S.S.C - Sleep deprived & happy about it

I am indeed getting more sleep deprived instead of less the last couple of days. I'm happy about it, because I can't blame Zachary this time - it's Dexter's fault. Dexter is finally starting to be very cuddly again. I woke up to purring three times today - 4am, 7:30am (Zach slept until 8:15am), and 4pm (nap). He was very cuddly all three times and let me pet him for quite some time. He even rubbed his head against me - like the "good 'ole days". :) Apparently, his 4am cuddle-fest with me was not enough - as I was feeding Zach at 5am, I watched Dexter try to get Art to pet him several times. Dexter would get in Art's face and purr and try to get Art to pet him. Art would pet him one or two times then roll over. Dexter would just go to the other side and start over, butting Art in the face with his head. When Art (who never woke up enough to realize I wasn't in bed) had enough, Dexter showed his displeasure by biting Art's feet under the covers. I got to watch all this while feeding Zach. Usually, Dexter has a cuddle fit around 4-5am, and I'm usually the receipent, but it is fun to watch him harass Art as well. Sometimes Dexter will come to the edge of the bed purring, and I'll have to hold onto Zach (while he's eating), and lean forward so I can pet the purring monster. I was just thrilled today that he asked for cuddles several times during the DAY, and not just at some awful hour. I'm hoping we are getting our cuddle bug back.

We had quite a scare with Dexter today. We have started letting Dexter go out back by himself, unsupervised (we check on him every 5-10 minutes). This is the result of months of walking him on his leash, then walking behind him w/ his leash on, then letting him out by himself w/ the leash on and one of us watching him on the back porch to where we are now, open the door, let him go out, without a leash, and periodically check on him. Well today he'd been pretty bad. Twice he went to the side of the apartments instead of staying out back where I can see him. Then, after I brought him in once, he wasn't happy and after 5 minutes of meowing up the stairs at me (I was feeding Zach and didn't want to let Dex out), he promptly opened the screen door on his own and let himself out. All this should have told us that trouble was brewing. Sure enough, around 6:30pm, he had been out for about 15 minutes, and we couldn't find him. Art had just gotten home and dinner was cooking. We looked all around and couldn't find Dexter. I was starting to get very upset and crying. We both were praying that we'd find him and he'd be ok. We finally did find him - he was just sitting inside the fence where the pool was - 30 feet from our apartment, looking at us like we were crazy for calling him. Little brat. So now we have to rethink his freedom.

As a side note, I'm getting much less sleep deprived due to Zachary. The last 2 nights he woke up for his 'night feeding' at 4:30-5am, then went back to sleep until about 8am. So that's real nice for me!

The pictures are of Dexter today. One being nice and calm, the next is his response when I tried to pet him - typical Dexter - bite first, ask intentions later!