must be getting old

Everyone was how I remembered them from the early 80s, except me....I was me now. No other details.

Last night

I dreamt that I was looking down at a shimmery pool of water.

As long as i kept my eyelids closed i could see the lights..( handy i know )

It was really beautiful and peaceful

Seinfeld madness

So there I am in New York City, and I'm walking around with Red. And then a bus goes by and heads down the steps into the subway. And I think it was Kramer driving the bus. And he says, "Oh, I thought that was the road to the train station."

And then the next thing I know, I'm walking around, and this time I'm on my own, and I see Jerry Seinfeld walking ahead of me. He's dressed in a Hawaiian shirt and he's talking on a mobile phone. I call out to him and run to catch up to him.

But when he turns around, it's not Jerry. It's Kramer, and suddenly his hair is all big, just like it should be, and I wonder how I could possibly have mistaken him for Jerry from behind.

And then suddenly I'm inside a tall Manhattan office building, and I'm rolling around on the floor, making out with Elaine. Now that deserves an exclamation point!

The art thief

I dreamed I was an art thief, and I had been hired by Gianni Agnelli (the late owner of FIAT) to steal a famous canvas. Gianni was accompanied by his son Lupo. [In fact, Agnelli had a grandson called Lapo; but by making that into Lupo (which translates as "wolf"), I might have injected some extra meaning into my dream. Agnelli, of course, translates as "lambs"...]

So I'm in the streets of Marrakech, pacing up and down in front of this antiques dealer that has the painting in question in the window, waiting to strike. The Agnellis are waiting in the shadows. I seize my moment, smash the window, cut the painting out of its frame and make a dash for it. I end up running on muddy streets with open sewers, thinking, "I can't believe Ridley Scott shot Kingdom of Heaven here. Poor Orlando Bloom must have gotten very dirty".

I end up in a dungeon, where I must hide from a gang of fellow art thieves hired by another high-flying industrialist to steal that same canvas. I manage to slip away, give Gianni Agnelli his canvas, all rolled up like an Athena poster and muddied up.

Then Ewan McGregor tries to stop me from getting away, he grabs at my legs and I know that if he manages to subdue me he will rape me. I spot a rifle on the floor and stretch to reach it. Then I hit him on the head with it to stun him. While he's down, I break all his limbs with the butt of the rifle and get away.

Octopus

I dreamed that a friend and I had found a place to vacation. It had a big pond. We wuold go swimming in the pond. Occasionally there was a big fish that I wondered if it would bite, but it didn't. Then the water began to stir and get muddy. Then a tentacled arm and then more arms started coming after us, trying to pull us under. We ran to the cabin. The giant octopus could grab at us from the water, but it couldn't touch us on dry land. That's all.

3/12/06 Dream

Last night I dreamed of Parkour.

(Isn't that at the beginning of a film? It's either Rebecca or Casino Royale...hmm...)

I'm being chased through a country estate by persons unknown, and come to an impossible drop off a balcony. Down and a way away is a large, flat roofed garden shed. I jump and effortlessly land on the shed roof, roll, and continue running. Just like you should do.

Then I notice, cleverly escaping, I seem to have done a full circle. I'm at the same balcony. I jump again, like the cool free-runner that I am. And land...spine first on the edge of the roof. Ow.

And then I wake up.

Bad, bad Burger King

I dreamed I had to go to the bathroom and I entered a concrete block building which resembled the public bathroom in the city park of 40 years ago. In the dream bathroom, there was a huge hole in the concrete floor (3rd world potty) and it was terribly dirty and too large to straddle, so I left the concrete building to look for a clean useable bathroom.

There appeared a very deep hole at the outside of the building and it was full of one-half people, cut off at the waist, all looking up out of the hole.

I looked up from the hole to see the Burger King King approaching me, but I knew he was really the nasty CC that I have to deal with twice a month. So I took off my sweat pants and put them around his neck and crossed the legs and strangled him right to death. Then I took him and threw him in the deep hole with all of the other one-half people.

After that, I woke up.

