side notes

Whooooo, another MILD attempt last night. I woke up around 630 AM, stayed up 10 minutes, and the result was a sort of lucid dream about an hour later. The 10 minute thing seems to be working pretty well, but I may need to stay up a little longer or be a bit more active during the 10 minutes, because I still feel like I'm falling asleep almost instantly when I lie down again.

Then, this morning when I got out of bed, at first I didn't remember that many dreams, but I got into a strange half-sleepy mode where I could suddenly remember a LOT of dreams from last night. This happens to me sometimes at night when I'm falling asleep, I'll suddenly start remembering a bunch of old dreams in a chain. Anyways, here they all are!



#1011:
Date: July 13th, 2011
Length: 6 minutes

I began the dream in a sort of grocery store. After a few moments, I was (partially) lucid; I think I did a nose-plug RC. I tried to stabilize everything and get into a clear mindset. I remembered one idea I had to help me focus and become fully conscious: remembering some things I'm doing in the coming week IRL. I only managed to recall two of them before losing attention, and I don't remember exactly what they were. I also switched to thinking in French for a while.

A friend of mine appeared to my left, and showed me a table with a whole bunch of food and stuff, inviting me to dig in. I started with a weird sort of bar of hard candy, but it tasted very strange so I spit it out. I think I had a slice of pizza and just generally pigged out because I knew it didn't matter and it's always interesting to see how things will taste in a dream.

After this, my recall of the dream is blurry for a while, I remember an Asian girl, a large lake that I considered swimming in but eventually decided not to, and some alternation between day and night. Eventually I ended up in a sort of motel room. The dream got pretty strange from there, so I'll pass on writing up the rest.



#1012:
Date: July 13th, 2011
Length: 4 minutes

This whole dream occurred in some kind of large underground mall/subway station. In the dream, I would repeatedly have to run and jump really fast to get from one side of the station to another. There was an elevator on both ends of the mall that I would go into. I would sprint, slide along rails and doing a whole bunch of acrobatic stuff I probably couldn't pull off in real life.

It was all pretty fun, but I was also scared because I was being chased (by police and other characters), so basically running for my life. Sometimes there was this sort of witch/hag dressed all in black after me. She would occasionally catch up with me and grab me. She had a kind of magical touch and whenever I came into contact with her it was like I was being electrocuted -- I could barely move and it was quite painful. Thankfully, I would get rescued by a mysterious woman who would fight off the hag whenever this happened, buying just enough time for me to run to the escape elevator, which took me back to the start.


Once, while in the elevator I saw a tiny inscription near the buttons, that said something about how this "game" worked: every 3 rounds there would be a more difficult, advanced round (which is where the hag usually showed up). Apparently after 3 advanced rounds it would all be finished. On the last run that I remember, near the start I was approached by a well-dressed Asian man. He apparently worked for the evil corporation that was after me, but had decided to betray them. He led me into a secret area of the mall, and I don't remember what he showed me there.


#1013:
Date: July 13th, 2011
Length: 3 minutes

I was in a city, though at times I was semi-aware of it all being part of a video game. I knew there was some sort of fixed plot I was to follow, somehow related to the movie the Sorcerer's Apprentice (which I haven't seen but whose title I saw the other day). There was a weird tension to the dream, so for a while I was intentionally just walking around doing nothing, kind of afraid of actually starting the plot. I rode on a bus for a while and just looked around, surprised that the city was so big (ie, that the game had such a vast area to explore).

Eventually, I ended up in a dark, creepy bathroom. The stalls were filled with junk, and in one of them I found a really strange pencil. It was somewhat pink and decorated, and it was apparently a wand of great power. I remember taking it, but nothing after that.



And some fragments:

- I was at home, juggling a soccer ball in the back yard. I accidentally kicked it too hard though and it went over the fence. I was about to go get the ball, but the dream ended.

- I was looking on facebook, and I was surprised to see that an old friend was participating in a competition that I'm entering.

