When does baby brain stop?

I realised at 4pm today that the jumper I’ve been wearing all day was on backwards.  And I’ve lost an avocado.  I had planned to put it in the airing cupboard to ripen it (a tried and tested trick) but it seems I never got that far and I’ll be damned if I can find it. 

For the past month or so the baby monitor has been acting up on us.  It will only hold its charge for five minutes when not plugged in, beeps incessantly and has come very close to being smashed against the wall.  Today I had the brainwave of putting in new batteries and, hard to believe I know, but it’s now working perfectly.

Alby often wakes up within an hour or so of going to bed, a pattern that on a bad night can be repeated until midnight.  Mark and I have spent weeks of our lives theorizing about the cause – is he hungry, too full, too hot, too cold, teething…  A couple of nights ago I was in the kitchen cleaning up and had the radio on.  Alby woke up and it was only when I was in his room that I realised how much sound travels in the house.  (This despite me having spent a number of evenings cursing Mark under my breath when he is home and listening to the radio downstairs whilst I put Alby down for the night.  It is so loud even when it’s quiet). 

It’s as though any noise from the kitchen moves directly to his bedside.  And so for the past few nights I have closed all the doors downstairs, kept the TV volume down low and all other appliances turned off.  And quel surprise – without the spin cycle on the washer and me banging about in the kitchen Alby has been sleeping at least a four hour stretch each night.

How has it taken me 6 months to work out that closing the door and keeping the house quiet (really really quiet) is a good idea?

Why did I not think of changing the batteries?

When will I learn to dress myself?

And, where in the world is that bloomin’ avocado?

As a bit of a side note, there is some comfort to be found in the fact that Mark didn’t  think to close doors or change batteries, but I’m fairly confident he would have stopped me from going outside with my clothes on the wrong way round.