side notes

Some dream fragments. There was a third one but I have such a faint and vague memory of it, not even sure where I'd start. I practically lost the other ones while getting up but made sure to keep my eyes closed as much as possible until I could write here, which helped.

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Dream Fragment:

I remember being at some sort of concrete structure. I'm not sure if I was "me" but a couple of other people were here too, I think one of them was that Torres guy from NCIS. This place was dark and there was a massive abyss right in front of us. Across this abyss was another flat area made of concrete and there were some soldiers there. They were holding us here or something and they shouted that we should stay put.

The soldiers got on a platform and it started moving down very fast. They disappeared from sight. Somewhere down there was some light, but it must have been a literal mile or more away. Then some more soldiers appeared but this time they didn't wait for the platform and just jumped down where the platform shaft area was. I was intrigued but at some point in the dream I simply "knew" that at the bottom was a special fluid that would break any fall, no matter from how high.

Torres like the idea of just jumping across and into that specific area. I felt it was too risky. It was a long way down and there was no way to aim ourselves properly and the gap between the two concrete areas was quite wide. But he got on some sort of pole hanging from our side and got closer to the other side, hanging just over the middle. Then some soldiers came back up on the platform and noticed. They started shouting at him and warning him to stop. He ignored them and now he grabbed onto some rope that was hanging from the ceiling. That's as much as I remember clearly for this fragment.

I do remember there were no light sources. We were very deep underground most certainly, but somehow we had a light radius of our own, like in RPGs where the characters just give off light...

Dream Fragment:

I don't remember how I got there but I arrived at a small lab/office place. This dream was somewhat vivid, more than the other one. There were two researchers, wearing labcoats, and one of them greeted me. He seemed a bit uninterested at first but then he saw my boots. They were covered in some sort of pale golden sand. I realised I hadn't noticed this myself until that moment and he became very interested. He went over to a counter and showed me some tins with rounded caps.

The caps were all a shade of gold or tan. He asked me to see which one I thought was closest. I selected four of the tins first just as a guess. Then I held them and made their coloured cap be over my right boot in my vision. The first wasn't it, too orange. The second and third one seemed similar, the fourth one was too dark but the right hue. I compared between the second and third against the sand and decided the third one was the closest. He seemed happy with this and I felt somewhat happy to help. I made a comment saying "well at least I can definitely tell that my skill at recognising shades correctly has improved". I genuinely felt this was true in that moment and realise now that it was indeed a very accurate test of my skill in this.

The other researcher was just doing something on his own over on another counter but I don't remember what. Oddly enough, despite looking at my feet, can't be certain what the floor was like. Some sort of plastic tiles? Maybe wood. But square shapes. The counters were an off white on the top and a light stained wood on the cabinets. There were a couple of windows to the outside and I made note of the fact that it was daytime outside, but the room was quite brightly lit anyway with some fluorescent lamps that actually gave off a warm colour for once.

This whole dream bit felt like it was in sequence of the previous one or another one between them.

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Side notes:

- It could possibly be the first time while dreaming where I had to use a skill that I'd use for painting in waking life. For me this is a particularly good sign because for a long time I've wanted that context to come over into dreams in some form.
- The researchers wearing labcoats were clearly dreamsigns that I missed. The labcoat is a dreamsign I successfully managed to insert into my dreams as a dreamsign a while back, I think last year or the year before.
- The dust on my boots reminded me very much of gold powder in the dream. In the dream I had a much clearer notion of where I had been previously, which was relevant for that context.
- Despite looking at my boots and remembering them very clearly as the black leather army-type boots I have in waking life, I only vaguely remember my trousers and can't really say which ones they were. It seems odd that my boots are the only detail I remember clearly from looking down, despite the fact that in the dream everything was the same level of vividness.
- I do remember I was wearing some sort of dark hoodie in that dream. I remember it because I remember the sensation of having the sleeves pulled up, something I often do if I'm indoors.
- Don't have much at all to make note of from the first dream since many details are vague now, but the fall-breaking fluid definitely made me think of stuff from Portal and from Satisfactory.

Recorded the majority of these dreams early on in a vague form on my phone on waking up. Had to go somewhere in the car; while I was waiting in the car for an hour, typed everything out in more detail, which I'm now putting on the DJ here.

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First Dream (Some detail missing):

Fairly long dream. Can’t remember the start now but I would recurringly go for a swim with H but also alone. When I started, I felt weak and slow. I can’t remember the water's temperature.

We were on some sort of cruise ship but it was mostly empty, and I don’t think it was ever moving. I started to become strong at swimming, when I was back on the decks I can remember feeling like I my chest was sort of almost puffing out from all the swimming workout.

At some point I was walking down some wooden decking stairs and I could see my parents lounging on some patio type chairs on a higher level. I could hear dad make some sort of mock bird call. I remember then seeing some birds. Seagulls? Dad laughed. H asked from some place below, “is that your dad?” I said yes and then remember continuing down the stairs and losing sight of them.

It was daytime for most of this dream but I made note of the fact that it was sort of cloudy and grey. I remember a horizon of water. It may have been windy but I don’t remember the sound of it.

I remember a few times I’d take my boots off, but at no point do I remember what I was wearing.

When I went swimming, after a short while I’d usually arrive at this sea floor base of some kind. This place did have a lot of people. I remember lockers, the inside of this place almost felt like some swimming pool changing rooms but with a more modern and futuristic feel to it, a bit more like the base from Ocean Girl or the sea city from Bioshock.

Before this dream or through the middle of it, I was stuck in some sort of void like limbo with H for a time. It was like being in an out of control perpetual fall, and there was a strange light and distant but dark cosmic background. This void was filled with ancient structures and artefacts from unknown civilisations, a lot of the stuff looking like it was from some sort of classic period.

I remember interacting with some walls and pillars from a distance, with some kind of telekinetic ability, and cutting them up into smaller chunks. As I did their lighting would change, usually to some dramatic purples and yellows.

