In nature, some of the most amazing things happen at night. While the moon pulls most humans into their nesting routine, a great many animals are foraging, hunting, fighting, and competing for survival. And some don’t make it until morning. It’s an epic struggle to overcome the forces of the dark. Be alert little gazelle.

If I use a dry British accent, does that sound ominous enough?

I love nature documentaries and remember being entranced by one that pits a pride of lions against a clan of hyenas. Talk about an epic struggle! The lions took down a zebra or gazelle or something (sucks to be a grass-eater in Africa) and the hyenas wanted in. They didn’t want to share though. They started nipping that the rumps of the lions. The lions kept them at bay until their nasty cackles attracted their entire clan. Then there were seemingly millions of them laughing and biting. More huge lions came and the fight went on. 

The lions looks like me when I had toddlers at TGI Fridays.

“Why can’t we ever just enjoy our meal?”

There is similar nocturnal aggression going on in my home and likely across the civilized world. It’s an ancient conflict that pits husband against wife and can be as savage as lion vs. hyena: The Blanket War.

A few nights ago, I was happily asleep, swaddled in my cocoon when I was viciously pulled from my dreams by a tug. Then another. The tug persisted and even got stronger until I roused to realize the blanket was gone. Not the whole blanket, just the nested layers I had made this cold night.

“What are you doing,” I roared.

“You don’t get all the blanket,” she replied calmly.

“You can’t just rip it off me!”

“You don’t get 2/3’s of it.”

“But I’m 2/3’s of the people in the bed.”

            I must break the thrilling dialog here to explain that while this might appear to be fuzzy math, the concept was quite sound. What I was attempting to elucidate in a sleepy haze is that I am 2/3’s of the human girth in our relationship, thus 2/3’s of the poundage in the bed and deserving of 2/3’s of the blanket.

“It doesn’t matter, I get half.”

It was then that I woke up enough to realize that I did, in fact, have nearly all of the blanket pinned under my immovable 2/3’s girth. That’s why she was tugging. She was right.

But I doubt the cackling hyena ever admits he was wrong to poach the lions hard-earned meal and I wasn’t about to admit I was hogging the blanket. 

So I did what any husband would do; I grumbled and rolled until she could get under the blanket with what I assume was a contented, smug smile. Even though I wasn’t quite as warm, I started to drift back to sleep until the answer to this nocturnal aggression hit me – double king-size blankets. They would unfold like a happy burrito shell and both partners could sleep merrily under their own 2/3’s of a blanket – making it a total of 4/3… 

While this math definitely doesn’t line up, my invention could possibly shift the balance of nature, allowing lions and hyenas to live blissfully together.

Wouldn’t the zebras be happy then.