- A strange dream where I was exploring what was supposed to be a college campus, but it really just seemed to be some place in the mountains. I think I had a few moments of lucidity, then the rest of the dream just got blurry and weird.

- I was "in" a game similar to minecraft. In front of me was a long bridge, and at the end of the bridge was a giant red sort of laser beam. My friends told me that it was a portal to hell, and that I should just jump into it. When I did, I died and all my stuff dropped down far below. I respawned and tried to go get my stuff, but down where it had fallen was a whole bunch of lava and only a few stepping stones and water. I managed to get down there but struggled to escape and I think I died a few more times.

- A dream where I ended up back at several old places where I supposedly used to live (they were somewhat similar, but none of them actually exist): one was a tiny place with two beds, with another room down the hall for doing things besides sleeping. There was also a depressing 1-room lodge.

Well, last night was certainly interesting. I had one lucid dream, (that dragged on and may have been followed by a second dream with moments of lucidity -- I'm not sure if there was a split or the two were the same dream). I had another dream which was not lucid, but had a strong emotional impact on me, one of the stronger ones I've felt in what dreams I can think of.


#1004:
Date: June 20th, 2011
Length: 8 minutes

I was downstairs in my house. It was dark, very early morning (say, 2 AM or so). I was near the kitchen, and my mom was also there, though I don't recall what she was doing really. After a few moments of idling about, I recognized one of my strong dream signs -- darkness. This caused me to do the ever-reliable nose plugging reality check: as usual, I was able to breathe through my nose even though it was plugged.

It took me a few moments to realize that I could actually breathe and that it meant I must be dreaming, but I became lucid. I had intended the day before to have dream sex, so I won't go into the details, but needless to say it happened: I don't quite remember how I got to the place where I found the person I was looking for, something with a phonecall.

After the sex I did not wake up, but instead went along with another woman to some strange room which slowly morphed into a movie theater. Before entering, she shot out a camera on the ceiling with a gun.

(Lucidity around this point was tenuous, kind of came and went as far as I recall, so I'm switching colors) A bunch of people walked into the room, apparently to see the movie. The woman I was with suddenly turned hostile, and tried to stab me with a bizarre syringe that contained a sort of liquefied or powdered metal alloy. I pushed her away, and left the theater.

Here the dream, and my recall, becomes blurry. I think everything went black, but eventually I found myself outside in a dark, snowy place. I think I was lucid at this point, and I tried to stabilize the dream. Eventually a sort of city formed around me. I remember trying to experience the whole environment, focusing on things like trees and the snow to really make the dream as vivid as possible. Soon people were gathering around me, and my brother was also there. I think a sort of plaza with a statue was created around me, or at least I ended up there. I unfortunately don't recall much more than that, I think I woke up around that point.


#1005:
Date: June 20th, 2011
Length: 6 minutes

I was at a party which was basically a meeting of a lot of old friends of mine. At the beginning of the dream I was sitting on some kind of bench, looking in the distance as most of my old friends were getting food at a barbeque and caught up. I was, for some reason or another, anxious to actually go see them and say hello after a long time of not having seen them.

Finally everyone sort of dispersed, and I went to the barbeque to get a hot dog. There was a girl there, and at first I thought she was someone I vaguely knew as a freshman in high school. Looking fairly neutral at first, she offered me a hot dog, and I took it. After a few moments, though, I sat down and we began an intense conversation. I was apprehensive and unsure of myself, while she seemed fairly upset, at least at first.

She told me that she had only two questions for me. The first was why I had never really reached out to her after we went our separate ways. She was obviously hurt and a little angry about this. Trying to be compassionate but also puzzled by how she was acting, I explained to her that I didn't feel like I ever really knew her that well, and so I didn't feel the need to continue talking when we weren't in the same school anymore. She seemed really surprised by my response, and I suddenly realized that she was not the person I thought she was (I think her appearance in fact changed between the two people as the dream went on).

