Nazrax

Bed @ 2230 /w water
Wake @ 0100 /w full bladder

Fragment:I'm walking alone through a very white hospital hallway.

BTB /w SSILD
Woke @ 0400 for no obvious reason

Cleaning the bathroom
I'm staying somewhere along with a bunch of men from my church. Someone's suggested that we could help the women by cleaning their bathroom for them, and everyone agreed that would be a good idea. Everyone else is already in there, working, and I'm on my way to join them. I really don't want to, but I know I'm just being selfish and do my best to ignore my feelings. I feel very strange walking into the women's restroom, and I poke my head slowly around the corner, so I'm relieved to find that the room has only a bunch of men hard at work cleaning. The wall to my right is entirely taken up with a long counter with sinks, and it already has enough guys working on it. To my left is a large stall, and a few guys (including Ben) are working in there. Next to the stall, oddly, is a urinal. I wonder what it's doing in here, but since no one is at it I decide to see if it needs work. I'm surprised to see that it's actually pretty gross. I wish I had some gloves - in fact, I think I have some work gloves back in my room - but none of the other guys have any, and I don't want to look like a wimp, so I forego them. I grab a bunch of paper towels from a wall dispenser, wad them up (hoping I've got enough that my hand might stay dry), and start wiping around inside. I realize that my clothes are too nice for this kind of work, so I try to keep my distance and not splash myself. I didn't really expect my hand to stay dry, and sure enough the paper towel wad is soaked through pretty quickly; but I can see that my effort is making the porcelain look much better.

Now I'm reaching into some kind of access hatch to clean something from the inside. I'm wiping down a ventilation grill and I'm surprised at how dusty and rusty it is, especially since I'm pretty sure it's newly installed.

BTB @ 0430 /w dream yoga exercises; but it takes a long time to get to sleep.
Woke @ 0715 with no recall

Bed @ 2245 /w glass of water
Woke @ 0400 /w full bladder

Fragments:
I'm in a flat grasslands, and I'm surrounded by people with horses who I know to be the Rohirrim. I'm pleased with how they treat their horses (and wouldn't expect anything different), but I feel very uneasy about something.

I'm showing off my trackball: especially how I've got buttons on it set up to switch between different virtual desktops and how Synergy lets me control two computers from a single keyboard and mouse.


BTB @ 0410 /w SSILD
Woke on and off through the night

Fragment:
I'm in a strange vehicle that looks like a white, mechanized worm. A bunch of blue goop gets dumped onto its head and a giant circular saw comes down and starts cutting into it where the goop is.


Going for a walk
I'm talking with my wife about the day's schedule. We're going to be taking the subway downtown, and I'd like to stop by my office for a few minutes, since it's near the station. I think I'll have time for about half an hour, but my wife points out that, with walking time and schedule uncertainty, I'm probably not going to have any extra time at all, especially if we plan to have lunch together. There's something about a restaurant in the station itself, walking down the hall from the dining area straight to the ticketing booth.

Now my family and I are walking to the local subway station, and my old friend Brian is with us. We're spread out across a full lane on the road, but there are no cars, so we're safe. We come to a T in the road, headed off to the left, and take it. The road starts going uphill. Now Brian is pushing a small shopping cart with some of our stuff, and he's going (in my opinion) way too fast. I keep thinking that he's either going to tip the cart or run into someone. Eventually, I end up running alongside the front of the cart, keeping one hand on a front corner to guide it. We come across a neighborhood on our right and turn into it.

Now we're standing in the neighborhood near something like a gazebo. Looking through it, we can see that we're right on the edge of a steep slope down, and we have an amazing view of the country beyond. Most of it is flat, but there's a mountain sticking up from the middle. The side of the mountain looks like a patchwork quilt of different colors. I remind my second daughter that the other side of the mountain was all one color and contrast it with how different - and neat - this side looks.

Bed @ 2240
Wake @ 0140 /w full bladder

Call of Duty
I'm getting ready to play cooperative Call of Duty 4 with a friend. It's been a long time since I played, so I watch a video refresher. I get a reminder mainly about stealth, how to sneak, how to stay out of the light, and how it's pretty much impossible to hide when you're carrying something important, which glows like a beacon from y our back. Now I'm watching another video staring a couple of guys. It's much more colorful than the first, and at first I think it's something else, but eventually I realize it's still for this game. Now I'm watching as a couple of guys are sneaking across an area full of pressure plates (each of which has a special marking) to get to an artifact in the center. As they're getting close, a large man walks brazenly through the area, reaches over an unbroken ring of pressure plates, grabs the artifact, and starts to walk off. The first team sits stunned for a moment and then goes into action, trying to take down the newcomer and his team. They manage it, though some suppressing sniper fire makes it difficult.

Now I'm seeing the game as if I'm inside it. It's night, and I'm carrying the artifact. I see an enemy sniper off to my left, on the other side of a multilane road, though doesn't yet see me. I've got two teammates (one of whom is currently very stealthy while the other is slightly stealthy), and they manage to take him out so I can move. I can't see myself, but I know the artifact is making me glow. Now we've reached an elevator. One of my teammates wants to show me something, and he asks me to hand him the backpack. I do, and he immediately jumps into the elevator, pushes a button to close the doors, and laughs at me. I realize he's going to get credit for delivering the artifact instead of me! I bang on the doors of the elevator, then try to open them with my hands, but nothing happens (other than additional laughter from inside). I run for the stairs behind me, but it's many flights to get down to the mission objective, and I know he's going to beat me. I kick myself for forgetting about the artifact glow (huh?), and I wish I could play coop games with John again. We used to do it on a regular basis, but it's been a long time and he's just not interested any more.


Slippery cave
I'm in a cave with a friend. We've both got little sliding board. The cave is steep and fairly straight and covered with something slippery (snow? That doesn't seem right - we're not dressed for cold), and many people are sliding down a long way, going from the opening of the cave all the way to the other end. Now I'm about to go, but something's changed: there are large bare patches, and most of the crowd is gone. My mother-in-law apologizes: she thought everyone was done and has started cleaning up and putting away, though she says if I want to slide I can just put down <something>. I look around for it and see it (it looks like rolled up carpet); but I'm confused again because it looks like it's no more than twenty feet from the cave mouth to the far wall, and I could have sworn it was far longer than that before. Maybe I was thinking of a different cave. I walk deeper into the cave complex and find another room with sofa cushions on the floor. Maybe this is what I'm looking for. There are a variety of cushion designs, including some that look like they came from my own house! Initially, I think that all the cushions are of the same height, but looking again I see they're all sorts of shapes and sizes - some of them aren't even "box"-shaped. I see at least one or two foam blocks that look like cubes cut in half, triangular and sharp. I pull them out and go hunting for pillows of an appropriate size and thickness to fit in nicely with the pillows around the spots which held the weird "triangular" pieces.


