April 19, 2004

Last night I had a devil of a time going to sleep in my bunk. There was a very quiet, but steady high-pitched beep coming from somewhere, at what I reckoned to be about the speed of the clock's second hand. I recognized it from somewhere, but could not identify it right away. ...almost like the sound a Shark watch makes when you're adjusting it for a stopwatch mode or anything like that.

It was my version of the tick-tock that haunted Captain Cook.

I lay there in my bunk - wondering how everyone else in the bunk area could sleep through its exasperating consistency. ...It couldn't be a tire or other part of the bus' machinery...

I remembered seeing Chris take his mandolin out to the front lounge after I'd gotten into bed. Maybe he was practicing with his metronome.

Not wanting to disrupt the nice, little, warm cocoon I'd made of the flannel sheets I treated myself to for the cold bus, I felt around in the darkness for my cell phone that was charging at my side and called Chris. His phone rang in the front lounge and I heard him answer--first through the thin door, and then through my phone. He said he wasn't using his metronome.

No. Of course not. I knew the beep I was hearing was most definitely not the nice clicking sound his new metronome makes, but had thought maybe the tone was distorted through the wall.

I then realized the nerve wracking, itty-bitty pulse came from my right side. But my bunk is on the passenger side of the bus, and with my feet facing forward, there is nothing on my right except for the wall and two air-conditioning vents!
Ah HA! The VENTS!!

The familiar beep I now identified as the sound a disc-man makes when it's paused. Somebody's CD player, probably in a back pack and thrown into a junk-bunk along with all the other day-bags, must have been accidentally jostled on and paused.

Irritated at how long it took me to figure that out I, at last a little satisfied, bunched my comforter up against my right ear, and went to sleep.