She was not some vague acquaintance from high school, but a good friend from before that. I felt terrible, apologized and explained that I had confused her for someone else. I then tried to explain, and figure out for myself, why I hadn't tried to get back into contact with her. The conversation continued like this for quite a while, and over time we seemed to rekindle that old friendship and I started feeling true compassion for her, and regretted not having talked with her for this long. On her side, she seemed less angry than before, and more understanding.

Finally, with most bridges mended, she reached her second question: something along the lines of "Would you consider going out with me?" This sort of blew me out of the water. It was unexpected and surprising, especially with how the conversation had started and how we didn't "really" know each other anymore. But I realized we were actually quite similar, she attracted me, and I felt a connection with her. At the same time, this was all really sudden, and feelings aside, did we really know each other anymore?

She sensed my hesitation, but I didn't want her to think I was rejecting her, because I didn't want to. I think I said something along the lines of: "Well, I would definitely not say 'no.'" This was my way of saying that I definitely felt something between us, but was sort of confused at the whole situation and how quickly it all happened. She seemed pretty satisfied with the response, and we continued talking until it was clear we would at least give a shot at some sort of relationship. I took her hand and my mind raced as I thought of what was happening, and how she somehow seemed to be the perfect fit for me. It seemed too good to be true, but I was firmly decided on at least giving it a shot. Despite my few doubts, I felt an overall sense of immense peace and hopefulness.


What it all means I suppose is for me to decide: I think I will remember this dream for a long time though. It is really sort of a plain/mundane dream in content or plot and may seem kind of cheesy on the surface, but I felt so many strong, genuine and varied emotions throughout it. Truly amazing what the dreaming mind can do.

Lots and lots of recall, all from last night / this morning.

Fragments:

- I was in a movie theater, but when I looked up at the schedule of movies, there were instead some lucid dreaming classes being advertised. Should have reality checked >_<

- I was watching Djokovic-Federer at the French Open. John McEnroe was commentating, and he said something like "The timing of Djokovic's push (his win streak) couldn't have come at a better time for Federer," in terms of motivating him to win. He then said he thought Federer would win it all.

- I had a dream I was wearing some sort of body armor.

- I had a dream where I was in a hotel, in a large room I was sharing with a few family members. I went out a sort of window/door into a balcony-alleyway, but after walking around I got lost and couldn't find my way back to my room. The rest of the dream was about my quest to find my room, but I only remember flashes. There was an atmosphere of great tension and mystery about the dream, as if something was really wrong, but I can't quite remember what was going on. I remember being in a long corridor of rooms with numbers, and I had to try to guess which was the right one based on some clues. I also ended up going in a room where there were many computers set up, and participating in a kind of contest there.



#999:
Date: April 2nd, 2011
Length: 4 minutes

I'm in a sort of game where I'm a bad guy being hunted by the inhabitants of an island. I have a couple powers to escape them, like short-range teleportation. They have various vehicles and guns, and I'm basically just running for my life the whole time. The island has two parts -- a village where most people live, and another area which is more remote and has sort of an observatory, partly floating on water, and a dock. It's very early morning.

I get chased through the village, then I'm nearly sandwiched between two small armies, but manage to evade them by teleporting. Progressively I start getting hurt more and more, until it looks like I'm going to be killed. Just at that moment, the sun rises fully and I suddenly gain mechanical wings. I activate them immediately and fly off a cliff, evading the villagers who are extremely angry I got away. I start flying towards the observatory, looking for a good place to hide.

I end up landing in the water, and the dream fades out here. I may have gotten slightly lucid for a few moments.




#1000!!!:
Date: April 2nd, 2011
Length: 4 minutes

I'm in a small plane that my friend is flying, even though he has no training in this. For some reason we're flying to some place that's actually really close by. Anyways, we fly over a highway, and the ride is really shaky -- my friend doesn't really seem to be a good pilot. I keep telling him to be careful and we avoid colliding into a few things, but then we suddenly come up on a tall building and crash into it, unable to pitch up fast enough.