Cleanup snafu
I'm helping clean up, including throwing a lot of stuff away. Something goes wrong, and I'm embarrassed. I end up throwing away a bunch of stuff and immediately running to get far away from the trashcan - I was trying to avoid some kind of threat.


BTB @ 0200.
Woke @ 0400 /w crying baby

Fragment: My second daughter is standing in a stark-white kitchen.


Woke @ 0545 /w noisy kids
Final Fantasy cheat codes
I'm playing Final Fantasy 7. I run to the top of some stairs, jump off, and land a long, long way down. As I land, I remember that, if I input the right code during the fall, I can get something really good. I go back up and try again, trying to remember the code, but it's just not coming to me. I send a quick message to John, asking if he remembers, but he doesn't. I try to look up the code another way, but something else comes up and I have to walk away from the game for a while.

Bed @ 2200
Woke @ 0020: Nothing
BTB @ 0025
Woke @ 0210 /w crying baby

Troublemakers in church
I'm at church, sitting in my usual spot. A group of young adults is behind me, and I don't know any of them. We're in the middle of Sunday School, and some of them are whispering and talking about the speaker, an older man I don't know. Later, I overhear the most disrespectful of the crowd, a late teens girl, talking to another of her friends and listing many perceived grievances she has with the teacher, and I take note of them. Now, I'm back in the sanctuary, and I've got her comments written down. I'm not sure what the best way to move forward is - or even, really, what I'm trying to do - so I leave them sitting on a chair where the teacher will find them. As it happens, someone else finds my notes - which have now become a hardback book - and brings it to his attention while he's teaching. He comes over, flips through it, and proclaims it wonderful - he wishes that other people would take the time and effort to write up their questions half as well as this. He thinks for a moment, opens the book back to the front, and signs it with a huge flowing signature that completely covers the page - Patrick something.

Later, I'm talking to him one-on-one, and he's sharing stories of the old days. *He says that medicine has come a long way since his youth.He starts talking about how he really started to feel his age when he hit seventy or so, but some new pills made him feel young again, and that was many years ago now.

Now potluck is laid out. I notice the cake we brought and take and eat a small hunk that's fallen off. I walk into the next room and see more food, including the cake we brought. Huh? I notice with some surprise that there's much less of it than I thought, so I decide not to take any.


Pizza delivery submarine
I'm seeing inside a car as an old-timey (20s-30s?) pizza delivery woman talks to her boss while on the road (I wonder how, since they didn't have cell phones back then ...). He's telling her about a problem with a customer, and she responds that she'd hate to lose their most responsible driver (I wonder what customer and driver have to do with each other). He asks her to pick up the slack, and she sadly agrees. Now I can see the driver holding up pills in a blister pack. The top half are blue, for the driver, and the bottom half are red, for the customers. Somehow they help to ... something? Now I see the driver, dressed in an evening gown, embracing a man dressed in a suit. She's holding a small flower bouquet, but when she tells him she has more deliveries, the flowers instantly wilt in an almost comical way.

Now I'm watching from above as a girl (who my mind labels as the pizza delivery girl) pilots a small submarine up to the beach near my youngest daughter. She opens the bubble hatch and hopes out, asking my daughter to come with her. The sub is parked in the surf, with the opening just barely above the water line, and my daughter doesn't want to go out to it. A particularly large wave comes by and knocks the sub back out into the water. Its hatch automatically closes so it doesn't get wet inside, and both girls look on with dismay as it floats away from them. A fighter jet passes by low overhead.

Now I'm wading into the water, going after the sub, but now the sub is a large friendly sea creature with a gentle face and large paws. I'm not chasing it at the beach but instead in a very attractive zoo exhibit that has a little branching river passing here and there under the walkways. I'm almost to it, but it swims into a little tunnel. I consider following it but decide it would be better to head it off. I think for a moment to remember where the other end is and then head there. Sure enough, it comes out, and I gently take it by the paw. It doesn't try to fight or escape, so I lead it onto a small island. I call the girls over, telling them to get in before it decides to swim off again.


BTB @ 0235 /w SSILD
Wake @ 0500

The auction house
I'm in a majestic old conference center. It's paneled with a lot of dark wood and has high ceilings and carved pillars. A large amphitheater-style area has been roped off, and there's a long line of well-dressed people waiting to get in. There's an odd system in which each participant tears off the bottom part of his ticket, drops it into a jar, and gives the top half to a guard. My father-in-law is nearby, and I ask him what's going on. He says these people are here for a very prestigious auction which is by invitation only, and that we shouldn't even try to get in, because these people are very particular about their auctions. However, a nearby guard overhears us and lets us know that, since we're employees of the company, we can go in once everyone else is in, as long as there's still room.

Now we're walking through the theater area looking for seats - we're the only ones still standing. The seating arrangement is very odd, with small clumps of chairs - anywhere from about 2 to 8 - scattered around without any apparent design. He heads for a small clump near the edge of the room, and I follow, even though it looks like that clump only has two seats which are already occupied by a mother and daughter. As we get closer, I see that I somehow missed a couple of empty seats next to them.

Now we're seated. Unfortunately, from where we are, we can't see the stage; but there's a fairly large TV (which is set into a strange boxy cabinet) in front of us which I assume will show us a video feed of what's going on. However, right now, it's panning in extreme close-up over what seem to be company logos rendered in bas-relief. I look away, fearing that subliminal messages have been implanted in the video. After a while, I look back, and now the bas-relief logos are actually formed out of human bodies which have been painted with metallic paints. It gives a very odd effect. Now the TV is showing a beautiful tropical beach, and the painted people are running along the sand.

Now, I've been sucked into the video. I'm on the island, naked except for a blanket I've got wrapped around myself. A strange woman comes up to me and tells me that she can help me get back to the real world. Now I see my wife, in the real world, sitting in stadium seating, with the strange woman leaning over the back of the chair making smooching faces as if to kiss my wife - but now her mouth is perfectly round and filled with rows of rotating teeth (it actually reminds me of a Sandworm from Dune). Naturally, my wife refuses the "kiss," and so she ends up getting pulled to the island as well. I kiss her instead, and we end up back in the real world.


BTB @ 0515
Wake @ 0630

Fragment: I'm in bed with wife, talking with her. *


Nap: 1500 - 1630

Dark (Chocolate) Lord's castle
I'm walking on the coastline of black, rocky island with a group of adventurers (something like a D&D party). The island stretches away ahead and to my left as far as I can see. Off to our right, out in the waves, is a dark castle - the home of the Dark Lord we've come to defeat. As we walk along, I realize that not everything we're stepping on is rock - scattered here and there are huge chunks of dark chocolate, large enough that I need two hands to hold them. They're smooth and sharp, as if the world's largest chocolate bar was smashed with a sledgehammer. I motion to the party's wizard and we walk a little way to the side, out of hearing of the rest of the party. I tell him that I know that trustworthy sources have said that the chocolate is meaningless, but I can't help thinking that all this dark chocolate is the source of the Dark Lord's power.

Bed @ 2215.
Woke @ 0240

Fragment: Something about a British boarding school.