At some nearer the “end” of the cruise ship segments I went into this too, to have a wee, but there were no toilets. In the dream my mind was telling me that there were some type of urinals but there was nothing on walls or anything like toilets. Instead there were some tables. I walked past a clear plastic box filled with what looked like cheap and brightly coloured electronic components.

At the tables were some big circuit boards with several components already soldered on, including some transformers. For whatever reason I had to have a wee on these boards, but I remember someone telling me I could only wee on the electrolytic capacitors... I remember doing it, but on a big black electrolytic cap, and then some guy appeared, who apparently owned all this stuff and told me off just for weeing on the big one. He was annoyed but not angry or shouting.

Then I remember going out of that room after a short dialogue. I went some stone stairs, in a wide spiral. It reminded me of castles and churches. There were a few murderhole windows where daylight shun from. This was a different place, it was puzzle like. As I reached some kind of landing I immediately realised that the structure was like in some games like Legend of Zelda and some modern puzzles where the paths loop back into themselves, but I could get around the issue of looping paths by taking them whilst walking backwards.

I remember a crawl space path where the same would happen and there were statues and displays scattered about like some museum. There was a warm artificial mood light and everything had a sort of modern feel to it in the areas with displays.

Second Dream (Fragment):

A different dream. I was born out of a big egg, looked mostly like a birds egg but was covered in a polka dot pattern on the outside. A sort of magenta colour to the dots.

There was some old man in this dream and I remember telling him we all had stomachs made from tin and gold. When I told him there was also sulfuric acid in there, he was incredulous.

Third Dream? (Fragment) NSFW:

A still image, as if on a computer, no doubt from a transition phase into wakefulness,

Spoiler for NSFW:

of a giant phallus in space “absorbing” planets along its skin.

One of the stranger things I might draw from time to time. But unusual for this type of thing to appear whilst still sort of in the dreaming context.

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Notes:

⁃ Almost immediately after waking up I realised I probably had the swimming and diving dream because I spent so much of last night reading stuff on Dreamviews. It made me feel like the water was representative of dreaming in itself.
⁃ When I was reading stuff last night I had some thoughts about symbology, mostly because of the topics but I think also because of something I’d said/posted. I feel this is probably why the dream ended up being so metaphorical.
⁃ I ended up taking the whole swimming and diving experience, which in the dream made me stronger, as a sign that I may be making some progress again with dreaming. There was just a sort of clear association in my head when I woke up that all of this was a metaphor for how I was doing lately.
⁃ The void filled with artefacts etc. also felt relevant in that context because it seemed like a collection of lost and unknown culture.
⁃ This void was very similar to the Chthonic voids found in Grim Dawn, probably because I was also playing that a bit last night.

Kind of a single long dream, but some bits are missing.

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Dream:

The first part of the dream I can remember was at a somewhat accurate layout of the cul-de-sac in front of my old home. I was sitting in the driver seat of a car, which I think was my dad's car, as some of the interior felt familiar. But I had the window fully down and was sort of resting my arms against it and looking out. It was a sunny day, probably past 3PM but not sure what season. First half of the year, I think.

Where my building door was supposed to be was actually this entrance into some sort of church, but not a church, as there was a machine there like a manually operated computer, and there was a group of people running it. I think I had been in there previously in the dream, or I just "saw" this somehow. But then there was an oddity about this machine, it could be switched off by literally anyone who walked past it, as there was a button labelled "STOP" and another "EMERGENCY STOP". They both did the exact same thing. I think I remember I had asked someone why, and they couldn't explain it to me.

Then, while I'm in the car, some black guys show up. I realise better what position the car was in, sort of blocking in the entrance of the cul-de-sac a bit. These guys smile at me, I smile back, but I immediately know that they are there for something. They sort of huddle up around one side of the car, sort of hiding from view from where the machine place was. They look at me worried and I say nothing, quietly watching with some amusement, I'm curious what they have planned.

This one guy stops trying to hide and just walks straight up to the place. I can see that he hits that stop button out of amusement for himself and the people running the machine get annoyed and make audible grunts, but seemingly don't even pay attention to the guy. I don't remember what else he did in there, but he comes back near the car and he has this piece of jewellery, I can't remember exactly what, but somehow I immediately know it's sort of stolen or something.

Then a different guy gets up and goes in and a bit later comes out with something similar. I think this happens a couple more times and I remember the last piece of jewellery, a silver necklace. It reminds me of a necklace H has, but only the chain was similar.

I remember getting into some small talk with the guys and then saying I had to go. I think I drive away and they disband, but I don't remember how it transitions into the next part exactly. But I remember my thoughts stayed on the "stolen items" for a bit.

Then I'm walking down an unknown dream park with two people. One of them is H's sister (A), but I'm not sure who the other person is, some guy, around my age, but a friend of mine, not A's friend.

It's night time and there is plenty of green vegetation and everything's slightly wet. Sprinklers had been on, as it isn't raining and I don't get the impression it had been. There are paths through this hilly park and the path we're on takes sort of long curves around some well mowed lawn-like fields, well lit by strong cool lights.

As we're walking this path on the left-hand side there's a hedge going all the way along the curve and on the right-hand side there's this man on a short two-sided ladder. I don't look up to see what he's doing, but all of a sudden sparks and arcs of electricity go everywhere. Somehow I'm not surprised or worried, and neither is anyone else. Moments after I'd walked past, I pause, looking back. A is sort of looking closely at the ladder and some cables, which I somehow think of as being a bit foolish considering the electricity, so I think I motion for her to carry on.

We arrive somewhere and there's some kind of transition. I lose any awareness of A and the mystery friend.

I'm now at a place that closely resembles my high school, or college. But the lights are sort of dim and moody. It was still night outside. All of a sudden I find myself in the middle of a group of random people, of all ages really. And then I'm lying down, between this girl my age on the left and this old woman on the right. They're both lying down too but sort of sitting. There's a cover over my legs and this girl on the left.

