Batch

11-14-2012 -- Early parts gone, but I am in an area that is half a small area of streets backing a lake in Florida, and half somewhere on the Fullerton College campus in California. I'm not sure why I am here, but I am at Don Dunn's shop, so it probably has something to do with car repairs. At the back of the property, where it borders on the lake, there is a spider web across the path, with a small red spider in the middle of the web. As I watch it, the spider is growing slightly larger, and is turning into what almost looks like a vaguely sponge ball-ish blob, about an inch across.

Moment by moment, there seem to be more and more of these things, some connected together, almost like centipede segments or something. Somehow they are important, but not terribly dangerous, and they help to keep the path clear, though clear of what, I really don't have a clue. There are some kids who live in a hillbilly-like house back in the mud around the lake that are running through the area.

I seem to be standing here with Bonnie M. at Don Dunn's place, wait for somebody who I am almost sure is Xander Harris (Buffy the Vampire Slayer) to bring me something, though at first I am not sure what it is. [Problem is, I have never seen BtVS, so I don't know the character, which makes this very strange.] Whatever I am waiting for, it has already been paid for, in fact it was paid for perhaps a year or two ago, and Xander is very late in providing it.

I'm pretty sure it is supposed to be a state-of-the-art computer which Xander was supposed to be able to get for me really cheap. Anyway, as we're waiting for Xander to hopefully show up, Bonnie decides to give me a worn, slightly bent metal side-panel from a computer, and since it isn't in the best of shape, I'm hoping it isn't supposed to be a part of my new state-of-the-art machine. It isn't, just an extra piece of metal she has found that she thinks I may want.

No idea how or why, but I seem to own an old, beat up truck which is a cross between a box truck and a trash truck. I don't see any use for the side panel except as a bit of scrap metal, so I climb up the side of the truck to toss it in the back. As I go to do some, a worker looks out and asks me "What's up?" Worker? I didn't know I had any workers with the truck .... I don't have anything for him to do, and no money to pay him with, so I tell him he can take the rest of the week off because we have nothing scheduled.

But I find myself thinking that maybe I should start up a salvage yard like Jupiter's Uncle Titus (Three Investigators). I wonder if I might be able to make a living as a junk dealer. I suddenly find myself looking at some old statues and thinking of how I might pack them in the truck to be able to move them safely, figuring in wrapping them in blankets and things to help protect them from damage in moving. It seems to be almost a sort of test.

By this time, the area has turned to Hazelnut in Buena Park, and Bonnie M is trying to call Xander on her cell phone, but is interrupted when a sort of mobile home trailer pulls up to Sean S.'s house. Sean has an aunt or something that is a friend of Bonnie's, and she has just shown up and is unloading something off her trailer. She seems to be handing me bits of foam packing material or something, and I assume she needs help and am neatly stacking the material for her, until she asks me what I think I'm doing. I have no clue, and she doesn't tell me anything, but she doesn't seem to need my help.

About this time, Xander finally shows up and starts unpacking a lot of very large boxes. It seems he finally has my computer, but there are hints that not everything is right. He may need more money, or may not have all the parts because some things were not available. The large replacement hard drive may not be as large as it is supposed to be. And the 20" monitor which was supposed to be top-of-the-line when I ordered it is now more toward the lower end. But it is still a very good Mac system built on the Power PC line at about 367 MHz, which in my dreams is still quite good. (In real life I no longer know what would be a good Mac processor.) I am thinking this system will help me to reacquaint myself with desktop publishing software on the Mac, giving me a better chance at graphic artist job interviews since I still need to find work.

As we're unpacking stuff, Don Dunn comes across what almost seems like large stacks of advertising pogs or perhaps coasters. Small, thin paper-ish discs with pictures and system details printed on them. In some was I'm not really clear on, I'm shooting them out of a sort of air cannon, trying to fire them into a pile out of the way. But the air cannon is far more powerful than I realize, and I end up shooting them several houses down the block. I try to go gathering them all up again, but find all those that have landed on the grass have absorbed the dew, and are too wet to be worth collecting.

10-03-2012 -- [Two dreams tonight, and no idea why when last few days have been so bad ... especially since 1st one was clear, detailed, and made internal sense, even though I dreamed it in first 2 hours of sleep, which is usually short, choppy, and impossible to make sense of. Can't fathom why unless imitation apple soda is as good as apple juice before bed, even though no real apple in it. Don't know.]