BTB @ 0250 /w SSILD
Woke @ 0340


Going to the doctor
I "wake up." I have an appointment in Atlanta with Dr. Carson at 9:30. I check the time and decide that I have another fifteen minutes before I need to get up. My wife comes into the bedroom, seemingly also having trouble sleeping, and recommends getting up now - Atlanta traffic is very unpredictable, and I don't want to be late. I go ahead and get up. I check some mapping software on my phone, but I don't understand what it's telling me - it's showing me two curved arrows going from my house to the destination, almost forming an eye shape; both arrows fade from <a color> to red, and both fan off into many more arrows. I assume it's trying to tell me that there are many routes and that they're all bad. I zoom in and see that every street is colored red. Great.

Now on my way, and I'm riding a motorcycle. I know how much my wife hates motorcycles, but they're very effective. I'm trying to psych myself up for driving between cars which are stopped in gridlock, but thankfully I never actually need to; despite the lanes around me being stopped, my lane is moving well.

Now I'm driving downtown (I may be in my car now, but I'm not sure). Traffic in all lanes is jammed, and I'm trying to merge a couple of lanes to my left. Up ahead, I can see barriers across the two rightmost lanes of traffic - no wonder everyone is merging left and traffic is so bad.

Now I'm in a tasteful office building, at a reception desk that's at the intersection of a number of hallways. I'm talking to the receptionist, and I'm really suspicious that this is all some kind of conspiracy. She's very polite and answers my questions well, and I'm not concerned any more.

Now I'm in the parking deck at the doctor's, talking to Pete A, a friend I haven't seen for many years. I'm holding a pile of pipes and fabric, amazed at modern technology - this is the first time I've tried my car's 'fold' function, and I had no idea it could fold up so small or so light. Even so, I have a hard time keeping hold of it all and wish they could have automatically put the whole thing in a bag with handles. I realize I've got a bag - a big gray one made out of a tarp-like material - and start to put it in, wondering if this bag came with the car; but then I see it already has camping stuff in it from over the summer and remember that, no, this is just my bag. Now I'm talking to Pete again and notice my sunroof. I didn't know my car had a sunroof, and I certainly never opened it myself, so I assume it must have opened automatically when I parked to reduce heat. Unlike a normal one which slides back, this one has folded open three 'petals.' I reach over and wiggle a petal, then realize that this isn't actually my car. Whoops. Mine is one over, but I see that it, too, has a sunroof - a more traditional one that slides back on rails. I push a button on a panel on the roof and it closes. I wonder if there's a button inside the car that controls it too - if there is, I've never noticed it.

Now it's time for me to head home. I consider giving Pete a quick kiss (it seems that I'm a girl now?), but I decide that that wouldn't be appropriate and just make my goodbyes and get in my car.


An unusual landing strip
I'm watching planes landing. In turn, each one approaches what looks like a toll plaza, touches down just in front of the toll booths, and rolls forwards under the roof, out of sight. So far, all of the planes have been small, but now I see a larger one coming in. Not only is it large, but it's coming in really quickly, and I'm afraid it's going to crash. Amazingly, the moment its wheels touch down, it's going at the same slow speed as the others and taxies away safely. As it passes, I look at its tail and see the American Airlines logo. Even though everything worked out OK, I'm still rather horrified at how the pilot handled things, and American has lost some credibility in my mind.


BTB @ 0400 /w SSILD
Woke at 0645

The new water park
I'm reading about a new place opening up - a weird hybrid indoor swimming pool / game. It's small enough to be in a store in a shopping center. I see pictures of people in it - a deep pool filled with pipes about 3' in diameter - and I think it looks neat but scary - not only is the pool deep, but I think it would be far to easy to run out of breath while in the middle of one of the pipes and not be able to surface. Now I'm actually there, climbing out of the water (yet fully clothed). Now I'm talking to a woman about the cost of playing and the size of the prize for the winner - it seems to be a game of elimination, with the last player left taking the prize. The floor is glass, and the pool is under us, so I can see a couple of families swimming around having a great time.

Now I'm walking through a large restaurant area (much larger than the pool) filled with circular tables. I see the owner, an Asian man, and decide to go up to him and congratulate him on making something really unique. He's really excited about it and talks to me for a few minutes, eventually asking if I'll be bringing my family. I have to decline, saying that we live in the US and wouldn't be able to make it. He understands but still says he hopes that one day it'll work out.

Now I'm walking across a parking lot away from the shopping center with the pool place. I've just come to a gas station on the corner when I remember that I have my car, and it's back next to the stores. I turn around and start walking back to it, surprised by how large the parking lot is and how far I need to walk, and - by extension - how far I've already walked.

Now I'm driving around the shopping center. I realize that my stomach is grumbling and am tempted to look for something to eat. I don't want anything too sweet, ice cream or any real dessert like that; then I remember there's a store that sells some kind of frozen orange juice dessert, and I'm really tempted to try to search it out.


An odd gathering
I'm in a small apartment with a family I don't know well. We're all in the living room. Most of the family is seated on a couple of sofas, and I'm walking around, looking at things. I come across a water massager and fiddle with its controls for a minute, trying to figure out the different settings, but eventually I give up - they don't make a lot of sense. Eventually I give up and notice the I notice that the wallpaper, which at first glance just seems to be of mythical scenes, is actually rather ... risque. I consider asking my host about it but decide not to.

Now we're talking about watching a movie, but someone else has to go in a couple of minutes. Our host and another guy head off to get a quick nightcap before he heads out, leaving me with the kids (early to mid teens) and another adult. At first, I just keep to myself, but eventually the other adult comes over and we start talking. He tells me that AI is much farther along than anyone thinks and starts describing its progress.


AI apocalypse
Now I see a post-apocalyptic scene with a hunch of people standing in a derelict building, visible from the outside through a hole that's been blasted in the wall. A firing squad kills most of them, and the rest flee deeper into the building. I know it's the government killing off people it doesn't need since AIs are able to do most of the work now. Now I see the survivors of the first firing squad being executed by machines who have decided they don't need humanity at all. Only a couple of people escape. I watch them fleeing through more derelict buildings, grabbing what they can. Now I see some strange creatures - something like huge anteaters - moving along roads in the falling-down city, spraying themselves with water from their long trunks. They see something that looks like a huge cube of pizza and hurry over to it, and it somehow traps them. Now I see that the trap has been moved elsewhere and they're being freed from it to face ... something.


Security notice
I've received a security notice from my company's security team telling everyone to stop using instant messaging built into OpenOffice. I'm reading it on my new, pretty monitor. As with all the security 'training' they send out it's very pretty and totally useless. I flip through it, thinking they've probably sent it out because the official IM client is so terrible and they don't want people to have the option of bailing to one that works.

Now I'm looking at another security communication. This one is telling everyone that we need to install some new security software which will make sure we don't have any unauthorized files on our machines. I wonder how I can get around it - I have lots of useful third party software, plus a couple of games, and I'd hate for all that to get wiped, or to get me in trouble.