People are mostly just idling around and there are some paintings on the walls. I look closely at some, finding myself annoyed that I know some of them and that they've been there for an eternity, half thinking to myself "why can't one of mine be there?". The thought passes quickly and I look at another painting that catches my attention and I quite like. Somehow this makes many other people look at it too and start discussing it.

My attention fades away from it and this girl on my left starts touching my private areas; I don't realise it's her doing it at first. I realise that both me and her didn't have pants or underwear on. For a moment I wonder if H was touching me in waking reality but the thought doesn't go past being somewhat automatic. I enjoy her touch but start to wonder why she's touching me like this. I assume that she wants the same so I move one of my hands to touch her in the same areas and this seems to completely surprise her, despite whatever pleasure she felt. I get the impression she is embarrassed now and she sort of gets up and dresses herself and leaves.

The old woman on the right makes some comments, the last bit of which I vaguely remember. "It's not easy making money that way, you know." the old woman says. I reply: "No, I didn't think so either."

Then I am left with some lingering thoughts of why she would try to make money in such a way, and why she left, but the rest of my dream recall sort of ends here.

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Notes:

• In the third and final part of the dream, there was a fair bit of conversation between everyone and myself and other dream characters, but as I try to recall the dream I can only mostly remember silence.
• The group of black guys in the first part of the dream were nobody I recognised, though they reminded me of friends I used to have when I was younger. I have had a few recurring appearances of those groups of friends and I felt it was somewhat familiar, especially because of the dream's location, which is where they typically appear in my dreams.
• I think the jewellery was actually coming from some sort of replicating machine in the same place as the manually-run computer thing, but my memory of it is extremely vague.
• The stone hall where that computer thing was, really wasn't very different from the actual entrance hall of my old building. It was sort of just super elongated and wider.
• I have no idea now who the friend was with me and A. I don't recognise the face and seems to just be a generic construct of "male friend".
• The girl touching me in the final part of the dream didn't tell me her name and somehow in the dream I felt the expectation that she would have done, especially before leaving. Although I remember her hair as being somewhat long and curly and dark, I got the impression there was something about her that was "redhead" or that the word "red" was somehow associated with her as a character.
• The old woman in the same part had some sort of old-style blue dress, and reminded me a bit of a cartoon character in some way. Her hair was a perfect white and tied up in a sort of bun. What little I can remember of her face is that she looked youthful for how old it sounded like she was.
• The appearance of both these sort of contrasting female figures is not without some personal meaning to me; it's the sort of thing I sometimes wonder about, especially if I'm working on some art piece involving nude human figure- the old woman was young like us at some point and so wasn't at all phased by what was happening. I often wonder how I will see this type of situation when I'm much older myself, or how I'll feel about it.
• Nearly forgot to add this note: The odd mood lighting (sort of an orange-y red/purple) in the last part of the dream was incredibly similar to that of another strange dream I had some time back. I can't remember if I did have any thoughts about it during the dream.

Small parts of several dreams from today.

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Dream Fragment:

My friend L tried to contact me. Somehow we were communicating by typing on our computers on notepad, on a shared .txt file, which we would save in turns to effectively "send" messages. Despite being a plain text file, I remember L used emojis, something she'd probably find pretty silly for the specific situation.

I have forgotten most of this dream's content but I remember L had an overall feeling of concern, and equally I realised I felt somewhat neglectful.

Dream Fragment:

I was outside, in a mix of my old home area and of some other place more like where I live now. It was daytime, there were bits of settled snow here and there and the pavement looked completely dull to me at the time. There was a row of terraced houses on one side, with an inordinate amount of front yard space. The pavement was unusually wide too.

I was out here with someone, either my aunt or my mother, or some kind of blend. There was this tiny ancient and ruined chapel and we were sort of investigating it for whatever reason and there was supposed to be a secret passage that we had to activate from the outside. We walked around it several times and eventually I pointed at this crude square shape covered by dirt and grass on the floor, which I'd noticed several times when going around the chapel's exterior, finally insisting that maybe it was what we wanted to check, as at this point I felt that any observations I made were being dismissed entirely.

There is some sort of dream transition and there's a different feel to things, and I find myself sort of manipulating wall segments as if it were a strategy game; the placement ghost for wall sections changed dynamically based on whether I was placing it close to existing walls or apart from any walls.

Dream Fragment:

Something about a blonde or fake-blonde woman, lying in bed. She was reading a book about things she'd done right? Or about things she had to pay for. This was in some sort of birthday party setting. It felt cheesy and crowded, inside a bedroom that somehow reminded me of a hospital room.

Dream Fragment:

I was in bed with H, who was reading something on the phone. It was around morning time by the looks of it and I was lying in bed in a funny way, because I was also reading a magazine of sorts. But the magazine was about as thick as my thumb is wide. It had all sorts of articles, about everything and anything, though I've forgotten most of it now, I remember the last one I was reading before closing it and looking at the cover. That article was about how an older Spain had convinced everyone during the exploration of the Americas to "drink this swill" that we call cocoa and how it's rival neighbouring country of Portugal had done little during that time to stop it too. It was like a sponsored article about an anti-cocoa cult of sorts and I found it to be pretty ridiculous even in the dream. It mentioned they already had hundreds of followers and hoped to expand them greatly in the coming times.

After I shut the book/magazine, I gave H a cuddle and that's the last thing I remember. Somehow I didn't realise the irony of the very dream-like situation at all.

---

Some notes:

• The text in the fourth fragment was very consistent. I remember reading and going back to re-read something I'd already read to make sure I was getting it right. In that dream I should have realised that no magazine would ever be so thick.
• The magazine cover was a cream or khaki colour, with a picture of a large manor or something on a sunny day in the front, with some smaller squares of other scenic views.
• I remember seeing bits and pieces of the book in the third dream by myself. It didn't make any sense, it was like a children's book but with tasks and questions. The pictures were all sort of life-like, but drawn.
• The very first dream fragment was one of several that I could still vaguely recall from the early morning before I fell asleep again, the other three fragments being ones from after falling asleep again.

