It's absolutely no secret that I am quite possibly the world's heaviest sleeper™. My entire life it has been an absolute nightmare for anyone who has needed to wake me up. I've slept through storms, dogs jumping on me, phones ringing in my ears, full volume conversations, and literal haircuts (a story for another time). So knowing this information, it should come as no surprise to you that a couple weeks ago we had an extremely bad storm, like the house was shaking from the thunder and everything. My mom came into my room to make sure I was okay (sweet, isn't she?) and there she saw me, sleeping like a sweet angel completely oblivious to what was going on around me.
Anyway, today my mom needed me to get up early (and I'm so not a morning person) to help her and some others with some renovations we're doing on the house. After having woken up at 9am and (truth be told) quite literally doing nothing, I decided that I earned a well-deserved nap at around 11:45am. I was in my mom's room helping her pack for her next adventure outside the house (read: laying in her bed cuddling her cat) when I decided that this was very clearly the perfect place to take said nap. (I very rarely lay down in my mom's bed, but hers is so much more comfortable than mine that it's honestly hard to not want to sleep in it.) She finished up her packing and I dozed off to sweet slumber with the softest cat on the Earth's surface.
You see, this was the case... until I was awoken by thunder booming. Now, remember how I said that I'm a heavy sleeper? Well typically no storm ever wakes me up. Knowing that, you can understand why I was slightly concerned when it did wake me up. Sleepily and confused, I laid in bed while the thunder continued to get louder and start to shake the house. Our house is old, sure, but storms don't typically shake it unless it's really bad. Since at that point I was home alone with the cats, I figured I should check to make sure that there wasn't a tornado warning. If there was, I wanted to make sure I gave myself enough time to round up both of the cats and head into the basement. First step to that would be finding my phone... which was no where to be found around me.
No worries, I don't think I brought it into mom's room or even downstairs for that matter... It's probably in my bedroom, right? Wrong. I go into my room and search for it, but it's no where to be found. I gently tear up my room looking for it, but I can't find it anywhere. The thunder continues to boom and shake the house.
Did I bring it downstairs? Maybe I blocked it from my memory when I brought it downstairs? Wrong. I headed downstairs and checked all the places that I thought it could have been, but again to no avail I couldn't find it. The thunder still booming in the background.
Okay, no reason to panic... I'll just call it. Even if the volume is off, my FitBit will vibrate if it's in the house. I pick up the phone in the kitchen and dial my number without even bringing it to my ear. I wait a few moments (our phones can be slow because they're old)... but I hear nothing. I wait a bit longer but still, nothing. I hang up the phone and check to see if it has a dial tone, but I hear absolutely nothing. At this point the thunder is practically on the verge of having a baby outside my house, seemingly having strikes that are getting closer and closer together.
Alright, well I know sometimes my kitchen phone can be funky, I'll just try the one on the family room. Or so I thought. I picked up the phone in the family room and once again, I was met with no dial tone. At this point, I was definitely getting anxious because I felt like I was trapped with the thunder continuously getting angrier outside.
Okay, well on the off chance that there is a tornado warning, the tv would surely say something. I take the remote and flick on the TV, only to be met with the same reaction as the phones.... Absolute nothingness. Just simply floating text telling me that the servers were trying to connect to each other.
Well, at this point I had the trifecta of the inability to get anything to work, the racing thunder crashing outside and shaking the house, and the absolute confusion of where my phone could possibly be. You know what was born from this trifecta? The complete and utter conviction that there was a tornado heading straight for my house and I had absolutely no way of knowing.
Frantic and panicked, I ran upstairs as fast as I could. I tore up my entire bedroom, cursing the entire time about how I couldn't find my phone while my anxiety matched the thunder. Nothing. I ran into my mom's room, frantically looking. Nothing. I raced back downstairs and tore up downstairs. Still nothing.
At this point, I convinced myself that surely my mom must have taken my phone by accident. I, somehow and I'm not even sure how in all honestly, wiggled my kitchen phone into working. I desperately dialed her number. When she picked up, at lightening speed I asked her if she had my phone and she said something I was dreading, "no".
While continuing to race around the house searching while the thunder screamed outside my house, I told her the predicament that I was in: terrified that maybe there was a tornado warning and I had no way of knowing because I couldn't find my phone and nothing was working. She asked me if I accidentally tucked it in the bed. No, I didn't tuck it in the bed, come on? I was asleep in your room, I didn't make your bed.
"Well did you check under the cat?"
... How could I have been so stupid to not check the entire bed? I walked into her room and very calmly stuck my hand under where the cat was laying... And sure enough, there was my phone which she must have been using as a personal heater.
Anyway, TLDR: I worked myself into a frinzey and convinced myself a tornado was heading straight for my house... Even though we've never even been close to that... And now I know to check under the cat when I can't find something.