I'm in my 1st bedroom in the Hickory House. Kevin B and I are sitting around writing stuff, except very unusually, Kevin is not trying to write stories, but is trying to write a love song. Suddenly he bursts into two lines of song, and they flow, they sound quite musical ... he may well be on to something. The lines are something along the lines of 'thinking about you, thinking about you' and I think he may be on his way to a great song. [Didn't note it in the dream, but the fact I woke with the words "I can't live with or without you" running through my mind tells me my mind probably stole the tune.]

It does sound amazingly familiar, and I don't want to encourage him on trying to rewrite an already published song, so I am really trying to think of where I might know the words from, and I find myself thinking of a New York public service thing that was supposed to make New Yorkers think about making a good impression on the tourists or something. I even find myself remembering a red and blue circular sign with the wording on it from a New York trip ... and no reason why that shouldn't work, is there?

In trying to remember this and research it, I have somehow stepped into an office somewhere, and started looking at some books. One of the books I have somehow come across is a digest-sized book of Spider-Man comics, except it is about 6" thick and claims to contain all the cross-over stories or some such thing. I am flipping through it and seeing sections labeled Spider-Man and Superman and others, while the person whose office I am in is talking some sort of business deal on the phone.

When he finishes up, he turns his attention to me, and I am talking about the book, and wondering where he got it. Though nothing is said about how I got there or why I am in his office, he is very friendly and helpful. Somehow as we're talking, I reveal I am out of work and need a job. He is asking about my skills and encouraging me to talk about what I am good at, and I mention my computer skills and on the computer nearly every waking hour, but then admit I don't have a computer science degree because of the math requirements, and he doesn't seem to think that is a bar, though it will require a different angle of attack.

Then he is on the phone again, this time with a woman from Minnesota. Somehow she knows me, and he is wondering if I sent her an application sometime. I am trying to figure out where I know the person from, whether it be something Disney or some sort of balloon gig, or a research letter for a story or song or something connected with church. Whatever the reason, he has come across another person who thinks highly of me, even though I don't know them, which only increases his interest in helping me regarding job.

But suddenly there is a huge snake (about 4" around and perhaps 10-15 feet long) that slithers out of a bag on the floor by his desk and heads in my direction. It seems to pause, lifts itself off the ground like a king cobra preparing to strike and sort of sniffs the air, then drops to the ground and slithers at me remarkably fast. I kind of scream, bolt out of my chair as fast as I can move, and start running out of the office. The snake is right behind me, and I keep screaming and running, but oddly I almost seem to be composing an incident report or something in my mind, calmly, at the same time, noting that if I am running at top speed, the snake falls behind.

I run past an elevator and down a hallway, into a reception area, and the person sitting there is Joy (in charge of hiring for Mears, hired me for my original job there, and will not rehire me now). I am still screaming about the snake, and she is instantly on the phone to animal control or something. She knows it is the guy's pet, and harmless, but she's been wanting a reason to get rid of it, and she is jumping on the opportunity. The guy might have every reason to now hate me, but he understands that I was scared and surprised and doesn't hold it against me. Instead he just gathers up his snake and his stuff and takes it to his car to go home before they can come for the snake. I go with him to the parking lot to continue our conversation.

As we are talking in the parking lot and he opens the door to his car, it turns out he has a lot of other pets, mostly much smaller snakes, and one tiny little dog (was it a dog? It might have been a prairie dog or something odder like that, instead), all running around the area. I am sitting on the ground, and a small snake (perhaps a centimeter around and about 10 inches long) seems to be cuddling against the bottom of my bare foot. While I am slightly uncomfortable with this, it is nothing to being chased around by the huge snake, so I can manage to ignore it. Thing is slightly cute, after all.

We walk past some ladies in the parking lot, and seem to be heading for another building, when for a for seconds the scene changes completely, and it's almost like an entire different dream. I am in an apartment or hotel with Bonnie C., and somehow the key for the door lock is in the door kind of like a locker key. I take the key and somehow make a duplicate of it so I have one to keep. Bonnie is asking me about it, and says I have taken three keys, when I think I have only taken two. I feel in my pockets, and do find three keys, but one is from earlier, and has nothing to do with here. Weird and out of place.

So now we're in a parking lot on the other side of the building, and there is a landscaping guy blowing leaves with a blower. The guy I am with (looks like a thinner version of Christopher Bean) is determined to know if it is a gas blower or an electric blower, because in the dream an electric blower would be much better for the environment. So he unplugs a cord for an instant, and the blower starts to die. He plugs it back in, it starts to blow again, and he has his answer. Meanwhile, I seem to be glancing at a book by Rush Limbaugh about buying wholesale to save money or something odd like that (business, rather than politics.)