We apparently have several "lives" though, so we end up starting over again. I think we crash again. The third time around, the plane is different, and we're with another friend. The plane now seems very makeshift, composed of a bunch of long pieces of cloth held together by ropes and the like. We're also much higher in the sky. For a while we fly smoothly, but then we start going in circles in the air. My two friends argue for a while about how to fly the plane, then things stabilize for a few moments.

Eventually, the plane starts falling apart for some reason. I find myself stuck on a cloth platform above the main section of the plane, where the other two are. The place I'm at is collapsing, so I need to jump and land below without missing or falling off. I'm quite scared, but I finally do it. I jump down, but I don't make it perfectly and find myself hanging on for dear life. For some reasons my friends are casually taking their time, attending to other things in the plane and letting me hang there for a while before helping me up. I don't recall much after that, I think we arrived above some sort of island. I wrote something here about become lucid also, but I don't recall that?


Ahh, 1000+ dreams. Really happy to have made it to this many, it's really nice to be able to go and look back at all these dreams, I can still remember most of them when I read them. Of course, there are many more to come, hopefully with greater frequency and quality of lucids!

So last night I went to sleep with the intent of waking up after every dream period. It didn't work perfectly, I only woke up after a couple, but in the early morning when I woke up I went back to sleep trying to count myself into a dream ("1... I'm dreaming, 2... I'm dreaming" etc), using a snooze on my alarm to regularly wake myself up.

It didn't work directly in the sense that I didn't ever consciously transition to dreaming, but I had a strange sort of lucid dream. Lucidity fluctuated a lot, but it seems like I re-entered the dream twice, but I don't recall if I actually woke up between re-entries or not, so I'll just mark the places I think they happened. Also a lot of other dreams recalled.

#996:
Date: May 30th, 2011
Length: 8 minutes


I began in some kind of house, where I quickly realized I was dreaming. I ended up walking outside, just stabilizing things for a few moments. I wanted to meet someone in particular, so I yelled out her name, hoping that would summon her. Instead, a sort of plot developed where she had been kidnapped and was being held in a building in front of me. My lucidity here was pretty insignificant, but I went inside the building. It was a sort of inn/bar, and I went upstairs to a room.

Now something to understand is that this dream had odd shifts in perspective to a game of Starcraft. My mind was interpreting the concept of lucidity strangely (second time this has happened lately...), as if Starcraft was the real life I would awaken to after this dream. At times, I had flashes where I was seeing my base in a game of Starcraft being attacked, and afraid that this would wake me up. I was asking my allies to help defend me.

Anyways, the person I was looking for was in the room, but my vision shifted to Starcraft mode and saw that she was "infested." I decided to just leave the room and head back outside, having to fight through some people who wanted to stop me.

Back outside, my mind was a bit clearer and I think I was more conscious of my dreaming state. As I walked, the dream began to fade, however. Everything turned dark, but I tried to concentrate on my sense of touch. <Re-entry here?> Eventually, I was back in the dream. I decided to try to use all my senses to stay anchored in the dream, so I walked into a nearby shop and found a bizarre glass container which had some kind of perfume in it. I smelled it and poured some on myself, and also ate two sort of black sort of "rocks" that were inside it. It tasted pretty disgusting, but I kept chewing on it for quite a while, happy about how real it seemed.

At this point my notes read that I was in a room packing up some stuff into my backpack. I vaguely recall this, but I don't know why I was doing it. Anyways, I think the dream faded here again, and I had another re-entry (maybe). I found myself in a wooden shack near a body of water. I looked at myself in a mirror -- I looked basically like myself, though a few features were somewhat distorted.

After a little more stabilization, I stepped outside. Below me was a pretty steep drop down to the water, and in the distance I saw a few hills and islands. I decided to go check out what was over there, though it didn't look like much. I launched myself into the air and flew down towards the water. As I did so, everything felt so real and crisp for a moment that I was completely exhilarated. I tried to calm myself, fearing that this would wake me up. Unfortunately, my flying slowed to almost a dead halt and I had a weird false awakening: the Starcraft game appeared again, with my base being attacked. I typed something like: "can you believe it! I was having a good lucid dream and just then this woke me up!"

