Batch

06-25-2017 -- Couple of short fragmenty bits tonight, but writing them down anyway. The second, right before I got up for the day and in less than an hour of sleep, I'm out mystery shopping, perhaps one of the four shops on Okeechobee (though it also has a certain feel of the shop area that is right down on Euclid, near Kevin's house, except that it is a couple hours out of town from other dreams). I've just finished the shop, in part by buying an entire tank of gas, which I am mad at myself about, because now how am I going to fit in all the rest of the gas I have to buy? Anyway, I'm trying to squeeze my car out around other cars and hit the road.

I somehow find myself on a freeway, heading away from my next stop (that is probably right down the road) so I am trying to get off and turn around, just to find myself on the same freeway heading back the other way, when I suddenly find myself in New York, and I am approaching another gas station, but it is on top of a hill, and is surrounded by debris, and there are construction vehicles and stuff, and I realize it is the site of a terrorist bombing attack. I am considering taking a picture from the bottom of the hill, but even though there has been a lot of damage, I can see there are lots of regular people walking in and out of the place, so it looks like the store is still open.

Since the drive is blocked off, and I am not physically up to walking up the hill I don't know what I'm going to do, but luckily I can see people riding their bikes up and down, so I pull my bike out of the car and use it to ride up the hill to the top. The pump area is gone, and the store is mostly surrounded by scaffolding, but there is a small area under an awning with a few jewelry-type display cases sitting in front of it, where a very small amount of things are being sold. Unfortunately, everything looks very expensive, and any time I catch a glimpse of something cheap, it seems to have vanished before I can reach it. One thing is the small candy in a yellow and black checker pattern rapper (something like Zazu?) but it's gone as I approach it. Another is a lollypop wrapped in a plastic and cardboard thing that would be hard to get it out of which is being advertised as the largest really fast lollypop, and again is too expensive. Finally I grab what I hope is a Charms blowpop, but instead it turns into just a piece of wrapped gum.

One of the store employees is wandering around commenting on things to people, and I am just waiting to make my small purchase, wondering if I will have to suggest a hand-written receipt, when I hear him saying something about Uber or Lyft drivers causing him problems by hanging around, and I have to resist making a comment. Then I hear the three young girls saying something about Son of Interflux, and I have to say something, but can't find a way to jump into the conversation. Somehow it is mentioned that the girls love reading and are very smart, and there is a little boy who looks much like Anikin, who is playing with a small box that he then causes to warp into a model of a space ship that then flies to a shelf and puts itself away, while it is somehow revealed that the three young girls are werewolves, but they are well-treated by their family. Very strange mix-up.

12-29-2012 -- Earliest parts are very sketchy, and seem very interesting. There is something about time travel and chase situations, with at least some of the cast from NCIS. Can't remember any details about anybody specific, except that we end up at a shopping mall, where FBI Agent Fornell is trailing an attractive blonde woman, before she wanders off on him. I am with him, and comment that as long as he is here, he ought to stop off at a steak restaurant at the mall and have a meal. The place is perhaps a blend between Ruth's Chris and The Hops. I tell him something like "That steak is so good, you'll feel it's worth the instant coronary!" He refuses, and angrily drives off.

I head into the mall, and start browsing around. It is one of the big ones that I used to always dream about, like Westminster or South Coast Plaza, and mostly I am just browsing around, but I spot a candy store, and I really find myself in a mood for some large jaw breakers. I soon find a candy store, but at first glance it doesn't look like they have any jaw breakers. But then I spot some special equipment, and it seems like they actually make the jaw breakers to order.

The person has just finished making some for somebody else, and I indicate my interest. They urge me out a door on the other side of the storefront, when I really want to use the one right next to me, because I am lazy, but I do what I have to. I remember what I've seen on the internet a few months ago (I really did look up how jaw breakers are made) about pans of liquid that they slowly roll around in, as they build up, and I soon find myself standing in front of a sort of pan with several large tubes above it. You select the flavors you want, and they pour them in, so you get the different flavored layers.

They allow you to choose four flavors, and I want orange in the center, blue raspberry, lime, and cherry. Problem is, they have dozens of flavor choices, and they aren't marked well, but you just have to go by color. The blue raspberry is so dark, I end up adding root beer, instead, and have to add the blue raspberry afterward, my lime, and forego the cherry. Oh well. Somehow the process is really quick, and they soon have four or five jaw breakers ready for me, about two inches around, each, with four layers of flavor, and the common white coating around the outside.

I step back into the store, to give them a chance to bag them and ring them up for me, and I go to sit down on a sort of a sofa to wait, but there is a cute girl there that I seem to know and like, and a bunch of her friends who are pushy and rude. Dale shows up, holding some sort of Superman-themed staff, and we stand next to the sofa, talking, when it starts to rise up in the air (with the immediate floor area around it) like some sort of giant elevator.

The girls are freaking out and starting to scream and yell, and Dale tries to explain something about the character of Superman, and points to a huge, curved I-Max screen that we soon find ourselves looking down on. The sofa seems to be rising to it's proper seating location to give us a good view of the movie. But the girls aren't interested. We've reached a place of about 40 feet in the air, and our 'platform' has lined up with another floor of the mall, so they belt out the door as quick as they can, leaving us all behind.

Wimps! Dal is feeling really tired, and kind of ill, and decides he is going to go home. Problem with this is that he has only partly paid for the Superman staff, and he is supposed to go back and pay the rest of it before he leaves, but he asks me to do it, instead. I take the staff, and my bag of jaw breakers, and also start to try and pick up a sort of sheet of glass. The way things change in dreams, I now have either a clear piece of glass with colored sand kind of etched into it, or a sheet of shiny black material with brilliant colors streaked on it in a design I made on the machine (the one that originally made jaw breakers?) that is now very fragile art work.

I make my way back down to the main floor of the mall, where I find Dale's Superman store, except moment by moment it is turning into a Star Wars store, instead. The staff is becoming one like the Sand People on Tatooine carried, and the decor is shifting before my eyes. I find myself facing an older salesperson who looks like a cross between KFC's the Colonel, and my Jr High guidance counsellor, Mr. Cravens.

He understands that I am trying to finish paying for the staff, but he doesn't know the proper amounts, so he says I am going to have to wait for one of the others to help out. She eventually comes up, and I think she tells me that he still owes $500 on the thing, and I say I thought it was $100. She says that's what she said, $100. I start scrabbling through my pockets and count out maybe $200 in twenties, and can't find any more. I just don't have $500 ... wait a minute, she said $100. I have that right here! I hand over the money, and she hands me the rest of Dale's purchase, a very shiny, solid silver model of R2D2, just about 6 inches tall. I don't know how he's affording this very nice piece!