After living with someone, plus two dogs, for five years, having an empty house is startlingly quiet. You tend to jump at things that never would have bothered you in the past. Take last night, for instance.
I had just gone to bed, and I hear a rattling from the back door. Now, the alarm system is armed, and had I thought things through, I probably would have taken the time to grab the shotgun and load it, and still be ready in time to blow a hole in whoever walked in the door before they set the alarm off… But no, I go down the hallway, buck naked, and grab the axe I had sitting by the garage door. By this point, the thought had crossed my mind that it might be one of the seemingly infinite number of cats we have plauging our neighborhood trying to get in, but by the time I picked up that axe, the thought was firmly in my mind that it was NOT just some cat, but someone trying to jimmy the door.
So, axe in hand, I flip on the back lights, and what do I see? A cat, running off to the fence. Boy do I feel like an idiot.
Still, it took me over half an hour to calm down… With a loaded shotgun under the bed.
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