Batch

09-02-2012 -- Again, more bits that serious full dreams, but some interesting parts making it worth noting stuff down. Had trouble sleeping for no known reason, so lots of time spent half-dreaming dull, repetitive stuff involving picking up passengers in Railroad Tycoon without ever building stations. Strange stuff.

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Some kind of Alvin Maker dream, back in the 1800s. Can't remember much, except I am crossing mountains by climbing a much longer, taller than usual overpass. I get to the top of this thing, and half roll, half jump off a semi-cliff to reach the Indian lands to the west. I visit for a little while, and make plans to return the following year, but only after the spring thaws. The Prophet is laughing. He thinks things are going to happen in such a way that my time estimates will be off, and I'll actually be leading everybody else back just before the major snows of winter hit. Neat stuff, but can't remember most of it.

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Somehow branching off from the last bit, but in current time. I am driving across the country with two others, Dale, and another person, who is our navigator. Have no idea who he is, though. We're going all the way from Florida to California, and though I try not to ask too often, eventually I have to ask how we're doing, and have far we've gotten, though I promise I won't ask every few minutes, and it won't turn into "Are we there yet? Are we there yet? ..." Suddenly I don't have to ask, because I recognize the small town we've just entered. [Its not a real town, but one I have dreamed of before.] I can't put an exact name to it with any confidence, but I think it is about halfway across on our trip. [The last dream was a trip between California and Nebraska, so I think we're actually more than halfway through, since we're covering the whole country, and not just half.]

Anyway, we've arrived at this town, and it is late in the evening, and we're going to get a room for the night, and a meal. There is a pizza parlor here, and to motel also offers pizza. (Think it is an Econolodge.) I am explaining to Dale that the hotel's pizza is thinner, less toppings, and less tasty, but cheaper. The pizza parlor's pizza is much better tasting, and more filling, but it is also much more expensive, and he is having to decide which one we're going to eat for dinner. The same lady is working the front desk who was working it the ten years ago or so that I was here, and she almost seems to recognize me. Dale is asking about sodas, and she explains they have powdered milk or warm juice available to drink. There just aren't a lot of drink options at the motel, itself.

I refuse to worry about that, though, as I have just remembered that on the last trip through this town, they had Hostess Os donuts, and I'm about to run off and go looking for some. I start to walk out the back door to go get the car when I find somebody in a gorilla mask, carrying a gun. I am afraid I am going to be mugged, but it turns out to be the front desk clerk. She wears the mask and carries the gun when she goes outside to scare off anybody who might try to mug her. So I continue on my way to the car in search of donuts.

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Am at some odd sort of combination of a hospital or doctor's office and Fullerton College. I'm walking around, trying to find a way to talk to a nurse friend of mine, and just listening to what is going on. I overhear some conversation about how Peter Pyle took advantage of some sort of government program to form his own college -within- Fullerton College. [This is kind of like the way there are a bunch of colleges that make up Cambridge University, which makes sense, since I got to know Peter during the exchange program to Cambridge.] Gives him more control over what he wants to study, and I am thinking it sounds like a good idea.

Somehow I am putting on an old blue blazer from Pedus (first security company I ever worked for) in the hopes that nobody will notice me, and I can go looking for my nurse friend. It turns into a long white smock, which ought to blend in even better. I get distracted, though, by a friend who is looking at a large man-eating plant. [Think of Audrey II from Little Shop of Horrors.] This thing is young, and it can't talk yet. It actually seems slightly friendly, or least not evil. There are two pods (faces, thinking parts) and some of their vines have grown together, so they can't get too far apart. One of my friends is trying to untangle them, but with no real success.

I'm trying to take some pictures at them, and I discover they react at least somewhat well if you sort of cluck at them to draw their attention. Not cluck like a chicken, but like you might make slight sounds to get the attention of a cat or dog, without actually saying anything. One of the pods swings to look at me, and I try to take a picture, but I find my camera is a gun. Well, I find my camera is in the shape of a gun. I stare down the sight, pull the trigger, and it snaps a picture. Problem is, I'm not hearing the click I'm supposed to, so I don't know if it is really taking pictures or not. Anyway, I keep trying to get some good shots. It must be near Christmas time, because I see a marmalade cat shift out of the way as the Grinch peeks out of a hole in the wall above the plant, then pops back in. I call out to try and get it to reappear so I can take a picture of it. I think then gun scares it, though, because suddenly its the Doctor (not sure which one) revealing he was only dressing up as the Grinch.

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I find myself in the living room of the Hickory house with a couple of friends from high school. For some reason Amy F is asking if we can all remember an old TV show, and making comments about what station showed it. I'm not sure what the show was, might have been Bonanza or Big Valley, but whatever it was, I doubt she could remember the exact station it was shown on, anyway, so I'm kind of considering challenging her to prove what she says she can remember. But since she is sitting on the couch in a short, loose skirt, and crossing and uncrossing her legs a lot, and I am sitting on the floor with a nice view of it, I'm a little distracted. I don't see anything except a nice expanse of leg, but it's still a nice sight. The other friend is a blond that I can't identify, but she suddenly stands up and starts to strip off her shorts. I'm thinking things are starting to get interesting, but she's just running to the restroom with a lightning case of diarrhea. Yuck!