I also wrote something in my notes about a checklist, but I don't remember what it had to do with the dream. It had an entry on it that said "pre-fight bosses."



#997:
Date: May 30th, 2011
Length: 4 minutes

I was in a class that was taught by one of my former History professors. It was the first day of this class. For some reason, there were a bunch of pool tables all around the room. I was eager to meet people, and quickly introduced myself to a few. People were told to assemble around the pool tables for some kind of group work. There was some confusion for a moment as some tables got deserted and others overcrowded.

After a while, something odd happened and we were suddenly in the middle of a zombie invasion. I was strangely calm (felt sort of like a game) and ran towards the class entrance. We weren't really in a building or anything -- the room was just sort of merged with outside. It was night time, and I followed a group of people across a small brook and to a sort of checkpoint. Once we made it there we knew we were safe.

Somehow I ended back in the classroom before the zombie thing happened. This time I walked towards the front of the classroom and then beyond it, to a seashore. There were a couple boats there, and I just enjoyed the view for a few moments, when the zombies came again. This time, however, it definitely felt real, and I was scared. I was with a group of journalists and we sprinted towards the same brook we had crossed before. This time, however, there was a problem and we were unable to cross it. Instead we had to take a long bridge to our left.

One by one people fell behind and died, until it was just me and another guy. We ran as fast as we could. For some reason we were suddenly being chased by two cars, and we ducked out of the way just in time before they lost control and crashed horribly, blocking the zombies from catching up with us. I thought I was safe as we stopped a moment to catch our breaths, but then I realized the guy with me had been bitten and was turning into a zombie. He started approaching me aggressively, and I backed off. Soon he was charging me and trying to bite my face off. I fought him off desperately, but I was weaker than him and terrified. I frantically tried to prevent him from biting me while also somehow mentally accessing a menu, trying to stop this "game" (though nonetheless it felt like my life was at stake), and managed to just in time. I don't remember anything after that.


#998:
Date: May 30th, 2011
Length: 3 minutes

Basically just a dream of playing soccer. I was playing defense at first, then switched to attack, then back to defense, then back to attack. It all made sense at the time. After a few uneventful plays, I suddenly started to play much better, just sort of naturally sensing where my teammates were and making good passes. Then I got the ball on our half of the pitch, and suddenly found myself able to dribble their entire team. I fell just short of scoring a goal, tapping the ball a little too far in front of me and losing control at their last line of defense. Still, I was really happy with how I was playing.

We reached a break in play, and some guy kept complaining about how the online system for this soccer league was broken. I asked him why he was so concerned over this when it wasn't even playoff time. He explained that there was a team called "The 300 Spartans" whose name had caused a glitch in the system, somehow resulting in gif images of the car in Back to the Future to be placed above each team's name. This was apparently a very big deal.


- I also had a dream about being in some kind of underground facility, and meeting a ton of people I haven't seen in a really long time.

#967:
Date: (Approx.) October 10th, 2010
Length: 5 minutes

It's another zombie apocalypse. I begin the dream in a large, fortified bus with a bunch of people from my family. We drive down a bunch of roads until we finally reach a coastline. We roll down the beach until we reach a sort of military encampment which is apparently one of the few human settlements remaining. There are many white tents, and as we drive into the camp, people are impressed that we've survived on our own for this long.

We don't stay for more than a few moments though, I think because we realize that whoever is running this camp has some kind of sinister motives. In particular, we notice a sort of symbol on the side of buildings and vehicles that looks like "^^^^", and it makes us very suspicious. We end up in a sort of city, and we stop at what used to be a restaurant, looking for food to scavenge. My recall is a bit blurry at this point. I think we find some guns inside the restaurant, and then someone appears at the door. At first we think it's a zombie, and immediately take aim with our rifles. It turns it's a human though, and we all end up sitting at a table and talking.

