on my landlords' door until he gets up, or i can break in. what would you do ...?" and a half an hour later i was climbing up his shoulders into my own window. it was now around 4 a.m.

so when the alarm went off this morning, i'd gotten about 3 hours sleep total. i tried to drag it out a bit by repeatedly hitting my snooze button, but suddenly, about a half an hour earlier than when i absolutely needed to get up, my eyes just popped open. i was awake, alert, and rarin' to go. this NEVER happens.

THEN .... on the way to work (i left 20 minutes early to give myself some time to go around the block again) i found my keys. they were exactly where i'd thought i'd dropped them the night before. i guess 'cause it was so dark, we couldn't see them.

THEN ... go to the convenience store to get a pack of cigarettes, and am forced to use one of those money-grubbing convenience store ATMachines. hit "yes" to the $2 charge they're gouging out of me in the name of convenience (on top of my regular bank ATM fees), and go to withdrawl $20. 'Cept $40 pops out. My statement reads that only $20 was taken from my account. I double checked when i got to work online to make sure. *grin*.

yah, i know it's stealing, technically ... haha ...

ask me on my deathbed if i'm still thinking about it. wheee!

... to be continued ...