Some fragments from last night.

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Fragment:

I was in some kind of starship, not unlike one from Star Trek but there was a mixed feel from several space stuff, including a bit from Starpoint Gemini. I was captaining the ship and we were headed straight for a blue-ish planet, covered mostly by water than anything else. I could see the system's star just left of where the planet was, much further away.

Some four or five other green-coloured ships appeared, intercepting and following us closely. I suggested to an officer to simply activate the cloaking device ability and could see in a third-person view from outside the ship as the field enveloped it and the other ships disbanded in separate directions. (Expectable AI behaviour if it were a game)

As we got very close to the planet, I could see everything in a sort of cinematic view and then the ship started getting close to the ground to land somewhere but for whatever reason it had to be at an airport, so the ship kept making really wide loops closing in and away from the planet surface.

Every time we got close, I could see on some disembodied interface some information about the local surface structures. I did see a fair few airports, but many of which had tractors lining up vegetables in the runways. This annoyed me slightly.

There is a transition and I am now on my own at some sort of Japanese-looking castle. It's night-time but I can see the moon and everything looks bright and blue-ish. There are some sort of holographic security features. (This part of the dream vaguely reminded me of Starbound)

Fragment:

Just a small part of some other dream, I was in a town with some friends, not sure who. We just came out of a restaurant that was closing for the night and then two of us went one way, and I wondered where the third member was. I asked my friend, who only vaguely suggested the other might have gone looking for something.

I remember wandering streets, there was a lot of light, from glowing signs and lampposts. I could see people sitting at cafes and so on.

At some point we went into some shop and I wondered again about the missing friend. The friend that was with me was fascinated and excited by rediscovering some sort of cardboard packed plastic ketchup sachets.

The next bit I remember, stuck in some sort of traffic at a four-way junction, with three lanes on each direction.

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Side notes:

• The first dream was a bit more unusual as I haven't had many dreams that take place in space, even though I've played a lot of games that do.
• The view-point changes were sort of frequent in the space dream and they felt a bit like they were made through a keyboard I couldn't quite feel. I suppose this sensation is quite similar to when I'm actually playing or writing something, where the keyboard sort of just becomes an extension of awareness, rather than existing as a physical obstacle, in a sense.
• Most of these dream fragments I am getting lately are written quite a lot later from when I had the dreams, so it's a sign that recall is improving somewhat and I am also noticing more pre-lucid thoughts at a sort of "gut feeling" level, where I am not expressly thinking in spoken words but rather getting feelings or intuition about the dreams' content.

Two dreams, turned mostly into fragments after getting up from bed. I think there was a third one, but I must have forgotten it.

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Dream Fragment 1:

I don't know where I was, it wasn't a familiar place at all, but there was some kind of square and a market. There was a town or city feel to the place and I remember it was day time, although everything looked a bit dark or murky somehow.

There was this woman with blonde-ish hair and a fit look (V) whom I know online from a game, though I've never met her in person. She was showing me around? I remember her grabbing me, by the arm or hand and for some reason in the dream this made me visibly uncomfortable. V noticed and asked me what was wrong or whatever. I explained that where I was originally from, physical interaction even with strangers was commonplace, but since I have been living elsewhere for some years now, I had sort of become estranged from the feeling and it was a confusing situation somehow.

Next thing I remember is something about a big cruise ship. I went down some steps, avoiding a queue for said ship, with no interest at all in getting on, having passing thoughts about a waste of time it looked like, due to how crowded it seemed like it was going to be.

There is then a transition of some kind.

Dream Fragment 2:

I remember being with H. We're on the road, H is driving; it looks like the type of countryside I'd expect to find here. It was day time, but the sun was close-ish to the horizon, I think more setting than rising, and it was also cloudy. Everything looked a bit desaturated.

There is a transition and now we're at some sort of lodge. My mom and my dad are there and we're having a look around. Nobody else is around, and the place is littered with what I can only describe as cultural artefacts from many different places. For some reason I take no particular interest in them however. I remember my parents talking, probably with me, but don't remember the content of the conversation.

There are stairs that go up and next thing I know, I find myself going through several upper levels of this lodge. One of my siblings (L) is here and we are both going up the stairs up to a point when we're not inside the house anymore, and it's a cliff. There are still steps, made of rough and weathered stone. As we go up the steps, the incline gets sharper, and this random girl with a massive backpack is also climbing these steps. At first I get past her but as I get nearer a flat bit at the top of these steps, she overtakes me.

Next thing I know, I expect to be at the flat bit and that there would be more to climb. I expect that the cliff on the other side would be gentle based on what I felt the formation was like, but no. This was the peak, and it was like a sharp peak.

Up here, there was a large but flat rock, on which L sat in a precarious way as always and I could see lots of things below, fields, towns, other mountains. I felt the height we were at was impossibly high for the amount of climbing we'd done, but my legs were shaking and I felt giddy from my irrational fear of heights. At first L tried to get my attention so I wouldn't look down, but that didn't last long. I remember seeing parts of this mountain we were on, looking toward the left. There were large and ancient man-shaped stones along certain parts of the ridges, almost like steps but which were really more like foundations for fortifications.

I couldn't let go of the rough stone steps. The way the flat bit of rock was connected meant that there was an extremely narrow part of dirt or rock and I just felt it was risky to try and get there. I wanted to go back down and eventually I did. I remember being at the main part of that lodge again, but the rest of the dream is missing.

---

Some notes:

• V looked exactly as I would have expected but though we had some conversation, I have no idea what her voice was like, or if it was accurate.
• H's presence in the second dream was quite short, but so was the presence of my parents and the random girl that was doing the climb too.
• When I was at the peak of that mountain, there was a cold feel to being there, although I don't remember actually feeling cold. But everything was quite bright, it was clear and sunny and I enjoyed that on some level, but the sort of physical stress I was feeling due to the fear of heights made the experience remind me of several situations in my childhood.
• During that part of the dream where I was climbing, I remember clearly thinking; "I'm sure I've dreamt of a climb like this". In actual reality, I don't think I have had a dream like that before, but again, the experience was similar to some I had in my childhood.

