Night Of Terror.

I just had one of the worst hours of my life. I've been up late cleaning up the kitchen. When I got home earlier I went ahead and locked all the doors to the house because Joe is away on business, and while cleaning up went to take some recycling out to the garage and locked myself out of the house. I knew as soon as I heard the door slam I was in trouble. It was like slow motion and it was instant panic. I actually got dizzy for a few seconds. The kids are all upstairs sound asleep. So I'm running around the house (in bare feet) checking all the doors and windows. All locked. I'm trying to decide what to do. Do I ring the doorbell? Do I throw rocks at the boys room? They are both heavy sleepers and I don't want to scare them half to death not to mention I don't think either one would answer the door in the middle of the night. So I do what any other woman in their right mind would do. I call my mommy. Yes, I did. Luckily my cell was in the van in the garage. Apparently she fell out of bed and was running around the bed looking for the phone because she thought something was wrong at the hospital (see Max post.) She's completely out of it because she'd been asleep for a long time. So, she wakes up Don to see what I should do. His great advice was, "Doesn't she have a key?" Go back to bed Don! So we decide I should call a locksmith. I call every single locksmith in the yellow pages. I'm getting no one even though they advertise 24 hour emergency service. Either their services were discontinued or the machine would refer me to another number that ended up being useless, etc. I actually left a few messages in the hopes that someone would get it. But its 11:30 at night! I'm trying to figure out what to do when I get a call from some unknown number and I'm getting all excited that someone has called me back. I say "hello" and this automated voice says "Good-bye" --click. That was when the tears started. It's now been about 1/2 hour and decide to call the police. They're going to send an officer to help me break in. 20 minutes goes by. I finally get Joe on the phone...he's much more panicked than I am. He says, "what are the chances there's a random key loose in the van?" I start looking just to make him happy because I know there's not going to be one. I find this old nasty key underneath the stereo console. I swear I have never seen this key before in my life. It doesn't look anything like our house keys. I figure what the heck, slide it in the hole. The door opens. I scream, "HOLY SH*T IT FITS!!"' Yep, I said it, and I'd say it again. Long story short, I'm in. I'm exhausted. Thanks, Emily, for keeping me company while I waited and making me laugh. When in doubt, tell funny mom stories! Ha, Ha! Thanks, mommy, for praying for me.