Of Duvets, Dogs and Dozing Denied.

I'm knackered! No sleep AGAIN last night. My eyes look like half-tomatoes in saucers of soy sauce. This has got to stop.
I know the cause of my perma-wake. I'm not on speed. I don't snort the Colombian marching powder. I don't spend the whole night making passionate love - well, not to anyone else. It's not because my mind goes into turmoil every time my head hits the pillow as I worry about whether my leading washing powder could outsmart New Improved Bold. No, I know the cause. It's my bloody dogs!
The married and otherwise mate-manacled among you will no doubt be familiar with the duvet wrestling, gassing and snoring contest which constitutes a night in bed. There is the "voluminous arse in your back" manouevre which leaves you teetering on the edge, the arm-across the face technique, the I-prefer-sleeping-diagonally ruse, the that's-no-warthog-I-can't-help-my-breathing bullshit and the that-sauce-was-really-rich-wasn't-it? excuse.

I am under attack in all those ways each night but not from some unfeasibly large breasted, XX-chromosomed type. No, I get it from the dogs (well, three of them. The fourth, my alsatian, is reduced to the indignity of sleeping in a dog basket downstairs). Before bedtime battle commences, there is the trial of finding a slivver of bed to lie on in the first place. The chaps tend to morph across the duvet and challenge you to get in (see photo evidence). Will they move? Will they beggary! ALL of them snore, NONE of them are strangers to the world of methane production and ALL of them dream vividly, thrashing their legs about wildly as they do so.
Yes, I know, so why do I let them in the bedroom? I have tried shutting them in the kitchen - they just howl a la Big Dog From Baskerville. I have tried just shutting them out of the bedroom - they scratch/headbutt the door until I relent and let them in and if I don't they make artistic creations on the landing out of shit. In short, I am blackmailed by the little critters and then bullied by them in bed.


To make it worse, when I finally give up at dawn and get up, one of the contingent just refuses point-blank to get out of bed, no matter how much she is cajoled or shoved. I have to make the sodding bed with her still in it (again, see photo evidence)!! That's as annoying as when you have to go to work and you look back to see your partner snuggled up, with a blissful grin on her face, and she murmurs "yeah, bye, day off today" without opening their eyes as you shuffle away and out into the cold for another day of misery at t'mill.
Duvet-dedicated dogs can go to Grantham. I want those ones on Disney films which just lie peacefully in front of a roaring log fire - and don't fart or snore!