Big jump here, I somehow end up in a kind of massive factory, and I am being taken to an audience with the factory's owners (I think the guy from the restaurant told me to go here). After taking an elevator, I enter a large, Japanese-style room, and stand in the middle of the large carpet that spans the room. After a few moments, I am surrounded with a bunch of vaguely human-like cats, who are apparently incredibly wise and think I'm some sort of chosen one. I try to talk with them and explain that I'm nothing special, but they speak a language I don't understand.

For a while I'm really confused, as the cats are all saying many things and I have no idea what is really going on. Eventually, I try to just relax, and I think I slowly start to understand what they are saying, despite not knowing their language. They begin some sort of chanting, and I start floating in the air. I just try to roll with it and wait. Unfortunately, I don't remember much of what happened after that.


#968:
Date: (Approx.) October 8th, 2010
Length: 3 minutes

It's night-time, in some sort of suburban neighborhood. Apparently, I'm "in" a sort of horror movie, and I sort of know it, so while everything feels real, I also have some notion that it isn't, if that makes any sense. Anyways, I'm outside with a group of 4 people, one of whom is Mel Gibson. Armed with a few guns, we're on the hunt for some kind of mysterious animal who has been wreaking havoc (maybe killing people?) in the neighborhood.

After walking around for a while, we spot a dark figure, which we assume is the animal. I think it runs away before we can kill it, and I think to myself that it doesn't look that dangerous. We decide to split up. I end up exploring some sort of log cabin with another person, and it's suddenly morning. The guy with me uses his walkie talkie to contact the others, but eerily, there's no response at all. Everything is suddenly very quiet and tense. There is a knock at the door right in front of us. I feel like something horrific is about to happen, so I get behind the door and try to block my vision, as if trying to ignore the movie I'm in. The guy opens the door, and there is nothing there but books on the floor. If I recall correctly, the books belonged to a little girl who had been killed by the animal, and for some reason it was quite scary that they were suddenly here (who brought them there?).


#968:
Date: (Approx.) October 15th, 2010
Length: 2 minutes

I'm walking around on campus, and I see a girl I haven't seen in years. I follow her, and see her go into a sort of deli I have never been to before. After a few moments I decide to go inside, but go in through the wrong door and end up in a kind of bathroom. There's a bucket with some food in there, so for a moment I wonder if this is the actual deli, but eventually conclude that it isn't. I go in through another door and find myself in a kitchen area, where an employee tells me this isn't the right place to get food. I go back outside and in through another door, which is the right one this time. I ended up admiring some of the delicious things for sale.


A fragment from last night: I was in an elevator with some guy, and suddenly it started shaking fairly violently. It barely reached the floor we were going to, and when it did, the doors opened but the elevator started moving again. We scrambled to get out of the elevator, and did, just in time, before it dropped free-fall to the bottom of the shaft.


Finally, a kind of funny and technically lucid dream from the other day. I woke up in the morning, having overslept already, but fell asleep again. When I did though, I ended up in a dream of getting out of bed, only to see my roommate hiding in a corner getting ready to jump out to scare me or something. I knew my roommate wasn't here IRL though, so I yelled out "NO!!', mad at myself for falling asleep again. I woke myself up and get out of bed, for real this time.

#943:
Date: July 5th, 2010
Length: 3 minutes

I'm with my family, on a trip, aboard a sort of hybrid tour bus / buggy, with some hispanic guy as the driver. Apparently we're being driven to wherever we're staying (I'm not sure what country this is supposed to be in). After a while, we end up in some kind of off-road area with uneven terrain. The bus reaches a sharp sort of incline, and starts tilting massively. After a few seconds, the bus tips over entirely, and we go barreling down a hill. I try to protect myself as best I can as I get thrown around, but thankfully the bus seems almost designed for such situations and absorbs the shocks fairly well. Eventually, we stop rolling, and everyone is alright.

A while later, we're still on the bus, and see a huge ravine ahead of us. The driver makes some kind of weird turn, but messes up and we start falling. We crash on a sort of small chunk of land a couple feet below, where dozens more cars are stacked up, indicating that many people have crashed here before. Thankfully we stop just before the bus can fall into the ravine. We quickly get out through an emergency exit, afraid that the bus will lose its balance and fall. I think my dad yells at the driver for his performance so far. After that, the dream is a bit strange. My surroundings sort of morph into a hotel room, and I recall trying to retrieve our luggage from the bus.