Roses - Probably a Symbolic Dream

Just before I woke up, I dreamt that I was in my father's garden in South Africa. I was nurturing a magnificent rosebush that had exceeded all expectations and grew over 6 foot tall from just a tiny sprig. Instead of being in the ground, it was in a pot. I pulled out the rose bush and looked at the root, which hadn't grown really deep, but then, it wouldn't in a pot. I put the bush back in the pot and marvelled at the dazzling pink flowers. Beautiful! Next to this rosebush was another rose bush - a creeper, that was growing along the fence under the weeping willow tree. It was dying - the flowers were blackish and the branches all looked withered and old. The rose bush had been there a long time, but you could see it wasn't going to make another winter. I did feel sad about the old creeper rose, but I also felt really happy about the rose bush I had been growing that had done so well, and seeing the blooms on my rose bush, I knew that even though the old rose bush was on the way out, this new rose bush would still flower and bring beauty to the garden. As I was leaving the garden I caught sight of another creeper rose, this time pinkish-orange, in the rockery. It was a cabbage rose bush.I was amazed because this rose bush had not bloomed in many years and now, spontaneously, all these buds and blooms appeared. It made me happy to see and I felt really pleased that this rose bush was also looking healthy and happy and would be a beautiful fixture in the garden, even though mine was in a pot.

Walkin and talkin

i'm living in a mountain town..one of those quirky , bohemian , artsy towns ..

And Zee comes a callin!

We take a trolley ( trolley? what the fuck ?)to the main part of town ,the town is having a sort of art fair ..we look around , and talk..

and then we walk back to my house, and he goes home.

There's lots of conversation throughout this dream..it really was nice..
I feel like I've been on a date with mister zee..


* the only really strange part of the dream is I have on a skirt, and I'm worried through the whole date that he'll notice I didnt shave my legs..and I look at my legs and they're freaking sasquatch hairy!!..he never says anything about them though ..such a gentleman!*

Dead People Influencing My Dream?

My dead mother's presence has been hanging around me the past few days. Last night I said that if she has any message for me, she should arrange that I get the message passed across to me in a dream so that I have no doubt whatsoever she is trying to get across to me.

Last night I dreamt that I died of a heart attack at the age of 40.

Mobuto

I had the oddest dream last night. I was at my mum's, weeding the garden, when the ex Zairean president Mobuto appeared. I killed him, and buried him in hole I had to dig in a bank of earth which separates the house from the road.

It was all far too real, and even when I woke at 4 a.m I was still rather worried that I may have killed someone.

recurring dream

Okay ..back story
When i was little we lived in an old house out in the middle of nowhere. It was surrounded by acres of fields and there was a huge iron gate at the bottom of a mile long drive way
It was a 3 story stone house ( those sandstone blocks ? i have no idea what it was made from) ..It had a huge ornate staircase in the front entrance and a small narrow staircase in the back.
it had a balcony with a stained glass window in the door...so all in all it was a grand beautiful house..( reported to be haunted thats why we could afford to live there.)
when i was 7 I had a dream I was out on the balcony and I saw something waay out in the field..
It was some gorilla /sasquatch looking thing ( blondish haired though )..just standing there staring at the house
in my dream I'm running through the house trying to tell my family, and no one listens or pays attention.
And everytime I run to a window to check on it..its just a wee bit closer ..just standing there looking.
I'm still having that dream..at least once or twice a year..
So far the monster hasn't made it to the house.

30/10/06 Dream

I'm in a bar with H and her ex-hubby. It's one of those Old Orleans places with dark wood and expensive bar prices and lots of floorspace and not many people. I don't remember what we talked about or even if everyone was happy or sad. I just remember waking up and thinking "oooooooooooo".

I'm not sure what the dream meant but it must have been due to a) goading H on someone's blog the day before and b) visiting an Old Orleans on Sunday.

Literal dream. That's more like it.

Bison?

I'm walking along in a city with Tuffy P. We come upon a fenced off area, with split rail fence and pastureland inside. A lone bison is standing there, about 30 feet away. Tuffy walks ahead of me for some reason and the bison looks at me and charges, leaping the fence, and starts chasing me around cars and poles and other obstacles. It becomes obvious that the bison means me no harm, that this is a game. We make friends. Tuffy walks over and the bison is lying on the ground beside me and I'm scratching its neck. The bison speaks to me telepathically in a cartoon voice, and tells me he is bored to tears, he doesn't have a companion, and he misses Pierre Elliot Trudeau. I wake up.

I See Blog People

Last night's dream progressed as follows:

I had arrived at my Dad's house in South Africa on a visit to find that two blog pals - *(asterisk) and Red were already there waiting for me. This was bizarre and I said as much to them because they are Blog People. We don't know each other beyond what we read on blogger. ANYway... they said that they had come to help me out while I was visiting my dad because they thought it would be tough for me.

I decided to show them round. I took them to my dad's vegetable patch, which in reality is fenced in, but where the patch was, I saw a field filled with black and white two-tone lambs. I turned to them and said, "This isn't right. The fence is gone. This is a dream, isn't it?"

