MONDAY THINGS: A Little Sleep, A Little Slumber...

Drool sells it everytime

I think it's a valuable enough skill, that I am willing to suggest that every man should develop the art of pretending to be asleep.  I first began to employ this tactic while I was still living with my parents.  They seemed to possess particular disdain for gaseous expulsions, blanketedly attributed to me (I'm pretty sure dad and the dog found this convenient) and I found their reactions much less severe when they perceived me to be sleeping.  Through 5 years(ish) of marriage I like to think that I've perfected fake sleep.  It has helped me avoid changing dirty diapers, performing manual labor around the house, and long, meaningful conversations. 
Also, now that everyone in my life believes that I require 13 hours of sleep a day, it's a faithful standby escape strategy in every social situation.  I've noticed recently that my kids may be on to me.  They've been trying to excercise the strategic move when it's time to take a bath, go to the doctor, or (ironically) go to bed.  They suck at it... way too easy to break.  That's okay though, someone needs to do the yardwork when I'm "sleeping" through the weekend.

Last night I was awoken by repeated gentle knocks on our bedroom door.  I stealthily entered fake sleep mode just in case it was a kid... or a robber.  When our kids were babies and communicated only by screaming their friggin heads off, (always at 3am) my wife used to try and wait me out.  But, I am really good at this, and thankfully she's given up.  After the second round of knocks she began guessing who it was by calling out names.  She guessed both of our son's names first and hit paydirt on her second attempt. The child entered the room when he heard his name and began negotiating for a place in our bed.  My fake asleep ears perked up as he, rather impressively for a 3 year old, made his case for being permitted to join us.  He claimed that it was cold in his room and there was a bear upstairs.  I waited for my wife's motherly scorn to bring the hammer down on his ridiculous idea... surely, she wouldn't buy this crap.  But to my horror, she not only permitted his existance in our bed, she used the threat of a squirmy bed-wetter for the perfect counter measure to fake sleep... the risk of losing real sleep.  She sweetly scooped him up in her arms and instructed him that he could crawl on the opposite side of daddy and spend the remainder of the night there.  It obviously became necessary at this point to blow my cover and put an end to the victory dance my son had started performing on my midsection.  My wife has declared war on fake sleep, I've got to find the next level.