So tired

My insane work hours have left me bone-tired. So tired that I was grumpy this morning. So tired that I snapped at my husband. So tired that maybe I yelled a little too.

I got home from my work marathon at noon yesterday and parked myself on the couch with a glass of orange juice (which I was craving yesterday...I wound up downing three glasses, which is more than I consume in a normal month). Watched my saved episode of Dexter and a few minutes of the prior night's House, but the closed-eye part of blinking was beginning to overtake the open-eye part, so I wisely turned off the television, finished my OJ, and gave into the sweet snuggle of my two smallest animals, Gravy (the dog) and Roxy/Kitter (the kitten). They're the cuddlers of our menagerie, and served to keep me toasty since we've not yet turned on the heat.

Next thing I know, I can feel people looking at me. Those would be the children, just home from school.

I'm not normally a heavy sleeper. I wake up if it rains. I wake up if the dog gets off the bed. I wake up if my son throws up in his bedroom.

My husband had come home, been in the house for over an hour and left again, and I slept through all of it.

The rest of the evening was easy enough. I started some chicken boiling on the stove, walked the dogs, watched more television, made dinner (chicken pot pie for the meat eaters, veggie pot pie for the vegetarians), watched more television, walked the dogs again, went to bed.

The highlights? My daughter coming into the kitchen to keep me company while I prepared dinner. Eating real food. My son sitting on my lap to watch Kid Nation. The feeling of going to sleep in my bed with an extra blanket. The knowledge that the extra work I did not only will make a difference in my paycheck (and likely my paychecks to come, since my anniversary date, and performance evaluation, with the Corporation is later this month), but also made a difference in the success of the project.

Making a difference is worth losing sleep sometimes.

If I could just pull it off without the yelling the next day. That would be good.