Space trip mix-up
I'm watching a couple of people - a woman (dressed in leatherish pants and a solid-colored long-sleeved shirt) and someone else - talking to a guy (who looks like the mission controller from The Martian). It seems he's running a new experimental service to get to and from orbit, and the woman was supposed to be on the latest flight - in fact, she'd already paid for the trip, but some kind of paperwork snafu lost her records. Behind them are weird stretcher-looking things, which are what people are attached to to protect them from the g-forces. Someone is saying it's a good thing she didn't go, because they've since found out that if she did go, she would have been fatally injured, and their cryo-preservation facilities aren't yet set up, so she couldn't have been frozen while she waited for them to find a way to heal her.

Bed @ 2245
Woke @ 0300


The old house
I'm outside, sitting at a desk I've set up on my driveway, working on my laptop. One side of the driveway is lined with trees, and a beautiful old house is on the other side. The other side of the driveway has sparse trees, and I can see the road through them. I'm on a conference call with Chad and someone else. While we're waiting for Tony to dial in, Chad asks when we last had any time off. I tell him it's been a while, and he says that we should all take a day off. Almost immediately, he and the other person on the call drop. Tony dials in a moment later and I explain what just happened. He's rather stunned, not quite believing they'd do that. As he's becoming less stunned and more annoyed, I invite him over for the day to work, and he accepts. He's never been to my house before, so I try to give him directions, but I'm doing a really bad job. He dialed into the conference while he was already driving, so despite my bad directions it's only a couple of minutes before he shows up. Now I'm inside sitting at a large dining room table in a room paneled with lots of old, dark wood. Tony's not there, but Amita and a couple of others are. I offer them the leftovers from lunch - some tostada shells, refried beans, and other texmex bits and pieces - and Amita immediately accepts. She grabs something large - the entirety of what's left of something - and starts dipping it into the refried beans. I've never seen anyone eat it like that ...

Now I'm with my wife and eldest daughter in the kitchen. One of them says we've been asked how many trees on the property produce any kind of berry. We start trying to run down them by memory, starting with trees on the driveway. The ones at the top of the driveway don't produce berries; the next plants produce beries but would be considered bushes, but the next ones are trees which berry. Now we're outside wandering around, checking plants one-by-one to see if they have berries and would be considered trees.


BTB @ 0315, though it takes about 30 minutes to fall asleep.
Woke on and off. Woke for the last time at 0715.

A slow invasion
I'm sitting with two or three people at a round table talking about the best way to keep <something> out of <somewhere>. Everything we've tried has failed, and I believe that, ultimately, there's nothing we can do; eventually the place will be overrun and it's just a mater of how long it'll take.


Fragment:Someone standing by a road.

Going to the museum
I'm with my parents driving to a museum. We're going to cross a long flat bridge, but the nav software tells us to take a detour. As we're driving around, we pass the seafood store - a boxy building with two huge bright-red garage doors - where we bought fresh seafood at earlier. I'm surprised to see that the doors are closed, but then I see a sign showing it's only open from eleven to three. My first thought is that that's a really short time for a store to be open, but I guess that makes sense for fresh seafood.

Now we're taking a different bridge. Away to our left I can see the bridge we were originally going to be on. Now we're across the bridge winding our way towards the museum. Someone wonders about museum hours and I grab my phone to look them up. I seriously consider using voice input, thinking carefully about my phrasing, but I never actually use it. Instead, I do a normal search, and the first hit goes to the Hours page on their website. Unfortunately, most of the page rambles about other things that have nothing to do with when it's open. Near the bottom is a daily movie schedule, and I assume they're open at least as long as the movies are playing. Unfortunately, that's not the case, as some of the later movies are not public, but I'm able to make a guess at which column in the schedule is the last public showing. Of course, there's some kind of popup that's hiding the actual hours, so I have to drag it around to have a chance to see the listing.

Now I'm inside with my family walking around the large entry hall. It's a wide roundish room with a glass wall which parallels the real wall and has information carved into it. Now we're in a smaller, darker room putting our names in for events later in the day. One of the movies is about Duplos, and only my youngest daughter wants to see it. I'm not sure how that's going to work - I'm sure an adult will need to be in with her, and I can't see it as being interesting. One of the employees laughs at us and says that it's not that bad. The rest of the kids want to pet dogs. I'm surprised that petting dogs is a scheduled activity, but I guess they have lots of people doing it, so ...

Now I'm walking with my parents. A tall, skinny black man - college looking, with an earnest voice and a backpack - asks my step-father a question about the Bible. My step-father is a bit distracted, and it's not a hard question, so I decide to answer in his place. Unfortunately, the guy won't let me get two words together. Any time I try to speak, he just talks on top of me. Eventually I switch from trying to answer the question to saying something like "Hey, just listen to me!" Eventually, he apologizes, saying he thought I meant something else. I tell him that he can either listen to my answer respectfully or just walk away. He considers for a moment and then walks away. I'm kind of disappointed but also relieved that I won't have to put up with him any more.

Now he's back, but he's not talking; he and my step-father have gotten cat coloring pages and are coloring them with fine point markers. Both are doing well, though their styles are completely different. One of them is using long, sweeping lines, while the other is somehow doing a textured look. The black guy leaves before he's finished, leaving his paper on the table. I absently make a couple of filled loops on it, trying to finish it, but I quickly realize that my style is radically different from his and that it doesn't look very good now

Now a couple of employees are saying that he's had his privilege of coming to this area of the museum revoked; they're tired of his coming in here and claiming the kingship (and other things) and of refusing to listen to anyone else, making for a poor learning environment.


The incubator
I'm watching a guy with a lab coat putting a bunch of Petri dishes into what looks like a wall-mounted oven. Once he's put a few stacks in, he closes the door and punches something into a keypad beside it. He explains that he's set it for one pulse every fifteen seconds. The door has a clear window, and we can see bright white flashes, but I assume that the window is doped to block any dangerous energy from reaching us. Oddly, it's flashing once a second, not once every fifteen seconds. At first, I assume that the flashes aren't the "pulses" he spoke of, but then I notice that the blobs in the Petri dishes grow much larger with each flash. I wonder if he misspoke, that maybe he meant that it would pulse for a total of fifteen seconds. I keep watching, and on the last pulse, a bunch of little round red balls appear hanging in the air inside the incubator. He's not surprised and says that they're fish eggs which somehow made their way in, and since the pulses make everything grow the eggs grew along with the samples in the dishes. He opens the door and the 'fish' fall out onto the floor. I take a closer look and can see they're actually a wide variety of animals. I see a number of mice or similar creatures, something that may be cat-like (though it's mouse-sized), and even a tiny elephant! I marvel that they're all walking fairly well since they're all only a few seconds old. I notice one little animal which is basically missing one eye and feel sorry for it, and for them all, knowing how they were brought into the world so unnaturally.


