How to NOT get a good night's sleep.

I've been tired and crotchety today. And, it is (mostly) my own fault. I fear I'm the victim of an over-active imagination - and have at my finger tips - a whole web of information with which to feed it...

Last night, with the Ger-Man away with work, my over-active imagination went into over-drive.

The catalyst was our upstairs neighbour, who I had seen earlier yesterday, as I was heading out to pick the Caspi-Man up from Kindergarten. He whisked very quickly past me on the stairs -and continued on to the cellar carrying many bulging plastic bags and an uncharacteristically bright multi-coloured backpack.

Our upstairs neighbour, Herr Upstairs, is definitely a bit strange. I’d guess he is in his early forties, lives alone, and comes across as an unremarkable, conservative, suit-wearing business man. He is always polite (but never ‘friendly’) when we pass on the stairs. He always seems to be in a hurry. No-one seems to know anything much about him.

Herr Upstairs keeps very strange hours. He is often home during the day AND he seems to be nocturnal. Since he moved in – a series of the strangest noises have peppered our nights.

(Am sure Herr & Frau Grumpypants below are holding us responsible for EACH and EVERY sound that filters down to their level.)

For a while after he first moved in - I’d had him pegged as either a closet transvestite, or the purchaser of certain (um) “late night delivery services”, as we would often hear the click clack of high heels in the wee small hours. There are also bizarre scraping noises, knocks and loud thuds (that sound like serious furniture rearranging) which are seriously intriguing and frankly, unexplainable. (There's never any loud music, blaring television, or social noises.) He goes through periods where he likes to use a power drill late at night. Most often in the bathroom. Recently he has also taken up hammering. But the power drill is his favourite.

Ordinarily, this doesn't bother us too much, we're sound sleepers and, hey, if a bit of DIY in high heels at 2am floats your boat -and it's not waking the Caspi-Man - then who are we to spoil your fun?

But last night the scrapes, thuds and drill pulses, were, well, a bit scary really. And as one that has read more than her fair share of thriller novels ... well ...

So I decided to do a quick internet search- just to put my mind at ease- that there hadn't been a spate of people going missing lately that I may not have been aware of. (Certainly, I hadn't heard anything on the news and, no-one has been gossiping about it - but still.) I searched for "missing+people+duesseldorf" ... and ... discovered that Duesseldorf's already had a notorious serial killer! One Peter Kurtin, (1883-1931), who was known as the "Vampire of Duesseldorf". Apparently he started off by torturing and killing animals...

Mind, definitely NOT AT EASE now, - because at this point I remembered there actually IS a serial rabbit killer, (The Rabbit Ripper) on the loose around Dortmund (NOT FAR FROM HERE), and police suspect he/she could move on to humans ...

All of which did not make for a peaceful night's slumber.