Weird Dream(s)

[Dingfod]

Originally Posted by ceptimus

A few times I've had one of those "coding dreams" where, in the dream, I realise that the code I'm dreaming is so brilliant it must be written down or otherwise recorded before it might be forgotten - so I wake myself up.

Of course, once I'm awake, I think about the code and realise that, like most things in dreams, it makes absolutely no fucking sense whatsoever. So I tell my dreaming self not to bother waking me up again with such nonsense - but that dreaming self isn't an easy person to convince.

I've actually dreamed the solution to computer programming problems I was having. And by programming, I mean some very complex spreadsheet macros. And by problems, I mean I had in my mind what I wanted it to do, but did not have the expertise to make it so. After a frustrating day of puzzling over how to make it do what I wanted it to do, I dreamed the solution. I scribbled down a few notes when I woke up, and went to work and put it all together just as I had dreamed it. It worked exactly as I wanted it to. 15 years later, those doofuses in Salt Lake are still using that spreadsheet to calculate line pack and tell them which compressors to run to make a certain throughput happen.

[lisarea]

This one has some of you guys in it.

So we won some vacation to some awful water park, for some reason. Matlock and I have to get ready and leave really quickly, without much time to pack or anything. We go up to get settled in the hotel, then come down where everyone else is, including pretty much all of you guys.

Someone decides that Bort and I need to go buy provisions at a grocery store, so we go. I lose him almost immediately, and erimir (who was not on the vacation, but lives there) calls me into this weird sort of vestibule area of the grocery store, which is covered with Kraft paper, like it's just being remodeled. It turns out that he and some of his friends somehow took over this area of the store and turned it into a private business. It is called "Wal*Store," and the sign is the same font and color scheme as Walmart. I'm like, "OK, I'll get the provisions here instead," but then it turns out that all they even carry are humorous novelty buttons and little trinkets, so they're trying to think of really good substitutions for the things on my list. The main thing was that erimir told me that the SHELF BRA I WAS BUYING FOR SOCK PUPPET could be substituted with a small enamel brooch with a picture of Freddie Mercury. It was a really specific type of shelf bra (a cute red one with a white bow in the middle, he said), so I was like, "Whatever, I'm not going to find that in a grocery store anyway," and got him that brooch and a novelty button with a picture of a crown that said "King Santa," and just hoped he didn't notice.

So we go back to everyone and we're all getting ready to go to the Burger King Buffet. Because Burger King has buffets. Well, we get there and Matlock gets in this big discussion with the proprietor and comes back to tell me that he got a really good deal on renting a "motorhome" so we can stay right in the parking lot of Burger King instead of having to walk over. I'm like, "OK, but can we go back to the hotel and get our stuff?" and sort of handwaves that off, like, "HA HA WHO CARES?" The motorhome is this huge, obviously home built contraption with two parts that each fit into a parking space. It has writing all over the outside in Sharpie, outlining the terms and conditions for rental. Matlock tries to wipe it all off before I can read it, and I'm like, "Whatever, Matlock. I didn't sign anything," then I go in and the interior is made up of refrigerators and freezers. Like it's all these small plastic compartments with refrigerator doors separating them. There isn't even any place to lie down. But hey, it's right there, in the parking lot of the Burger King buffet, so we can always be first in line, right Matlock? RIGHT?

Then we go back to the waterpark, and it turns out they have this cool prize game on their fake beach area, where the ground starts to slope on both sides toward the middle, and then swallows up a person, and when that happens, they drop all these rolls of money from the ceiling for everyone to grab. I remember thinking, "No, this doesn't seem safe," but after the lady (it was either Lady Shea or liv--I couldn't even make it out) gets swallowed, I get a bunch of rolls of money. Tens of thousands of dollars at least. But I have nothing to carry them in, and Matlock won't carry any because he's got a really big soda now, so I'm just walking around with armsful of cash.

Just then, Demi comes over and tells me that she's lost her phone and someone is spoofing it, making prank calls or something, so I have to go catch the hacker before Contra finds out, and also she gave her number to some guy she met and is waiting for his call. (This is pretty hinky, Demi. Explain yourself.) So I go to the local 'hacker store,' which is a dingy, dimly lit storefront with young dirty people in it, juggling my armsful of cash and trying to trick this hacker, who is up on a big screen, into doing something I don't even know what.