House guests
I'm at 'my house.' I'm inside, trying to communicate with Ben C, but my phone is having issues. I decide to text him to let him know I'm going to reboot my phone. I try to use voice input, but something strange happens and I end up fiddling instead of just sending the message, so I never get around to rebooting the phone. Eventually I see his car pull up outside and realize I've really taken way too long.

Now I'm outside on the driveway. The O's have just pulled up and are getting out of their van. A number I don't recognize calls and I try to answer, but my Bluetooth headset falls apart in my hand. Margaret offers me another one, but I know I don't have time to pair it, so I answer the phone in the normal way. The guy on the other end is from another country - Australia, maybe - and isn't pleased with me and starts lecturing me about something. After a very one-sided conversation, he hangs up.

Now I'm in the garage. There's a huge metal tool case / drawer / shelving unit. It's got wing tables that can fold out, and one of my kids is messing with them. It's making terrible squeak, and another kid asks if I can get the WD-40, but I say no, not this time, since we don't actively use it and I like having the hinges be that little bit stiff so that someone getting whacked on the head by a falling table wing wouldn't get hurt as badly. If we ever start using it, then I'll oil it well.


Mishaps around the house
A man has come to my house to be interviewed for something. After he comes in, I realize that I'm wearing my earbuds and shooting muffs - fantastic for listening while lawn mowing, terrible for talking to someone - and quickly pull them off, not intending to be rude. Later on, I realize that I'm wearing the earbuds again, and again I quickly pull them out. I'm confused - the guy is still here, and I can't think when I would have had an opportunity to put them back in.

Now I'm in another room. Somehow a loop of thread from my collar has gotten wound around the button on my pants. In this awkward position I can't keep balance and end up falling over. I don't want anyone to find me like this and manage to crawl further out of sight. I can't get the thread untangled, so I reach into my pocket in hopes that my multitool is there. To my horror, it's not; but then I realize that it's fallen out only a few inches away. I grab it, open the scissors, and - with the scissors uncomfortably close to my face - cut the thread. I'm standing up just as someone walks by, but they don't notice anything unusual.


Chainsaw workday
At a church workday, I see my wife about to use a chainsaw to cut down a tree. She's not wearing any protective clothing, so I walk over to her to make sure she knows what she's doing. When I mention the protective chaps which normally come with chainsaws, she says she completely forgot about getting a set. I ask where she rented the chainsaw from, thinking that we may be able to swing by to pick some up, and she says the name of a place I've never heard of (something starting with L). Memories of guys who have had their legs chewed up, and of a couple of guys I know who were saved from that fate by their protective gear, come into my mind.

Now I see a couple of guys standing near the end of the driveway cutting a table in half. One is holding it upright while the other chainsaws it. I can't believe how incredibly unsafe that looks, but I just walk the other way.

Now I see my oldest daughter using a baby chainsaw - it's red and probably only about a foot long. Once she finishes her cut she keeps her finger on the trigger, and I tell her that that's a bad idea. She lets her finger off, but it starts sputtering and Bob B comes over and reminds her that that chainsaw has issues and needs to be kept running. I apologize, saying that it was I who told her to let off the trigger.

Now I'm using a small chainsaw to try to slice a watermelon. It's not working very well, and eventually I shut it off and go in search of a nice large knife which I feel will work much better.

Foreign bathroom labels
I'm in an older wooden building looking for the bathroom. There are four doors off of the hallway I'm in, and I'm pretty sure one of them leads to the men's room. The first door I look in is certainly a bathroom, but the word on the door is in a language I don't know, and there are no pictures. The room is too well decorated for a men's room, so I move on. The next room is also a bathroom, but there are so many piles of janitorial supplies and tools that the toilet isn't reachable. I walk to the next one, but someone warns me that it's under repair. By this point, I'm resigning myself to just having to hold it ...


Dog trouble
I'm walking around in "my" house. I happen to look out the window and see my dog running around the yard - something he's never supposed to be doing. My eldest daughter confesses to letting him outside. I remind her that his being outside alone could cause some serious problems, then send her out to fetch him.

I'm leaving a house, walking along a walkway under some trees to go down to the driveway. We've been staying with friends, but now it's time to go home. I pass my dog on the walkway and feel sadness knowing that it'll be a while before I see him again. I then come to my senses, realizing that he's my dog and so of course he'll be coming with us, and my sadness is replaced by relief.


Worst super-power ever
I'm in a large open warehouse talking to some people. Missiles are hitting nearby, but so far none have hit this building. One of the guys I'm talking to explains that something about this building confuses the enemy and they don't usually aim for it. There's something about drinking something from vats to gain powers. Now explosions are rocking the building, and I realize the enemy has seen through the disguise. People are running this way and that preparing for evacuation. Now there's something about driving somewhere and seeing someone on the side of the road.

Now I'm with a friend in a bright suburban neighborhood. We're trying to keep a low profile and escape from <something>. If we head due <that way>, we should be able to get to somewhere safe. Unfortunately, in our haste to escape, I don't have any shoes. I do have some strips of paper towel - maybe 3" x 8" - which I decide to try to make into something to protect my feet. I consider trying to tie them together, but I quickly realize that won't work. I try to fold a couple strips together - folding their ends a couple of times, folding the corners, flipping them inside out - and while I have a brief moment of triumph, it quickly falls apart. Finally, I remember that, because of the weird stuff I drank, I can put glue on anything I touch. I touch a couple of points at the tip of one of the strips, leaving behind dots of a tan-colored glue, then glue the strips together. Success! I'm worried, though - can I turn the power off? Will I end up putting glue on everything I touch for the rest of my life?


Concert without clothes
I'm in a huge room which is packed with people and nearly pitch-black. Everyone's looking in the same direction, possibly towards a stage. I have the distinct feeling that I'm at least partially naked and cross my hands over my crotch. I'm thankful that it's so dark that, even if I'm not fully clothed, it's unlikely that anyone will notice.

Rambling dream
I'm standing in what I believe to be a Home Depot watching some kind of laser cutting large wooden rounds into doughnut shapes. Each round is around six or eight feet across and about a foot or two thick. They're very rough-cut, and they still have their bark on. The rounds are hanging from a track in an upright position. One at a time, the machinery moves a round in front of a laser, cuts out the center of the round, and moves it onward. Each time, the bright orange laser stabs through the round, moves in a wide circle, and lets the slightly cone-shaped center drop out. As this keeps going on, I watch more closely. Oddly, the later doesn't leave a nice clean cut - the remaining hole is just as rough as the wood itself. I turn my attention to what happens to the scrap pieces and am surprised to see that they fall then seem to dissolve. My wife is standing nearby, and I call her attention to it. After a couple more times I look more closely at what the scrap is falling onto. At first glance, it just looks like a fairly industrial metal table but, looking more closely, I realize that it's supposed to be a replica of the Last Supper: most of the table is empty, but one place setting has a plate of bread and a cup of wine. Even though this is just idolatry - we're not authorized to use religious symbols like this, nor to profane the Lord's Supper - it's clearly having an effect on the wood.

