A loud click or snapping noise

     Since we moved into this house,  in the summer of 1979,  we have experienced an unusual loud noise in the master bedroom. I cannot say for certain that it occurs every night because we often turn in after 11:30  and the sound usually occurs sometime after 11 but before 11:30. It sounds like a loud snap  which usually repeats, slightly less loudly, a few minutes later. The sound appears to come from the southwesternmost corner of the room where a dumbwaiter used to be located. The dumbwaiter was taken out of service and walled off sometime in the late 1940s. But if we chance to turn in a bit early, we about always hear this snap or click. The dogs do not appear to take notice of it. I tend to think it has something to do with temperature change in the old sealed dumbwaiter shaft. But precisely what????? I have no idea. Nor why the noise is always in that short time window.

Snatched Book?

 It happened a couple of days ago. I've mulled it over and tried some experimentation before deciding to include it here. Monday night, my wife and I turned in early as we were tired and we both had books we wanted to read. Once the dogs settled in, one at the foot of the bed and the other in his bed on the floor, all was peaceful. I read in bed, lying on my back but the wife prefers a side position. I had only read a few sentences when my wife exclaimed,"What?" My response."Whats the matter?" "Something jerked my book out of my hand". "You just dozed and dropped it," I replied. "No, she protested, I was in the middle of reading a sentence". Then bending over the side of the bed she said,"Where is it?" Playing dumb, I asked,"Wheres what?" "Wheres my book, I don't see it?" My suggestion was "Run your hand just under the bed it probably landed on end and flipped under the bed". "No, it didn't,"she replied as she slid out of bed and was looking under it. Then crawling half under the bed she says, "Its here, halfway under the bed." So how did it get halfway under the bed? She says, "I told you, it was jerked out of my hands." I did not persue the matter. But what??? jerked it out of her hands? Why was it jerked out of her hands? And....What was the point of taking it halfway under the bed? Yesterday afternoon, trying to figure out how in blazes that book got halfway under the bed; I went upstairs and laid on her side of the bed, opened the book and dropped it several times. changing position several times as I did so. That book landed in plain sight every time. So, as I think this is a bit strange, I have included it on this journal.

Mysterious broken pitcher

   My wife collects those old potbellied white clay pitchers that are so commonly seen in Victorian pictures and even older representations. The pitchers are definitely bottom heavy. As they are a favorite of my wife's. it would be most unlikely that she would place one where it would be in danger of being broken. Our kitchen has a doorway that opens into a short hall (no door) off to the left are the rear stairs to the upstairs, straight ahead brings you through another doorway into the diningroom and off to the right takes you through a doorway (with door) into the downstairs bathroom. A wide shelf, well secured to the wall and top of the door, runs across the top of the doorway out  of the kitchen. That shelf is solidly anchored on both ends as well with heavy brackets. On that shelf my wife has placed one of her pot bellied pitcher plus two other pitchers and a couple of chicken figures. I was working upstairs in the front bedroom doing nothing heavy, I might mention, and my wife was painting details on the bathroom wall. Both dogs were sacked out in the dining room. Suddenly a loud crash was heard, bringing us all from different directions. The white pitcher was in pieces on the kitchen floor . Nothing else on that shelf was even moved and the shelf is still very solidly fixed. Only that pitcher which was bottom heavy (surely too bottom heavy to tip) was off the shelf and broken. There appears to be no explaination for this. So what happened?