I also had some dream where I was in an elevator that went EXTREMELY fast up and down a 71-story building, and I was scared that it would break.

Ah, feeling quite happy. Last night, after reading up on MILD (including my own previous experiences with it) and "rehearsing" reality checking to things like darkness and water, I decided to try MILD again. I went to bed, reciting "I will have a memorable, vivid and recalled lucid dream tonight." I tried to really take it slow and focus on every word's meaning, visualizing when I could. As I started to fall asleep, it became harder to concentrate on visualizing and meaning, so I just tried to keep repeating the mantra as much as possible. It took me a good while to fall asleep, but as far as I can tell I stuck with it basically until I was sleeping. And it paid off -- 4 dreams recalled (though good recall wasn't really the focus, but I'll take it!), one of which was lucid (not all that memorable, but still) and another of which was close / semi-lucid. Here they are.

#938:
Date: July 2nd, 2010
Length: 4 minutes

I'm in some kind of small city. I step out from the street into some kind of small store, accompanied by some guy I apparently know. For a long time I look around, unsure of what to buy, if anything. The guy ends up talking with the cashier, a girl that he knows. I think he buys a few things. Meanwhile, I start checking out an aisle that has a bunch of books/comics.

After a while I still haven't made up my mind about what to buy, and the others start making fun of me for it. I just kind of laugh and go along with it. The dream is a bit blurry here -- I recall something about stick figures: either one of the comics involved stick figures, or the guy and girl themselves turned into stick figures, I don't quite recall. Regardless, it somehow dawns on me that I am dreaming.

Excited, I step out into the street, and as I walk I try to stabilize everything. I then take flight, into a kind of suburb. After a while I land, and for some reason my surroundings seem extremely familiar, like I've been here before, but I don't think I have. I see two girls nearby, and I think I ended up kissing one of them. Shortly after that my surroundings become quite foggy and strange.

In front and to my right, there's a particularly thick patch of fog I can't see through, and I decide to try diving through and to see where I'll end up. I do so, and the dream sort of goes nuts -- my surroundings turn all dark, and my vision goes to third person for a moment, then my entire field of vision turns upside down and I see myself falling. I'm not positive about how this ended, but as far as I can tell/remember I had sort of a false awakening where some voice was trying to get me to wake up, and after that I actually did wake up in real life.




#939:
Date: July 2nd, 2010
Length: 3 minutes

I'm participating in this sort of worldwide game/contest (at times it feels like a video game, not a "real" thing), that involves accumulating treasure in a very short time, around three minutes I think. At first I see a sort of world map, and several dots indicate places where I can search for treasure. I pick one, and end up in front of some gigantic fish. It goes towards me and eats me whole.

I find myself inside the fish, wondering where I was supposed to find treasure here. After a few moments though, I realize that what the fish is eating is heading towards me, and see that it's treasure -- some kind of golden artifact is the first thing I spot. Instead of staying inside though, I decide to escape the fish. I take out a large knife I happen to have on me, and start slicing away at the "walls" around me. Eventually the fish dies, and I crawl out into some cave whose floor is covered in water.

I take a look at the fish, and realize that it has a bunch of teeth that are actually precious gems. I take my knife and start extracting them (there are about 10). After a few moments, my mom randomly arrives, and she tells me time is running out and I need to quickly grab all the gems I can and leave the cave because a rescue squad is waiting for me outside. I quickly remove the rest of the teeth/gems and start heading out.



#940:
Date: July 2nd, 2010
Length: 5 minutes

It's late afternoon on a sunny day, and it seems I'm trying to walk home. However, I'm in some place that I don't know. The terrain is very open, green, and uneven. I find some old woman, who decides to serve as my guide and help me find my way home. I follow her all the way to some isolated stretch of land very close to a large body of water, which I apparently need to get to the other side of. For a moment, I take a look around. The water is a beautiful blue, and it has suddenly become extremely windy. I realize that I'm going to have to backtrack and walk around the body of water.