Now I'm sitting at a small table with my wife. I'm still facing the same direction, and she's sitting across from me. A chain-link fence and gate are now standing where the cutting machinery had been. The gate opens, and a police RV drives in and parks. I wonder what's going to happen. Now I see a police officer trying to handcuff a man. He surprises the man and gets one wrist into the cuffs, but the man struggles and holds his arms straight out. Another officer comes over and helps pull the man's arms together behind his back so he can be cuffed. Another young officer comes over to my table and, in a lightning move, cuffs my wife's hands to the table. He's young, friendly, and very apologetic, explaining that they need to keep witnesses to <something> around for questioning. I put my hands on the table to show I'm cooperating and won't fight, but he doesn't cuff me. Instead, on older officer comes over and starts talking to me almost as an equal and asking my opinion on things. I realize I must be the main character. I make a gaff and he assumes I'm just joking and scolds me, telling me to be serious. Now I see the female lead getting ready for a fancy gathering, wearing a fancy blue dress, and somehow I know this is important to the case.

Now I'm watching a commercial for a TV show. The guy talking is the main character, though he's addressing the audience directly, talking about what a fool he gets to be on the next episode. The camera is showing him from the waist up, and behind him is an aerial view of a tropical island in a deep blue sea. He uses a couple of strange terms to refer to himself, referencing some other silly show, but I don't know enough about it to understand the references. Now the camera passes him and starts to zoom in on the island. Eventually the perspective is from ground level. The main character is with a bunch of old guys, and they're all lining up their motorcycles in a small front yard. They've all got some piping hooked up near the backs of their motorcycles to shoot water in the air up behind them as they ride, kind of like a speed boat's rooster tails. Even though they're not riding, they've got them turned on, and they're all getting wet. The main character is looking pretty goofy and has a rather long-suffering look on his face. Now the camera cuts to a dog in the street. It's gotten all wet from the bikes, so it prances around for a while, lays down on its side, and sends a stream of urine high in the air in an arc. Everyone laughs even harder and says the dog won.

Now I'm the main character, and I'm climbing the steps to the house, heading to a party thrown in my honor by a bunch of people I only barely know. I don't really want to go, but I can't very well back out of my own party. I go through the outer door, through a small laundry room, and out into a kitchen. I see my paternal grandparents and instantly know I'm dreaming, since they've been dead for many years. I hug my grandfather, wave to my grandmother, then look at them a bit, enjoying their presence. They both look really (really) old and, though spry, also look very sickly with pale, age-spotted skin. *I decide to try to fly and focus my efforts on soaring into the air. The only thing that happens is a feeling of a slight "shift." Oh well.

Now I "wake up" and find myself in the same living room, but with all the people gone. I remember that my wife and I are house-sitting for friends, and I feel bad about how everything looks. I go hunting for paper towels, but every roll I find - in the kitchen, in the utility room, in the bathroom - has exactly one sheet left. I finally get a grocery plastic bag and a length of toilet paper and return to clean up the mess. I notice that there's a bit of water coming down from the ceiling, but I ignore it for the moment. The toilet paper is single ply stuff, so it doesn't work well, and by the time I'm done it's squashed into something the size of a marble.

Now I hear someone yelling something from the second story. Now there's something about a fish and what a struggle it was to reel it in. I look over and see a strange fish, very flat and angular (as if it were cut out of a piece of wood and painted) sitting on a small table nearby. My wife comes over and I show it to her, explaining how it got here - something about the guy upstairs. Initially, I hadn't thought it had any usable meat on it, but on second thought I think it does.


Monster in town
I'm in an unfurnished house with someone else talking about the monster that's recently invaded the town. We're trying to figure out what to do - maybe hide in a closet, or maybe barricade the doors. Now a police woman is talking to the townspeople, letting them know that the monster has been defeated but that the police have decided that all female officers must quit.

*
Fragment: I'm at a concert. Two guys are singing - The Rock and someone else - and they're having mic problems. The Rock's singing is much better than I'd expected. *

Beard trimming mishap
I'm in my bathroom shaving. I look into the mirror and realize that, instead of using my normal beard trimmer attachment, I've been using something much shorter. I've already been running it through the beard under my chin, and the parts I've trimmed are way too short. I'm not sure what to do. At first, I consider running this piece (I don't even recognize it) through the rest of my beard to give it a uniform, very close-cropped look, since I've often thought that looks good; but the bits of the beard that are already trimmed are too short even for that. I decide to switch attachments and shave off most of the beard below by chin, leaving me with just the goatee on my face and a "cap" on and just barely under my chin. I carry out this plan; but when I look into the mirror I find that I've shaved off everything. I realize that can't be right, since I never went above my lip, so I look again, more carefully, and see that my mustache is still there. I realize it really doesn't help me, though, since my wife doesn't like the look of a mustache without a beard along with it, so I resign myself to shaving it off, too. I'll just have to grow the whole thing back soon and hope it doesn't look funny for too long.

Soldier in a pool and bus at a farm
A soldier-looking guy is in an indoor swimming pool, dressed in swim shorts, fending off a bunch of people attacking him. He's near one end of the pool, keeping his back to it. He's able to keep three at bay for a while, but eventually he gets overwhelmed. I'm standing by the pool about 10 feet away.

Now I'm walking down the hallway leading away from the pool. I've mostly dripped dry, but I'm still a bit wet, and I realize that I forgot my towel. I hope I don't get my clothes too wet. As I think this, I look to my left and see a towel rack exactly like the one in my bathroom, and I realize it has my brown towel on it. I realize that there's no way it's actually my towel - it has to belong to someone else (after all, I forgot my towel) and they just have the same towel that I do. Now I'm at the end of another hallway. A bench is to my right, and I'm looking through my bag. I see something that I think may be mine, but someone nearby claims it.

Now I'm on the second floor of an open-air double-decker bus. I'm sitting on the right-hand side, about half way back, looking over the green landscape. I have a moment of doubt that I may have forgotten to get changed before I left the pool, but I don't actually look at myself to check.

Now we're running parallel to another road. I see what looks like a very oddly-built bus: it's supported on 3 "legs," each of which is tipped with a wheel. The legs are all on the front half of the bus, but it's going rapidly in reverse. I can't imagine how it doesn't fall over - there's no way it can be balanced, especially not when it's going the wrong direction. I mention how strange it is to someone near me.

Now we're headed up a driveway. The pavement is very narrow - possibly too narrow for our bus - and it slopes slightly up. The ground on the left slopes up with it, but the ground on the right slopes down, away from it. The bus is staying to the left, possibly even a little off the driveway, and I think the driver's made the right choice. At the top of the driveway is a closed gate. It's not very sturdy, but it has razor wire across the top. We're not slowing down as we approach the gate, and I get concerned. The razor wire is at about the same height I am, and I don't want to get thrown into it. I start to call a warning to the driver, but it's too late. We plow straight through the gate and come to a stop just inside.

