Sailing the Noosphere

1. I'm in a bar, relaxing somewhat awkwardly at a table with my frenemy H.B. and his girlfriend J.J. The interior reminds me of a bar in my old college town, but the view out the windows is that of a bustling supermarket in my hometown. H. asks for a pitcher of water as I start texting with my own girlfriend. I turn around and notice that the bar proper is taken up by a line of sorority girls, dressed in black Playboy bunny costumes for a frat party.

2. I decide to go to my old grade school, touring it in a suit, but while doing so I run into people from all levels of schooling. John M. from high school I see in the bathroom, the high school art teacher I see in the hall (interviewing for a position here), and C.W. and S.A. from college I see on the stairs as I'm leaving.

3. I stay up very late watching some football game... then go to sleep. I FA into my own bed at 9 o'clock at night, and my brother is sitting on the chair beside me playing Nintendo DS. My mom walks into the room and starts to berate me for my lateness and asks me how I expect to eat.

1. I arrive at my college for a new year, but as I'm unsure where to go I end up meandering through random hallways. In one of them I find my friend Mary T, who directs me up to her room. She's very happy to see me, and we hang out by playing a music theory game using a piano controller against another friend via Skype. Soon we start to cuddle, but as we do we're rudely intruded by an orientation activity. The RAs are leading a "Parade of Geeks," dressed in suspenders and huge glasses. They take my friend CW from the room after asking "Is anyone weird?" and Mary and I join him in support. I get lost on the way and stumble into a succession of other rooms on the floor. One contains freshmen girls from my old high school, another is an office space, and another is an apartment housing my roommate from the research station and his father.

2. CA and I are the only survivors of a pandemic that is changing all of my college into gibbering lunatics. I commend her as she singlehandedly diagnoses the disease and develops a cure.

3. I'm present in the final level of a Paper Mario game that takes place in the bar level from Guitar Hero. I am playing bass in the background, but when the final boss shows up I start to interact in the Paper Mario world. My dialogue is extremely cocky as I fight rather poorly, but as people criticize me I say I'm roleplaying. Another band leaves in fear and I insult them, leading to one of their members and I exchanging insults. He ends up kicking me in the face, which loosens the glasses I'm wearing.

4. I am watching a dinner show at the Dollywood theme park. Each guest is given a light gun to interact with the show as it goes on. As the show starts, the main character boasts how presidents (Bush father and son) and other dignitaries love it. The seats then move backwards to proper viewing distance for a massive screen, where a trippy music video appears. In the video, a redneck pharmacist has placed the world in a stupor by distributing colorful pills in colored Solo cups. The audience seems to enter the music video, and there's a crowd marching single-file through a large mansion.

At this point, I remember the main character declaring that the whole thing is a dream, and I feel a mild awareness for the rest of the scene. However, I don't feel any control and the faintest of physical sensations, so I'm not counting it as a true lucid. For some reason, I know my name is Vincent in the dream, and my body has split into several selves. One looks like the waking me, but several are burly black men and one is a golden robot. I feel pulled away from the march through the mansion, and my other selves go exploring with me. The robot leads the way to a golden cabinet, where I see a camera and a cell phone. Out of the corner of my eye I develop an X-ray vision and see the two objects go down a shelf in the cabinet. I know that to go further into the mansion, I have to move the objects myself, as the vision was an illusion.

1. I've taken the day off to go shopping with the parents. We go to a Wal-Mart, and as usual I start goofing off. However, I soon find myself in a section of the store I've never visited before. It's a "premium" section, one for the extremely rich, even though the prices are still advertised as rollback (Fuck me, another failed text RC). They're selling things like ultralight airplanes and antique cars, but in the back I find a couple of Tour de France level bicycles. The first one I try has the wheels attached backwards, making it impossible to use, but the second is allright. I take it and start riding around the store with the wind in my hair, and feel silly but happy.
As I ride back to return the bike, my cell phone goes off (with the RL ringtone). I pull it out of my shorts, but with only one hand on the wheel I have no way to control what happens next. I crash through two panes of heavy glass in the back of the store, and stumbling from the wreckage fall over a plane! The manager comes up, angrily demanding that we pay, but my Dad only has $400 on him. I start to freak out.

2. I'm answering questions on Twocansandstring.com (an awesome website), when someone asks about spinach and Popeye. I start to answer, but wander outside to underneath a tree at my research station. V and one of the grad students wander over to me. V makes awkward small talk as the grad student strokes her, and I feel extreme jealousy.

3. Las Vegas has become a post-apocalyptic wasteland ruled by pop-punk style overlords. The streets, however, are filled with legions of metalhead zombies. Something happens to one of the rulers, and I see the teeming throngs rise up to take back control of the city.