I thank the old woman for her help, and tell her I'll find my way from here, not wanting to be slowed down by her and having a rough idea of where I'm headed. As I make my way back, I encounter some sort of large wooden structure with a bunch of ramps on it, serving as a kind of bridge. However, as I start walking on it, it quickly falls apart under my weight. Soon enough, it's entirely broken, and I drop down to the ground, a foot or so below. I realize that this wooden structure was actually part of someone's garden, and perhaps some sort of thing for children to play on that I've now wrecked.

I take a look around. The garden I'm in is part of a very large house, where a party is going on. I quickly walk down some stairs towards the house, and go inside, trying to look like a guest. Once inside, I walk up a large set of stairs, and find myself face to face with the father of the family that lives there. Worried that he'll find out what I did, I try not to look suspicious, and ask him where the bathroom is. I go there, and take a leak. The bathroom door, which I closed, opens for no reason. Shortly after, I see the father just outside the bathroom, and am terrified that he's going to confront me, but he doesn't.

Instead of leaving, I decide to stick around for the party. I go back outside, where there are many people near a large pool, most seated at tables and having discussions. At this point, I seem to realize that this isn't quite real (perhaps the sight of water twice in the dream unconsciously reminded me that it's a potential dream sign of mine). I don't become fully lucid, but get a sense that nothing I do here really matters. With this in mind, I decide to mess around a bit. I randomly sit at some tables and try to barge into the conversations, or act obnoxious/awkward (eg, randomly sit between two people and rest my arms on their shoulders as if we're good friends).

After that, the party seemed to disperse, except for a few guests around a distant table that had tons of food on it. They were standing, having a quiet, sort of suspicious conversation. I ended up going near them, but I don't recall doing anything in particular.




#941:
Date: July 2nd, 2010
Length: 3 minutes

I'm apparently a player for the Golden State Warriors, and we are having some kind of training session in a gymnasium. For reason, Yao Ming is on the team, and he has a broken left arm and is wearing a cast. I don't really recall any other specific players, besides maybe Ellis. The coach organizes a kind of practice game, I think 3on3, one weaker team (mine) against a stronger one (Yao's). I think there were a few people watching us from some windows that gave a view of the street.

We start playing, I think getting pretty handily beaten. We then reach a play where I am defending Yao, and we end up colliding hard, and we both fall to the ground. His broken arm takes a serious hit, and it seems he's badly injured. He gets carried off by medical staff I think, and the training session ends.

#937:
Date: July 1st, 2010
Length: 4 minutes

I'm on some kind of one-day trip to Britain, where I meet up with a friend for dinner. We end up in some kind of restaurant, with a couple of people he apparently knows. For some reason though, I leave the restaurant (with the intention of coming back in a bit), and head to some kind of airport. As I walk, I'm a bit confused as to this whole situation -- I vaguely recall arriving in the country, but seem to have absolute no plan as to how I'm going to get back home, or even where I'm going to sleep this night. I seem to have assumed that my friend would have planned everything out, and so I tell myself that I'll ask him what the plan is when I go back to the restaurant.

First, though, I decide to exchange some of my US dollars for pounds. I go to some sort of change bureau, when I find my grandmother working, for no apparent reason. I go up to her, give her some of my money, and in exchange, instead of money, she gives me large pieces of paper, signed and with some monetary value written on them. I'm slightly suspicious of these, but I take them anyway. Don't recall much after that.




Been thinking a bit about my dream signs lately. From my more recent dreams, a couple ideas have come up:

- Darkness/night seems to quite frequent, maybe 50-60% of my dreams involve it.
- Fear, pain, confusion, or some sort of danger are pretty frequent emotions too.
- I'm very rarely alone in a dream -- usually accompanied by family or friends.
- Water might also be a minor dream sign, it seems to show up occasionally.