A farmer - with a dog running at his side - comes running to see what the commotion is. When he sees an animal (maybe a mule?) wander in from outside the gate, he starts to run faster. It tries to escape further inside but the farmer manages to catch it.


Having a guest over
I'm on my bed in "my bedroom". As I look around, I see that the walls are in terrible shape. At best, they're bare drywall, but most of the wall is damaged. Some of it looks like it's melted, and other patches are completely gone and expose a strange honeycomb pattern behind. Even the good looking walls still seem slightly odd, and I realize they're sticky - they're probably melting too, just more slowly than the rest of the room.

Now I'm in a living/dining area. We've got guests, so two tables are out. I'm with my family at the smaller table near the kitchen; our extended family, plus another guest, are at a larger table which has one end near my table and which extends out into the living room. The guest is right in the middle of the table, and there's something visually distinctive about him.

Now I'm in the kitchen pouring myself more wine. I pour what I think is a good sized glass of white wine, but when I look at it again I realize there's not even half a cup, so I pour more. I suddenly realize that white wine is supposed to be served chilled, and I have no idea if this bottle was chilled or not. Oh well, it'll taste good either way.

Now I'm sitting at my computer. I reflect that I've recently ordered new glasses and I can't wait until they arrive. Now I'm working with Notes, sorting my inbox. Our guest is watching over my shoulder and asks about a couple of columns at the far left. I explain that the leftmost column is Followup and that I don't know what the column next to it is. He asks why both columns have many flags set if I don't use them, and I explain that Notes has rules that automatically flag certain emails, but I just ignore the flags. I'm curious now, so I poke around for a minute to try to identify the second column, but I can't figure it out. Part of the problem is that Notes has started misbehaving - large areas of the screen have gone white and won't redraw themselves. I decide to kill and restart it. The guy says he normally starts it in <something>. I'm not familiar with that and ask for more details.

Nap time
Dog double
I'm in my bedroom. A shower head is mounted on the wall above the bed, and it's spraying towards the door. I notice that it's missing the bed and getting the carpet wet, so I turn the knob (mounted on the wall above my pillow) to turn off the shower. Now I'm walking on the carpet near the door, and I'm confused that I still hear water falling. I wonder if it's because I'm squishing the wet carpet, but the noise just isn't right.

I notice my dog near my feet, then notice another dog out in the hallway. My first thought is to wonder how another dog got into the house. My next thought is concern that my dog and the other dog are going to get into a fight. I look back towards my dog and see him staring at the new dog. I realize that both dogs look identical and look around to see if I'm somehow seeing my dog in a mirror; but I don't see one.

Now I'm standing near my window looking at both dogs - but this time the new dog is white. I briefly wonder if I'd thought he was black because he was in a dark hallway, then I wonder if I'm dreaming. I don't really think I am, but I go ahead and do a nose-pinch test, and I'm surprised to find that I am, in fact, dreaming.

Now I know I'm dreaming, but my vision has almost completely grayed out. I can see through only a very narrow vertical sliver, and it's closing. I raise my hands to where I can see them and start to rub them together, but it doesn't help. I can feel my hands rubbing, but only barely, as if they're mostly numb. I try to will my vision back, but it's no good. My vision grays out completely, and I lose the dream.

Ice cream + screen time @ 2200
Bed @ 2230 /w half melatonin
Fell asleep around 2300

jobn, leaves, mail, twitter, keyboard, annoyance with team over not understanding about configuration file
museum
trouble driving around airport

Being understood
I'm on a conference call with my team. As usual, I'm working while listening with one ear. I'm trying to configure a piece of software, but it's a bit of a trial-and-error process, and it takes a while to restart the software between each trial. I realize that the configuration file I'm looking at actually includes another file, and it's this second file that defines most of the unchanging configuration options. I can make a duplicate copy of the first file and run a second instance of the software with it, yet have both instances be configured mostly the same. No one has spoken for a while, so I start to tell the team about what I've found, but my scrum master starts talking just after I do. I stop, wondering if I'm on mute, but I'm not. Once she's done, I start trying to say it again, but again she starts to talk over me. This time I just keep going and she eventually relents. My team lead asks me a couple of questions about it, but it's clear he has no idea what I'm talking about. I'm annoyed with all of them - this is important, and they just don't get it!

Now I'm chatting with John. First, we commiserate about people not understanding us, then I describe the time saving configuration options I found.

Now I'm at his house, waist deep in leaves, typing as though the leaves in front of me are my keyboard. John is watching me, and I know he's good enough that he can figure out what I'm typing without any problem. He's one of a tiny handful that can; not only am I a fast typist, but since I used the Dvorak layout, even other fast typists wouldn't be able to make heads or tails of what I'm typing. I realize my hands dipped under the leaves for a moment, so I say the word he missed out loud, confident that he'll understand me.

Now it's time for him to go deliver the mail, so we're walking up the walkway to his house. He suggests that we communicate over Twitter while he's gone. I don't like the idea, but he says that last time we used <software> and he lost the chat log, and Twitter is a permanent record of the conversation. I relent, saying we'll give it a try.


Finding Pappaw
I'm downstairs with the kids. They ask where Pappaw is, and I say that I think he was going to take a shower. I shush them and listen closely, and I can hear water running. I point out the sound to them. Now I'm upstairs walking along the hallway. I'm struck by how clean it is - there's not a single thing on the floor. I intend to walk to the master bedroom at the end of the hallway, but as I pass my room I notice that the door is half-closed. I look inside to see two very large women packing my stuff. I know it'll be time to head home soon, but why are they helping? One of them, standing in my closet, says something to me.


Airport road
I'm with someone else, driving on the access roads at an airport. We're currently on a road that goes around a rather steep hill. My driver makes a left, going downhill to the next ring. Now we're out of the car, which has fallen between road rings. We weren't hurt, but we're getting away from it. Who knows how long it'll b e until it slips down and crashes into something.


Odd museum
I'm with my family at a museum of odd stuff. We're in the middle of a long drive, and we saw the museum in a traveler's guide and thought it would be a nice place to break the monotony. The guide described it as being small, but what it left out was that the first couple of rooms were free, and then you had to pay to see the rest. We don't want to stay for long, and we don't want to pay, so we just wander the free area looking at the oddball stuff. Now we're walking through the parking lot.

Milk & honey /w cereal @ 2220
Bed @2250 /w half melatonin
Overnight: Ninja's subliminal recall

Woke @ 0315 /w crying baby. Recall lost.
Woke @ 0600 /w alarm

Expensive Chinese
I'm in the Chinese restaurant near work. The waitress comes by, gives me my check, and asks me to take care of it, then moves away. I go to the cash register, but no one is behind the counter. I wonder if by 'take care of it' she means I'm supposed to use the register myself to charge myself before leaving. I look at the receipt and am astounded to see that it's costing nearly $25 dollars for my lunch - I normally end up paying about $10 when I come to this place! I look over the receipt to see why it's so expensive and see that the meal itself cost $14 - surprisingly high - and my request to change the kind of noodle I got raised the price by another $10! That's crazy. I look around for a menu to see the prices, but I don't see one anywhere. I check the counter near the cash register to see if there are any take-out menus, and there are. I grab one and look over it, but I don't see anything about a cost for requesting changes.