But then the guy from Burger King comes and says I have to leave to catch my flight, and he won't even stop for me to go to the hotel to get my glasses and my wallet and phone and stuff, so I'm worrying about how I'm even going to board a plane with nothing but an armload of cash.

So yeah, that's it. I'm not speaking to Matlock, and I'm pretty mad at all of you guys today. You all behaved poorly.

[BrotherMan]

HA HA WHO CARES?

[Sock Puppet]

Hey, I got my King Santa button and a lovely brooch, so screw the rest of you guys. After I find out what a shelf bra is, I might need to send Pea back to the Wal*Store, though.

[Beth]

I had a dream about a wilted and grey flower. It made me sad and I began to cry. Somehow, I became that flower. It became vibrant and strong, and somehow I knew that I would live in that meadow forever.

I don't remember ever having a dream like that before.

[Adam]

This one is from Sunday night.

I'm eating dinner at some kind of outdoor party, seated at a sort of trestle table between my SO on my right and a friend of mine on my left. The setting is sort of very loosely based on a house that an aunt and uncle of mine used to live at, where we would go every year on the fourth of July. My friend has introduced me to the woman sitting across from me. She is very familiar, although she is no one I actualy know. I think she might be a composite of several people. She works for a company (I don't know what company) that I know I would love to work for, and is very excited about helping me get a job there. Like she wants to go over my resume right there at the party, and has a project she wants me to work on, and wants to talk about with me. As the party is winding down, and my friend leaves, she starts gathering up the papers we have been going over, and insists that, even if I haven't heard from her with news, I need to call her.

I notice that everyone else at the party is gone. She says she has some work she needs to do, and would I mind finishing cleaning up. After I clear the table, I go inside to look for her to say goodbye. She is seated on a couch in a darkened room, covered with a blanket. She has a keyboard in her lap, working on some kind of programming project on a large flatscreen TV mounted on the wall. A smaller TV is mounted above it, and she is watching a movie that I think is a Pixar cartoon. I tell her I'm done cleaning and am going to head home, and she reiterates that she really wants me to call her, and I realize we're doing that weird "I guess I should go...?" dance that sometimes happens on dates and such. She lets the blanket fall away to reveal that she is naked. Weirdly, my guilt over contemplating staying here with this naked woman (and where did my SO vanish to?) blends with my guilt over looking for a new job while I'm in the middle of a huge project at work, and this is what makes me decide to leave.

I leave the room she is in and enter sort of a dining room/study area, with two doors leading outside. I start picking up wood from a nearby pile and building barricades at both doors. I am frustrated because unlike last time there isn't enough wood to build effective barricades. I'm briefly puzzled by there being a "last time" that I barricaded a couple of doors like this, but shrug it off as a familiar, video-gamey sort of concept. Why didn't more wood spawn this time? I wander through the rest of the house looking for more wood. I encounter the mother of the woman, who has stopped by to check up on her, and grills me about my intentions while we wash dishes together.

I return to the barricade room and look out the doors, nervous because the approaching army is almost here. I am confused, because I don't know if it's the Union or the Confederacy. A battle is going on outside, and I continue to wander through the house, looking for something I can use to protect myself. I realize that the house used to belong to the brother of the woman, and that he moved out suddenly after a messy divorce, leaving many possessions in the house. There are rooms that obviously used to be inhabited by his children. One bathroom has Tinkerbell wallpaper, although someone has smeared shit all over the floor and walls.

I decide to spend the night here, and make a bed on the floor using some blankets I find. The room I am in used to be a bedroom, and still has a couple of dressers in it. On top of the dressers are vintage video game systems. I get up in the middle of the night and use the Tinkerbell bathroom. I am disgusted by walking barefoot on the dirty floor. When I come out, two men are in the bedroom I have been using, and demand to know who I am. I am afraid, because I don't know which side to tell them I am with. Eventually, I decide to tell them that I am an escaped slave, and they believe me for some reason. I leave the house, and walk around outside. I am no longer where I was before, but in the ruins of a shelled city. I am trying to find my way back to the house.

The perspective shifts, and I am reading a review, with a picture that looks like the area I was just standing in, lauding Rock Star Games for their new release of a Grand Theft Auto style game set during the second Civil War, when Egypt declared war on both sides and landed troops on the east coast, and I reflect that it was an interesting period in history that you just don't hear enough about.

[Adam]

I also had a weird one last night that I don't remember very well.

