where did the time go?

J stole my alarm clock.

I spent Saturday practicing bad sleep hygiene (a term I just learned from GC). Running on three hours of sleep, the hard work of watching cartoons finally got to me. I penned everyone up in my bedroom, closed the closet door, checked that the TV cord was out of reach and all outlets plugged, then crashed. I woke up again to hear L say, "Brother, be careful" and to see J standing in the middle drawer of our dresser. No, it wasn't on the floor. I've never jumped out of bed faster.

Once the kids were relatively safe again, I discovered the missing clock. I looked through every drawer, under the bed, even in the closet (which had remained closed). It wasn't in the bathtub, in the now-empty Kleenex box, or under the covers. I even gave John my watch to see what he would do with it: put in the empty Kleenex box, as I suspected. With as many visual cues

He'd been trapped inside the room, so I know it had to be around somewhere. It certainly wasn't stuffed up his shirt, and I could guess that it would be somewhere below waist-height. My suspect wasn't talking.

We found it in the trash can, underneath three pairs of clean socks.