Remembered this fragment much more clearly earlier on but wasn't able to write it until now.

---

Dream Fragment:

Was in Wintergrasp from WoW; I remember the snow on the ground felt a bit "real" and I think the atmosphere was a bit more blue-ish than it probably ever was in reality. The battle was going to begin in just over a minute and the place was more deserted than I expected; but as the timer finished the place was crowded. For some reason I got teleported to a cave like the starting cave from AV and likewise there was a large metal gate in the same style. I could clearly see outside was still WG however, and I was going to be defending. I remember the gate opening but some details are missing now between this part and the next.

The next part I remember is next to one of the east walls of the fortress. I remember fighting outside the walls for a bit but can't remember exactly what class I was playing; either a warrior or a death knight with a two-handed weapon.

I got on one of the rocket turrets mounted along the east wall and pointed it quite directly at a few enemy players fighting some of ours on the ground below. I was mostly aiming at one of the sloped areas, where most of the fighting was taking place. I don't remember seeing the siege vehicles at this point. I can remember seeing the characters in much clearer detail than would be possible in-game, especially when this area was current content - I think there was a mix of horde and alliance in the enemy forces.

I remember during the dream I was feeling a bit of allure (pre-lucid?) towards the player characters in general as I could see them in quite clear detail.

---

Edit, some side notes:

Back in WLK I did play death knight, warrior and paladin classes a lot, the latter two especially compared to the previous expansion and the original game where I mostly just played rogue.
Though the snow had a more real quality to it, as I could sort of feel it crunch like it would if it was fairly deep, nothing else about the environment seemed more realistic.
The focus I took on the player character models is not uncharacteristic of something I would do when actually playing anyway, as I always liked seeing the different equipment on all the characters, but in this case it felt different because the characters I took more note of felt like they were “zoomed in”, in terms of detail. I remember I had felt it was odd/different.

Dream Fragment:

I was at my old home or some version of it. I was at the entrance hall and it was a bit dark but still daytime, suggesting it was the time just before sunset. H was there, but H looked like this actress from a TV show instead. She was crouched up in the middle of the room, in front of the dark stained wardrobe and I crouched next to H and started to cuddle, giving her a kiss and feeling how different her body was compared to what I should remember.

There is a transition and I'm outside, it's daytime but probably more around noon now. I remember walking by a few places that were altered from how they should be, namely D's building and its entrance. There were quite a few people there and I remember making small talk for some reason, but no idea what about.

I kept wandering the streets of my home town and eventually after going through a few streets that don't exist and a wall turning into an open street, I started to become sort of pre-lucid and gained some dream-control, not consciously thinking about it. There was a square or plaza of some kind, surrounded by short two or three story buildings, as expected, and people were just going about their business. But I wanted to feel alone and solemn in this place for some reason, so I snapped my fingers and most of them disappeared. A woman and her young boy didn't.

I snapped again, wanting rid of her from the scene. She wouldn't go. She walked up to me and started becoming antagonistic and asking why I wanted her to go. I didn't explain myself (perhaps I didn't know why either) and I eventually conceded and said "fine, if you won't leave, then I will", so I walked away across the plaza and into a small tunnel lit with fluorescent lights and as I did, she paced up quickly behind me, pushing me against a corner, hurting me, and twisting my right arm and gripping my bottom.

She said something that I can't remember word for word, which basically summed up to be about how I often am careless with caressing and cuddling H (making me cause pain by complete accident), and despite the pain she was inflicting on purpose, I laughed at its irony. In that moment, I felt a dire need to go to the bathroom, and I falsely woke up, then getting up from bed and going to the bathroom, and just as I sat on the toilet, I was in bed again, as if that was only imagined, but the urge to use the bathroom was suddenly gone.

Then I woke up truly and double checked how I felt, realising it was all just very realistic dream sensation.

---

Some notes:

• This dream wasn't particularly vivid in terms of visual clarity but the physical sensations were quite strong overall.
• The woman who wouldn't go was some sort of anima manifestation. Often it isn't so antagonistic but her look was distinct from previous appearances, mostly marked by her shoulder-long hair being black this time. Her face was more chiselled, too. It was simply a more raw and aggressive look in general; ironically enough, what I would expect from my home region.
• Though I had some dream control, it was completely non-lucid. I could feel myself having some sort of pre-lucid thoughts but they didn't rise up enough for me to start gaining lucidity.
• The woman's young boy reminded me of myself when I was younger, but his role in the dream seemed to be minimal. He seemed to be there pretty much just to characterise the woman as a mother, as he pretty much just went off playing in the street without a care for what was happening.

I've been having a somewhat better dream recall average than I normally would, but haven't been taking note of dreams enough and my last DJ here was ages ago now. This is a particularly memorable dream fragment from this week.

---

Dream Fragment:

First half is missing.

Was in my home city, or some altered version of it. It was day time and I was heading home on foot; there was a fluid transition to my arrival home but I've forgotten the detail of it, and when I got there it was dark at that point. My dad was in his car and approached me and told me to get in the car so we could go somewhere (for a meal or something?) - I was a bit reluctant, I was feeling in pain and really tired; mom was sat at the back with one of my brothers (T) and one of my cousins (R) was sat at the front, so I sat next to mom.

Dad started driving and very shortly after, we were going through some surreal highway that I've seen in some other dream fairly recently; surrounded by cliffs and 10-story buildings on top of the cliffs. It then turned into a rock and dirt road and there were dark abysses either side of the road, with more cliffs in the distance. I was a bit apprehensive too, but mom was starting to get quite worried and told dad, in the same way as I ever expect.

He reassured her with a smile, saying: "It's fine, I've driven on these roads loads of times!". Very shortly after he said that, we went over a bump in the road, but there was nothing on the other side. The car fell straight into one of those abysses, none of us seemingly very concerned by this, plunging into water at the bottom.