I was looking into buying this huge house, along with a roommate, who wasn't anyone I knew, and I was reluctant to live with them, but having them as a roommate was part of the deal for the house, and it was the only way I'd ever be able to afford a house that big. I'm not sure why I needed a house that big anyway, given that I was very concerned that I would never be able to find enough furniture to fill it. The coolest feature of the house was the ginormous backyard, which was under a big glass bubble that made it into sort of an atrium. Most of the area was occupied by a big pool with those Shinto gate things standing in it, and giant multicolored fish living in it.

Even though the house had like half a dozen bathrooms I decided, thinking I was alone, to use a toilet that was just sort of standing by itself in a big open basement/laundry room/entrance form the backyard area. The people who were showing the house came through with some other prospective buyers, and I was embarrassed.

I followed them to a "seance room" that was in the house, and spoke to some of the other people there. One of them was a very old man who was...a dentist? I think? Who had served in that capacity in one? both? of the World Wars? Anyway, it turned out that he was a ghost? Or a medium of some sort? Or a host for something supernatural? Or something?

And then I was walking down a hospital hallway, talking to Zach Braff about the television show we were going to be in together, a crossover between Scrubs and the popular long-running show about my life. We wanted the old dentist/ghost man to co-star with us, and I was super-excited to show Zach the seance room and maybe use it as a set.

The end?

[Dingfod]

Originally Posted by Sock Puppet

Hey, I got my King Santa button and a lovely brooch, so screw the rest of you guys. After I find out what a shelf bra is, I might need to send Pea back to the Wal*Store, though.

Mr. Pea could have used one to stash those rolls of cash.

[erimir]

Totally equivalent to a shelf-bra.

[Janet]

I dreamed that Mick put on an impromptu Dirtbombs concert in my the library director's office because he was mad about something she'd done to annoy me. Also there were all kinds of extra floors and hidden parts of the library that I'd never seen before.

[Demimonde]

Originally Posted by lisarea

Just then, Demi comes over and tells me that she's lost her phone and someone is spoofing it, making prank calls or something, so I have to go catch the hacker before Contra finds out, and also she gave her number to some guy she met and is waiting for his call. (This is pretty hinky, Demi. Explain yourself.) So I go to the local 'hacker store,' which is a dingy, dimly lit storefront with young dirty people in it, juggling my armsful of cash and trying to trick this hacker, who is up on a big screen, into doing something I don't even know what.

Gawd, I already explained this in dreamscape, but okay.

I had a suspicion that the motor home guy was the roadkill collector of your childhood. That is why it was full of refrigerators. It was made mobile for ease of collection and redistribution. The sharpie TOS also included proprietary instructions on the collection, cataloging and replacement of dead animals to confuse people. THAT'S why Matlock wouldn't let you see it. Because that evil Republican, ChuckF, convinced him once they acquired it, they could monetize it.

I was waiting to hear from a guy I met at the zoo who was with an open source, performance arts collective. He was interested in keeping roadkill trolls open to the public and making information readily available to the roadkill DIY community.

[Dingfod]

I had two weird dreams last night.

1. I dreamed there was an Ranch in the high desert of New Mexico. I went there to camp out and commune with my fellow ers. It was a good half hour drive off of a highway on a gravel road atop a mesa. The turnoff to the ranch was off of a short loop road that ran on a hillside covered in juniper and pinon trees below the main road. On that loop road there were several old trailer houses. One of them was where Mark Dreher lived and interneted, the other, Iacchus. Through the gate it was another quarter mile at least to the main house, which was an old frame ranch house. When I arrived there was only a few people there, Ensign Steve and beyelzu, LauriD (all three people I've met in real life), and some other people I did not know. We sat around a bonfire and drank homemade wine all evening. I slept on a large bed that didn't have any sheets on it, or any other furniture in the room either. Several other people slept on the bed too, fully clothed and passed out drunk. The next day, a lot more people started showing up, but the dream ended before I really took inventory.

2. I dreamed I was attacked by a large lioness, held down and forced to have sex with it. Difficulty: it wasn't a cougar, it was an African lion. I awoke aroused. Yikes!

[Corona688]

Originally Posted by Dingfod

It was a good half hour drive off of a highway on a gravel road atop a mesa. ... We sat around a bonfire and drank homemade wine all evening.

This is how I will imagine the FF chatroom, now and forevermore.