As we start to walk to the building again, I oddly find myself humming 'Jolly Holiday' from Mary Poppins, and the guy instantly starts to sing along with me. So we're both walking down the sidewalk singing "Ain't it a glorious day, bright as a morning in May; I feel like I could fly ...." But as we reach the point where the penguins start calling out ladies names, the names he is calling out are completely wrong, and don't fit at all. I am correcting him with names that are still wrong, but much closer in sound and cadence to the correct names. We're laughing, as others are just staring at us.

08-26-2012 -- This one is all over the place! Starts out in an old, spooky house. Might well be Grimmauld Place, as there seem to be two small beings running around, one that is friendly, and one that isn't. Almost certainly Dobby and Kreature. I'm wandering through the place, looking for secret passages and just exploring, but doors don't always lead the same places, and Kreature is dangerous.

I've already been given one ticking package which I've disarmed, but eventually I'm given another, rather lackadaisically wrapped, that is addressed to some sort of princess. It is a birthday present, but it is also ticking, and is probably also a bomb. Somehow I can't unwrap it and disarm it, though, because the present isn't for me.

Things shift here, as I have a package, and I find I must deliver it. I have no car, anymore, so they have teamed me up with another driver. We've driven a ways south, but not a huge amount. Perhaps Melbourne or Sebastian, not as far as something like Fort Pierce. Problem is, we're being sent to a huge complex with one address for the whole thing, and no instructions where to go. I think I've been here once before, years ago, and have a vague memory, but not enough.

Find a place to pick something up (seems like Idexx samples, and since the driver I seem to be working with in now Francisco, this makes sense), and so we start to head back to town, and soon we split up. I find myself at home, and I am listening to some kind of recording of the trip, and hear really subtle clues that tell me there were two place we had to pick up samples, and we only got one. Now I have to start planning a trip back. But since I no longer have a car, and need a new job, I'm also planning places I can stop for job interviews.

As I am about to hit the road anyway, I get a frantic phone call from Francisco. He's broken down or run out of gas or something, and is asking me to please hurry out to where he is to solve the problem. I explain we also need to go back to the first stop, and soon I am on my way. I'm on a freeway, driving along, though I'm not sure what I'm driving. My mind just doesn't focus on it. Eventually I am on a small scooter, though.

I hear a light honk and glance over to see an old, somewhat rusty, large red pickup truck, being driven by Amy Fikes. She's driving back to West Palm Beach, saw me, and wanted to wave. Soon I'm near a large brown van which is being driven by Joe Shirely, and he tells me he was meeting with Amy, and has pictures to share for the web site.

The traffic and fumes are getting to me on the scooter, and I take an offramp that for some reason is backed up. There is an accident ahead of me, and as I wait for things to clear up, I try and open a pack of donuts, but the bag tears, and chocolate donuts fall everywhere. As I am trying to pick them all up, some people from the car or truck behind me come up looking to assist anyone who is hurt. I tell them I'm healthy, and they look at all the donuts as if to say "yeah, right!"

They ask me how long I think I am going to stay healthy, and I just have this very odd feeling, and say "not very long. Watch yourselves." Suddenly there is a slight trembling, then the offramp we're on starts to break up and crash to the ground. We've fallen 15 or 20 feet, but nobody is seriously injured, just some minor cuts and bruises. From the offramp collapse, you'd expect an earthquake, but actually I soon see signs of a sinkhole that took out the supports. Soon we're all on our way again.

I continue further south and soon arrive at a mid-sized office building. Think it is at least three or four floors, but nothing much taller. I walk in the ground floor and start looking for an elevator, as the place I want is on the second floor, and I stumble into an office where Anne is working. She is dressed professionally, but in a red dress that is actually quite attractive, and shows off nice legs. She's not glad to see me, but I explain I have the wrong office, and was just looking for the elevator. I hear it through the wall as she points, and quickly leave.

I get in the elevator, and find myself sharing it with the family from the offramp. We all end up in the same office, and the family is there to begin setting up presentation equipment for a major party or event. Everybody is their group have small black patches around their eyes, spots where blood has pooled under the skin from blows from the collapse. I assume I probably have the same, but explain I am not with them, I'm here for a job.

They direct me to another room, where I find myself with two balloon artists working on some intricate and finely detailed small sculptures. They assume I am here to audition for the balloon gig at the party, and I didn't even know about that option. I was here about a normal job. Unfortunately they are not hiring for the normal position, and I'm not up to the skill level of the others (nor do I have my balloons with me) so the balloon gig is out, as well. Soon I'm just trying to find a way out of the building before I run into Anne again.