At first we didn't try to get out; I remember thinking "Well it doesn't really matter" but eventually we all got out and swam up. When we got to the surface of the water, some sort of root-like things descended toward us and took us to a sort of rocky area under a much bigger floating mass of rock.

At the centre of this area there was some sort of little shop. I remember going in and seeing all these small 4:3 CRT TV screens, each one no bigger than my head, sat on shelves, almost perfectly spaced apart. Each one of the screens had a landscape view in it, like a live feed, but not much was going on in any of them. It was a colourful shelf to look at.

As I walked along this narrow path between these big metal shelves with the TVs, something caught my attention on top of one shelf. A moonstone, but not as bright and vivid or even opalescent like one I actually have in reality. The gem was pale and sort of a sepia or cream colour but it was still slightly translucent as expected. What was odd about it was that it was encrusted with some sort of gold filigree and small golden spheres.

Start to remember less detail at this point. I remember dad went off his own way and so did my sibling and cousin. Mom stayed with me and we went outside, where it was still dark, although the direct area around wherever we went was always seemingly lit. More like the darkness was a fog made of black.

I remember seeing some bones or dead plants and noticing the floor was particularly arid. Eventually we found some building thing, which was very square. It had a brand new kitchen I think, but apart from that it was mostly just dark corridors. I don't remember anything after that point.

---

A note:

I remember that in the dream the surreal landscapes felt familiar but out of place. Although I did not get anywhere near being lucid, I've had more of these moments lately where I'll have pre-lucid thoughts or recognition of a feature from a past dream.

Non-dream stuff - Woke up about 3 times through the morning, between 8:20, the time for my alarm, then at 9 something then at 10:20. Some long-ish dreams but think they've fragmented.

---

Fragment 1:
At a square or cathedral. There with partner (H), something to do with pipe organs.

Then outside, at the square. Nice cobbles and layout. Remember meeting up with my parents and having them ask why I didn't have a stand here selling old coins; I remember explaining that I'd worked out that the cost to make them look new, plus the cost to rent the space, plus other things I don't remember now, meant that it was far too expensive and not worth it at all. I also remember explaining that I didn't have nearly enough coins to make it worthwhile.

Then at some version of my childhood home with my parents. At the rear balcony of the flat. Things look blocky like a voxel game. I remember blue leaves and yellow logs. We were on the 6th or 7th floor, judging by the height.

Fragment 2:
A friend of ours, M, was buying crap again.

Fragment 3:
At some sort of flat. Don't remember what lead up to this scene anymore.

There was a tongue and lips art sculpture thing on a wall. Then it became a bit more real and I then remember a giant furry outside the flat, peeking in. I remember the fur was white and the eyes were blue. I think it was a girl and she said something.

---

Some notes:

• The appearance of my parents and the questions about the "coin stand", has to do with how they often want me to try and do something else, since they are concerned I won't be able to support myself. This type of appearance in a dream is perhaps validating their concerns in part. When I was awake in bed I remember thinking about carpentry again.
• Being at the cathedral with H seems to be merely a reflection of recent events, as I help H with pipe organ work.
• Both the first and the third dreams were a lot longer, and I woke up sweating with the third dream; this has been happening a few times recently where I wake up sweating at about 10:20 with vivid-ish dreams. Generally being too hot is what makes the dreams vivid, as far as I can tell. Unfortunately it also means my mind is a bit more active when I'm actually awake, making it easier to forget details.

Non-dream stuff - Woke up at 8:20 or so with my alarm, waking up from a non-lucid, sweating. Slept some more and woke up again around 2 hours later with one or two non-lucids.

---

Dream 1:
I was living in a house with my partner (H); I remember it had a ground floor and a first floor. It was day time, and sunny. One of our neighbours was a couple, a man and a woman, who had two kids, two boys I think.

One of those boys started to "accuse" me of looking at him, when I hadn't been; this went on for a while in the dream and the parents themselves didn't seem that interested... Later on, this boy, the younger of the two I think, started messing around and eventually he tried to get into our house for some reason or something. I decided we should catch him and make him calm down and explain his problems.

I waited for him to be on top of our wall or fence or something and then when he couldn't see me I'd grabbed him by the legs and took him in and told him to calm down, as he was obviously upset now. I asked him why he was being left here when his parents were gone and he wasn't sure; and he said that sometimes when his parents were at home he wasn't allowed in and he could hear "pumping" noises? I understood the implied meaning of this in the dream to be his parents having sex.

I remember as soon as he calmed down and started to explain his problems I was a lot less tense too, as I hadn't wanted him to get away without an explanation for his previous behaviour at the very least.

Seems I can't remember any more detail for this dream.

Dream 2:
In a square-ish L shape room. The negative shape of the L (so, a smaller square area) was a vertical section of some sort. This looked it was all part of some sort of facility. There was a glass sliding door that would lead into a corridor. Next to the door were many armed guards, standing in a formation, they looked like stormtroopers but some with no helmets on.

By the glass around the inner part of the L, facing into the vertical section, was a woman. I can't remember what she looked like exactly but I remember something about her breasts being inflated, but then not. She was the DNA source for those clone troopers or something? But I was too or something.

I remember suggesting an idea to her that perhaps we could change her DNA a bit further, as it was ironic that the troopers were infertile and they couldn't procreate with her. Then I remember saying or thinking something about the fact that she could give birth to our genetically modified humans as a surrogate, rather than them being grown in wherever they were grown.

There was a lot more detail to this dream, but I've forgotten it.

Dream 3:
The last dream, like the rest was quite long but I only remember the last portion... I remember being in a shop, then outside at a pier... I was in Australia or something? I needed to take a boat to Europe or the Middle-East. I remember seeing a world map, but oddly Africa seemed to be missing.

The boat and some other things looked a bit cartoony somehow. The captain was the owner and they were struggling financially or something so I bought the boat really cheap off him and then I had to get some things ready and then someone else was captain of the boat and I bought it off them again as for some reason it was sinking and buying it stopped it...