[JoeP]

Originally Posted by Dingfod

2. I dreamed I was attacked by a large lioness, held down and forced to have sex with it. Difficulty: it wasn't a cougar, it was an African lion. I awoke aroused. Yikes!

This is how I will imagine the secret forums, now and forevermore.

[BrotherMan]

THANK YOU, LISAP YOU SAVED MY LIFE

The dream started off a mix of frightening and fun. I was on some kind of toboggan like thing that was being dragged behind a car. It's okay because the people driving were friends of mine. Mind you, this is not something I would do in the normal course of my life. I kinda like my parts in the places they already are and I don't think high velocity body modifications are my deal, see. I don't know what happened but the next thing I know I'm being pulled along by my best dog friend that I knew in for real life, Shadow. That's when I started having a lot of fun and I was telling Shadow to run RUN SHADOW, yaaaay!

Then the dream shifted into something else. Shadow was gone though I should have been said, I was happy to have seen her and played with her again. Then it was just some unknown ally-friend person and we were with a couple of girls. We somehow ended up at some cult's compound and it was up to me to get everyone out without being brainwashed or anything. I was sternly walking through the place dragging everborty with me trying very hard to reason with the cult people. The cult people were very nice even if they were intent on culting at us all. It was then that I thought to myself, Bort, what would pea do right now? I determined that pea would not allow herself to be brainwashed so that she could get everyone under her charge out and safe and stuff. Then I was all Yeah! pea power! and resolved to be smart and strong willed against the tide of cult people wanting me to join them.

As a reward I am bestowing upon you a which you can use for free somewhere.

[Dingfod]

Fuck you, Bort, the Ranch is not a cult's compound.

[BrotherMan]

This isn't really about a weird dream. The dream itself wasn't weird. It's what happened around it that that was p weird. But before I even get into it, I have some setting up to do.

This was in my mid to late teens. At the time it was just me and my dad. It was tough times for us. I didn't really notice it all that much. I always had clothes on my back and enough money for lunch (prolly liberal socialized school lunch, loaded with gay-making soy products). But we were living out of his shop. In those days he was leasing two three bay facilities. They were seperated by a goodly brick wall. On the one side was the original three bay he had been using, where he installed an office and the other side were the other three bays with its own normal door office built into it. I guess it was when he took over that set of bays that we officially moved in to live and work there. The original office was converted to a bedroom for me and he used a back room on the other side for his. To get into my bedroom you had to unlock and open one of the large overhead doors. It made a very particular sound and it reverberated quite loudly if you were on the inside of it.

Now, onto the dream portion. I don't remember everything about the dream. I wasn't really in the dream proper. I was like an observer, the camera as it were. It was like a old west movie. Cowboys were being cowboys and acting tough and macho as they did in those days. One guy caught another guy and was giving him a good hanging for some offense. (It wasn't very gruesome.) The guy dangling from the rope wasn't dying enough for the one cowpoker, so he pulls out his shotgun ...

... and this is one of the few if only times in my life where something matrixy strange happens to me. Just as the shotgun goes off the large overhead door makes its unlocking k-klang noise, waking me from the dream completely.

[Adam]

Here is how lame my subconscious is. First, it picks probably the most unattainable woman I know personally. Not unattainable like, oh, she's way out of my league, but unattainable as in there are several very definitive reasons why nothing will ever happen between us. So, what have you got for me subconscious? Hot sex dream about this woman I've never even thought about like that IRL? A dream time taste of what I can never have in the waking world? Bring it on!

Oh. No. It's going to be a dream where she confronts me and tells me she wants me, but then we have a long frustrating conversation about all the reasons it would never work out and how, we both really want to, but neither of us thinks it's a good idea, and then we make a compact to not do anything about it and to keep it a secret. There's even going to be a bit where her mother, of all people, warns me that we're both just going to get hurt. And this is all going to take place on a trip to Patagonia, because why the fuck not.

Fuck you, too, subconscious. I can be a mature adult who deals with the realities of life when I'm awake. You can throw all kinds of horrific shit about reanimated dead family members and lost pets and shit at me while I sleep, but you can't even bend the rules a little bit and let me enjoy a sex dream?

Also, I'm not exactly clear on where Patagonia is but, if my subconscious decides to set a dream there, it will stick it wherever the fuck it wants, and then put Brazil in the wrong place too, all like, ha ha, I am fucking up geography on purpose, who said I don't know where Patagonia is?