Too many lefts
I'm in a parking lot in a commercial area, and I'm standing by my car. I'm thinking about how to get to my next stop and am unhappy that the best way to do it is to make a left out from here, a left at the corner, a left at the next corner, and a left into the next parking lot. I hate left turns, especially in crowded areas like this (downtown somewhere). I realize that there are no roads crossing between where I am now and where I'm going, and it's not that far, so I decide just to walk.


Saving Roland
I'm playing a game. Somehow it feels like a first-person shooter, though my perspective is actually from over head. I get a transmission from Roland asking for my urgent assistance. Sure enough, by the time I get to him, he's already dead. I don't know if that's a scripted event or because I took too long, so I restart the section. This time, I hurry to him and arrive in time to save him, but a sniper ends up killing me. I try again, this time arriving in time to save him and managing not to get shot. I take him with me as we circle a large warehouse-like building, eventually returning to near where I started.


Borrowing tools
I'm doing yard work at my house, and I've walked over to ask my neighbors for a 'chop chop.' Their whole family - both parents and their daughter - is out front, and I end up talking to them for a few minutes. They moved in fairly recently and I haven't spoken to them much, though in the past they did offer that I could borrow tools from them any time I needed to. They have a vaguely foreign look to them, though I can't peg where they're from.


Costco renewal
I'm at Costco getting ready to check out, and I know that my membership will need to be renewed soon. I notice that one of the membership people has put a yellow folder onto the checkout counter and know that it's my account info. Sure enough, the cashier adds the new membership to my bill, which boosts an already-high bill even higher. After paying with my Amex, he immediately tosses the credit card into a burn bin since I'll be getting a replacement card soon. I'm not happy: that's the card I use day-to-day, and 'soon' isn't 'now.' It's one of those trash cans that's only got a slit on top, so there's no way to get the card back out.

Now I'm filling out the paperwork for the renewed membership. There are lots of name fields, and I start off by putting down my name, my wife's name, and my online handle. I realize that last one isn't appropriate for this kind of thing, so I erase it. I wonder if I'm supposed to put all my kids' names on the form, but that doesn't make sense for a shopping card when they're so young. I look at the back of the form and see a different grid. I wonder if I'm only supposed to fill out one of the two sections. The instructions are very unclear.


Fragments
I'm watching a couple sitting at a large event in Brazil. Some fireworks are being set off, and I see a rocket whiz past their heads.

I'm leading my family and the T's kids through a maze of hallways with moving sidewalks. Later we're outside.

2200: Ate a meat and cheese rollup and some ice cream with a mug of hot milk and honey
Bed @ 2300 /w half melatonin
Woke @ 0315 with no recall (~5 hours)
Woke @ 0515 /w alarm (~2 hours)

Church doors
I'm trying to craft new doors for the church. I a printout of their original design, and I can see that they were formed by gluing together strips of wood (2x4s?) at a 45 degree angle. I wonder if it's like my wife's bias tape that she uses for quilt bindings, if it's stronger somehow - but wait, that's not right, the whole purpose of bias tape is that it's more flexible and less likely to kink. My pieces are cut unevenly, as if the edges of the board were rather wavy, and when I try to put them together I get something that's very uneven. I think I'll probably have to glue it all together and then trim it down, but the plans don't call for that. Somehow, my pieces are already painted white.


Church weirdness
I'm at church on a Sunday morning when I realize that I'm wearing my jeans and a polo shirt instead of my church clothes. Whoops. At least I don't completely stand out, since there are some families at our church who wear these kinds of clothes every Sunday. My family is all home today, or else I'm sure one of them would have noticed I was wearing the wrong thing and pointed it out before I left. I see Trisha and - after doing a mental double-check to verify that's what she likes to be called these days - ask her how she's doing. We talk for a few moments, and I'm struck by how short she is. I know she's short, but somehow I just hadn't realized how short. She's getting ready for some kind of group babysitting thing to free up the adults to do something.

Now I'm carrying a couple of boxes around. One of them has a gallon sized ZipLoc bag of giant chocolate-covered marshmallows. I set them down for a minute to talk to Alex, and he starts eating the marshmallows. I half-jokingly tell him I'm going to have to take the bag away before he eats them all, though I let him keep one more before I close it up. I notice one of my boxes is empty, so I collapse it before moving on.

Now I'm outside the church. There are a lot of strange people milling around, all young adults dressed in 'punk' clothes. I don't like this, and I try to avoid them. There's a huge pile of backpacks against the side of the church, and somehow I know they belong to these people. I'm looking through the pile for my own backpack. I know I set it down just a moment ago, but now I've lost track of where I put it.

Now I'm at my car putting stuff in. I open the little fridge in the front seat to put a couple of things in, but I have some trouble since it's already pretty full. I manage it, but I also get something sticky on my hands.


Creatively framed
A bunch of guys are sitting around a table. One of them has fallen asleep, and I see that he's dressed very oddly: he's wearing only panties and a cape, and I somehow know that someone changed his outfit while he was sleeping. I see someone put a single drop of clear liquid into another man's cup. When that man takes a drink, he immediately keels over dead. The commotion around the table wakes the sleeping man who, after seeing what he's wearing, immediately dashes away from the table. The others assume that he's fleeing because of the murder, not because of his clothes.


Restarting a game
I'm playing a creative sandbox game. I've just finished all the missions it offers, and I get a message stating that I can go to the next planet, but that there won't be any missions there to guide me - it's totally free-form. I'm terrible at that kind of thing - I need suggestions of what to do - so I decide to start a new game so I can do the missions over again. Now I'm in the intro / tutorial area. I already know how to play, so I try to hurry through it as quickly as possible. I start out walking through a kind of school area - it's grassy, and there are buildings and covered walkways to my left and right and a building further in the distance. Now I'm walking along one of the covered walkways with a building to my left and grass to my right. A rather chubby guy stands right in the middle of the walkway ahead. I do something with his bag, go around him, and move on. Now I'm in a restaurant. Tables are split across a couple of levels, and the whole place is covered but open to the air on all sides. I pass the cashier's station on my left and walk between the tables to the back dining room where I find my friend. I ask him if he has a moment, then ask him to look up an answer. He Googles it, but instead of just clicking the link with the answer, he follows a link for something else that came up that's completely unrelated. I try to tell him it's the wrong link, but he wants to look anyway.


Insomnia
I'm in a hotel room with my wife and her parents. Her parents are sleeping on one large bed, and I'm with my wife on another one. I'm having trouble getting back to sleep. I get off our bed so I don't wake my wife while I go through some strange poses, but somehow I wake her up anyway.