Eventually I got on and there was some sort of transition. I remember seeing the map again.

The next place, in someone's house. It was like a holiday house that was let to people. I looked around for others but couldn't find anyone. It was day and I could see sunlight come through windows, but the windows themselves looked too bright (nothing but white past them).

I found some food and drinks, all prepared, for guests like myself, but I didn't take any. I looked around more for someone else and eventually entered this darker, tiny, kitchen. There was a door to the outside and it didn't look so sunny but it was still day. The door was open and there was a woman standing there with a slightly grumpy look on her face. In the kitchen was a man, about my age. He started talking to me and commenting about the house or something, and then all of a sudden he said "oh you've got a bit of a zapper there" or something like that, referring to the fact that he could see my junk poking in my pants, which incidentally were my sweatpants.

I apologised and said that this just sometimes happened and I couldn't control it (and in fact I expected him to understand since he was a man), but I got the feeling he brought it up more to antagonise his wife or girlfriend standing outside. I took a pair of my compression gloves out of my left pocket and said to him "look, maybe these were also contributing", as my gloves felt quite bulgy inside the pocket previously. Oddly, I can't remember what happened to the gloves, and it's the first time they've appeared in a dream since I've had them.

Then some transition.

I was outdoors with this guy. In some city in the US. There was nobody else here initially. I had an interface overlay in my vision, reminded me of the game Boundless and the flooring looked like a specific block-type from the game and I was inspecting it. The floor looked like limestone cobbles. Then he went in a direction and I followed him; he was saying something to me when we got to the top of a slope/stairs bit though I don't remember what. I saw a church and then to its left there was a castle. There were more people here. I remember a couple of cars and a bald man with sunglasses on, inspecting someone's papers.

The castle bit looked newer, and I asked about it and the guy said they had no old pictures or plans of it so it was rebuilt from imagination or whatever. There was an older castle/church part that had a big glass pane, and inside was a British flag like the one found on planes (the circle with 3 colours). I thought of asking the guy about it but then ended up not and just thought it was interesting.

Rest of details lost.

---

Some notes:

• The dream with the boy reminds me now a bit of a type of novel that I hear sometimes where someone express their troubles by causing troubles, sometimes at someone else's dear expense.
• In waking life one neighbour on the other side of the street does sometimes leave their two boys outside, when they're going out, which I don't think is good, and I think this first dream was related to this.
• I was happy that the boy confessed his troubles as in the dream I then felt like I could do something about it. I think I remember getting on the phone with the police actually, I think when I first grabbed the boy, because I was concerned that his parents were neglecting him.
• In the second dream there was some residual context from STRAFE, mostly with the layout and stuff like that.
• The woman wasn't anyone I know in particular nor did she look like anyone I've seen really, but I think she had a ponytail.
• In the third dream, the guy's presence felt a bit odd all the way throughout. It felt like there was a sinister subtext, although he did seem friendly enough...
• I might do a bonus image for the second dream, for the layout.

---

Scoring:
+ Previous score: 65.5

+ This DJ entry score (breakdown below): 8.0
++ Recall a non-lucid dream * 3: 3.0
++ Help someone in need: 1.0 (the boy; although my tactic was a bit too aggressive, it seemed to get him talking which I think was very important)
++ Buy something * 2: 2.0 (the boat, twice...)
++ Invent something that's never been heard of before: 2.0 (the DNA altered surrogacy procedure thing)

= Total score thus far: 73.5

Non-dream stuff - Woke up around 10:00, with one non-lucid sort of fresh in memory but all the detail quickly went away on waking, somehow.

---

Dream fragment:
This was from the end of the dream.

Game-like reality; "playing" with someone else in a co-operative mode and in some underground sand or clay tunnels or something.

The tunnels lead into a big chamber, dark. There was some sort of well at the centre. A stone colossus came towards us from the opposite side of the room and we backtracked a bit. In the dream I remember telling the other person the colossus was made of obsidian and we wouldn't be able to attack it in this form and that it would turn into black steel for a few minutes at a time every so often and we'd have to try and attack then...

The colossus came into the tunnels/halls but I ended up darting past and into the chamber with the well; I jumped into the well, partly by accident as I meant to go across the room where there seemed to be a portal or some brightness. It was completely dark underwater and I soon "died" in a game-like fashion.

The view changed and the camera panned out; I could hear a boss give a monologue which I don't remember in any detail, and I partly remember him asking "how did you get here? vaulted over the walls? exploited some location?" and other questions to that effect.

---

Couple of notes:

• The dream location and situation here at the end reminded me of the game Necropolis.
• The stone colossus was similar to Anubisath, a boss in the original World of Warcraft.

---

Scoring:
+ Previous score: 65.0

+ This DJ entry score (breakdown below): 0.5
++ Recall a non-lucid fragment: 0.5

= Total score thus far: 65.5

Non-dream stuff - Woke up at around 8:20/30 with alarm and fell asleep and had a non-lucid dream, waking up again just after 10:00.

---

Dream:
I don't quite remember the first part of the dream except that I was next to the floor or lying on it.

I was in the bedroom from my childhood times, and the curtains were closed but it was day. I had my laptop on a desk in the room but for some reason related to another part of the dream earlier, the hard drive was missing. I tried to boot it up anyway but considered that it shouldn't be able to because there would be no OS to pick.

It ran a load of white-on-black text as most computers do when booting, the branding/word "MICROSYSTEMS" catching my attention at one point. The boot queried for a valid pre-existing username, which I provided, and it started loading up some version of Linux OS. It immediately entered the OS without a login, which made me think to myself "it's not difficult to guess or remember a username even if you're not the computer's owner...", considering whether this was secure enough as a feature at large.

In any case, I think I started up an internet browser, don't remember if it was any in particular and then some cartoony image was playing but it was a bit laggy so I considered maybe because it didn't have a hard drive in it was caching everything in the RAM or something, slowing down the performance. For some reason the degraded performance stopped being an issue and I went on some dodgy website and got distracted browsing through it, and it had naughty cartoon animations, basically. At some point one of the animations had sound and I didn't mute it (which I now find odd).