Other things my subconscious apparently believes:

If you bicycle from Patagonia to Brazil, you will have to cross a bridge over a river lined with quaint, brightly painted, houses and workplaces, with paper lanterns and shit everywhere, before you get to the border crossing. After crossing the bridge, which sways like a motherfucker, you'll have to pass through several private residences to get back to a public street, like just straight walking your bike through their kitchens and whatnot, because lol South America. When you get to the border and realize that you've forgotten your wallet and are thus unable to show ID, local children will bicycle alongside you all the way back to your hotel, laughing at you as they ride.

In Patagonia, they play a sport similar to that Aztec thing with the sideways hoop. They let tour groups join in, and even lend them gear, but if you are completely unable to find a pair of the weird spiky shoes they provide that fit you, they will not let you play, and you'll be forced to wait in the locker room area while all your friends play what sounds like a thrilling game. Someone will probably steal your street shoes while you're in there.

In Patagonia, all the restaurants are American chains, and you will find this disappointing, but, once you get inside, you will discover that there are actually local restaurants hiding behind the chain store facades for some reason.

[JoeP]

Originally Posted by Adam

If you bicycle from Patagonia to Brazil, you will have to cross a bridge over a river lined with quaint, brightly painted, houses and workplaces, with paper lanterns and shit everywhere, before you get to the border crossing.

Favourite bit.

Originally Posted by Adam

In Patagonia, all the restaurants are American chains, and you will find this disappointing, but, once you get inside, you will discover that there are actually local restaurants hiding behind the chain store facades for some reason.

Second favourite bit.

[Dingfod]

I awoke this morning from a dream where I was making a phone call to someone, I don't now remember who, but not the guy who answered the phone with, "Pipeline Control." I found myself unable to say "Sorry, wrong number." I hung up on him.

[Qingdai]

liv.

I dreamt I was in Ciserano, Italy. No idea why. I had to look it up on a map also.

[Adam]

I dreamed that I had the ability to turn into a bird. I had to sort of concentrate and find a certain spot in my mind, and really clench down on it, mentally, and then it would initiate a slow and sort of painful transition between my human form and a large ravenish bird. I had a secret life no one else knew about where I was part of a secret society of people who could transform into different animals. I don't remember the exact circumstances, but I broke one of the rules of the secret society by turning into a bird in front of a non-member (I only turned halfway, as a means of intimidation, because I was in danger, although I don't remember why). I was facing serious punishment, which I remember telling someone was going to be ten years' hard labor.

Although my bird life was in the real world, when I explained what had happened to my parents, I described it in terms of a video game. So, mom and dad, you know how druids can turn into different shapes? Well, it turns out that like one character in every hundred thousand is affected by some database glitch where the game thinks they have all the right skills and talents to turn into all the available forms, even if they aren't specced for it, or aren't even a druid. We don't do it in front of other people, though, because if the developers find out about it, they'll fix it.

I was reading and Bort posted about how all my recent posts seemed very depressed, and he was concerned, and I wanted to respond about how, yes, I was very depressed, because I was about to be sent to a prison camp for ten years, but I couldn't because somehow I knew that liv was associated with the faction in the secret society that wanted to punish me, and would arrest everyone who read my posts if I revealed my secret on the forum.

I was driving my Jeep home from work, in the snow, and the brakes stopped working, and I flipped it, and then I just sat down in the snow and started crying. My dog was there. Then my mom showed up and asked me what was wrong, and I told her that it had just been a bad year, with X (an ex girlfriend form years and years ago) leaving me, and then all the family deaths, and the bird thing, and now my Jeep being wrecked. Then I just decided that, fuck it, if I'm being punished for having this ability, I'm damn well going to use it, and I stood up and started transforming into the bird. I woke up before the transformation was complete.

[BrotherMan]

Quoth the bird:

[Dingfod]

Originally Posted by Qingdai

liv.

I dreamt I was in Ciserano, Italy. No idea why. I had to look it up on a map also.

Better than my dream: I woke up in an alley in Cicero, Illinois. No idea why. It wasn't pretty.

[SharonDee]

I dreamed of lisarea the other night. I have no idea what she was doing in my dream; I hadn't been on in days. She was being all judgmental about how I did things in my home but she was being tactful about it. (Hey, it was a dream, all right?!)