I remember thinking that I was supposed to be doing something else and worried my partner or someone else was going to come in and be judgmental. I then closed all those tabs I'd basically mindlessly opened and tried to remember whatever it was I was supposed to be doing.

The dream went on for a bit longer but I don't remember any details.

---

Some notes:

• Perhaps the weirdest part about the boot up was that there was no flash drive or anything that the OS could have loaded from, so it would have to be stored in a ROM module or something, since the hard drive was out... I didn't remember or think to have a look at the internals or anything.
• I don't know if MicroSystems is an actual brand or not, but it's a pretty logical/easily thought of name...
• The dream's theme from the second half relates a bit to my teen context when I would get a bit anxious looking at explicit material because I was always worried about being interrupted.
• The lack of self-control is two-fold in this dream; one, because I was not lucid, and two, because it relates to the waking-life context of me struggling to, when drawing something of more sexual nature, to not get excited by it. It's an annoying issue because it results in unfinished work that I would like to finish but never feel motivated to, because I'd like to actually just work on it for once, instead of getting excited.

---

Scoring:
+ Previous score: 64.0

+ This DJ entry score (breakdown below): 1.0
++ Recall a non-lucid dream: 1.0

= Total score thus far: 65.0

Non-dream stuff - Woke up at about 8:20 or so with one of my alarms, but went back to sleep. Woke up again nearer 11:00. Was having a semi-vivid non-lucid dream, some details lost now because I had to get up to do other stuff.

---

Dream:
I remember my computer screen. I was sitting down to do something and then some weird pop-ups and music started. I couldn't find out what was causing the music to play so I started looking at the list of processes, finding a few things that looked out of place. I was a bit startled to find this was some sort of malware playing the music, and causing these pop-ups, which for once were mostly innocent (and somewhat detailed) drawings of several themes.

Even so I was feeling under threat or stressed and I looked at the file location for the suspicious processes, continuously closing these pop-ups as they appeared. The music was sort of calm, nothing intense, but it didn't feel any less unnerving in the dream. I found the files for the music-playing program and there was a file without an extension called "about"; I opened it up with NPP, which as expected revealed a few lines of text, including the motivation of the person that made this malware thing. Apparently it was from a Swiss games company, which I thought was very odd. I remember an e-mail address and some other details.

I remember thinking it was my own fault for not having an anti-virus installed and I was showing the malware to my partner (H) I think. But then I noticed a little tray icon for Avast or something like that and I said to H "see, it doesn't detect it...", referencing the lack of any alerts.

In the end I think I was going to delete the files of the malware programs, as they didn't look like they'd been protected in any way, but I can't remember what I actually did do.

Then some transition. Remember being in a town or city. In the US maybe? I was walking along with H and I think it was dusk or day time, but we went into this fancy modern/futuristic-looking building that was like a big surface tunnel; inside it looked kind of like a mall and was a bit busy, and I remember H interacting with someone. A guy that was working at a restaurant dropped something while clearing trays and H helped.

Not sure what happened next. Transition?

Outside, slightly sloped area, evening/sunset. Some houses. Thinking about the malware again? Faint memory of the music again.

There was more, but I seem to have lost recall for the next bits.

---

Some notes:

• The particular vividness of this dream did not seem to make me any more aware or questioning of its nature than usual.
• The music playing may mean that in waking life there was some other sound. This may have been my alarm or later one of H's alarms. Either way, music playing in dreams often relates to their vividness for me, though they are not always implicit to each other.
• The drawings were of things like classic representations of landscapes but also of "furry" themes and still life.

---

Scoring:
+ Previous score: 62.0

+ This DJ entry score (breakdown below): 2.0
++ Recall a non-lucid dream: 1.0
++ Ask for advice: 1.0 (asking H for help with the malware)

= Total score thus far: 64.0

lx. 28th or 29th of October

Dream fragment:
Something about some "stragglers"? I remember a location, from a bird's eye point of view, it was rural, there was a big mansion/manor in the middle. Remember going there and being told to try the stragglers. Remember another dream location supposedly nearby. Looked a bit like a dump inside, it was like a giant metal container, not unlike a shipping container but bigger.

Some sort of dwarf-like people, these stragglers. I was here to mine some titanium ore or something, and they hadn't been able to find any but I did.

---

lxi. today, 31st of October

Dream fragment:
Something about my partner wanting pizza.

Dream fragment:
A dream that was half-real half-game? Everything was fine but then there was some sort of war? Remember building blocky planes or vehicles and wondering if I couldn't just stay behind to do important logistics instead of flying off.

At some point in this dream I remember a living room of some sort and some pizza, a tv and a sofa...

---

Some notes about the dreaming:

• The first dream fragment feels related to the story I started writing a couple of weeks ago as a dreaming script. I have been thinking about that story but not writing a lot on it because of my tiredness.
• The war dream and building a plane probably comes from recently trying out the game "Besiege".

Some general waking-life notes:

• I've been a bit too tired recently and just can't get up or wake up at the time I want to, and it has happened I've gone to bed later than I wanted to as well.
• Lately I've been thinking about why certain elements never come up in dreams; such as reflective surfaces and some of things I do in waking life (such as painting and drawing).
• There have been mornings where I did initially recall a small dream fragment lately, but several times I had to get up and get on with something else and I'd forget the fragments or not have focused enough on them initially to be able to make a mental or written note.
• I have been practicing reality checks quite often and especially trying to make note of when things could potentially be dream elements. But the intention or the check muscle memory doesn't seem to be carrying over at all into dreams at the moment. Maybe I need to read more again, that seems to stimulate something different.

---

Scoring:
+ Previous score: 60.5

+ This DJ entry score (breakdown below): 1.5
++ Recall a non-lucid fragment * 3: 1.5

= Total score thus far: 62.0