I looked back at the field and one lamb had been killed - neck ripped out - by a wild dog.

I told them we'd best go let my dad know that one of his lambs is dead.

We went indoors and the kitchen was massive. *(asterisk) asked for a cup of tea, and I told him he was more than welcome to help himself since that's the policy if we like our guests - they get get a free pass to the fridge. Red wandered into the pantry and said there was nothing there. I followed her and it was empty.

Just then my dad appeared at the kitchen door and I gave him a great big hug. I forgot all about the lamb and the empty pantry. Then I woke up.

work-related grudge dream

after months and months and months of not remembering my dreams, the first dream i remember is work-related and completely dumb. but there you go, that's what it's like being a neurotic workaholic.

months (MONTHS!) ago i did a cute little animated postcard, which was nixed by the senior directors of my company for being too provocative. in my dream, one of the senior directors find a very very similar postcard online, and comes to tell me about how some idiot organization out there is using the concept that we so cleverly avoided. it turns out the idiot organization is just another branch of our ngo, and that the postcard is very successful. i smile to myself and feel a warm glow of satisfaction.

dumb, dumb, dumb.

10/10/06 Nightmare

I awake breathing hard, from a dream where an unknown cat is trying to swallow my fingers. It chews down hard on my digits, cracking finger bones, blood pouring from puncture wounds. Truly horrible.

Stumbling downstairs, I am confronted by Hunter, waiting to be fed.

*shudder*

Sex me up big daddy!

Here it is ..
in my dream I'm laying in bed..and cute as hell!..( normally i aint all that..but this is a dream!)

and In walks Ron and he starts talking to me with a bad spanish accent..

Hello Ceentheeah..
i am here to geeeve you the ultimate pleasure , that only I.. the Fluffy, can geeeve.

are you ready for my manly luff?

And I woke up laughing..

Did i mention that he had on a thong..? yeah..red
yummy man meat dreams ..

Tattoo you

My dream last night involved my tattooist asking me to tattoo him.

Why he would ask me is a mystery.

He chose a very small design, about an inch high, and wanted it on his upper arm. He had no other tattoos visible, which of course is silly because he is, in reality, fully sleeved up.

However, before he would let me loose he needed to check something. You'd think he want to test my artistic ability first, wouldn't you? But no: he needed to check that there was no gunky matter coming out of my ear piercings.

Yeah, that makes sense.

Falling

It's been a while since I had one of those dreams were you dream you're falling and suddenly wake with a heart thumping jolt. I guess the image below reminded me how bad they are!

4/10/06 Dream

I'm going to have to start writing these damn things properly. The piece of paper by the bed, where I jotted the dream down just says:

With Will @ comedy club. Louise - chips. She talks to Sasha.

Now Will is of course Wichita Willis from The Customers, who I went to college with. As is Louise, an ex-girlfriend from college. Who appears to be talking to my dear partner. I remember it being a weird-ass dream, significant enough to jot down in half-sleep...but I'm really going to need more details.

Irritating dream

I'm trying to dial the phone..
except the phone has gone all weird..numbers are all mixed up, missing some buttons.
and my fingers are too big and i keep messing up and having to start over.
thats it..
me constantly trying to make a call., over and over..
who in the world was i calling?

1/10/06 Dream

I'm in school, for some reason, even though I'm an adult. Sitting next to me is the shockingly pretty sixth-form girl who gets the same bus to work as me most mornings. We're trying to do some difficult tables or sums or something, and it makes us laugh as I'm clearly getting the whole thing wrong. She wrenches the book from me and starts to correct it, as I look round to make sure the teacher isn't watching us. She gets (from somewhere) a wet sponge and wipes it across the written pages of my exercise book, as if this is going to fix the problem.

And then I wake up.

And then I go to sleep again.

And for some reason dream about a cartoon cow which is attached to a milking machine and is sucked of all it's milk, leaving it wizened and skinny, only the next moment to be pumped back full of it's own milk until it is large and bloated like a beach ball with little legs and udders.

And then I wake up properly.

Doesnt take a rocket scientist

..This dream is crazy....I must have left CNN on while I slept.

I'm on a big luxury boat, it's lovely, but ominous..i'm walking around exploring, and I see Kim Jong-il !..I think, this is crazy ..
I walk over to where he is and he looks at his watch..he's wearing a nice watch but it only has half a face....
he looks up and smiles at me ..
I feel scared but i think, we're on a boat what can he do really ? ( its a dream people..why a boat would be safe is beyond me )
He looks at me and smiles
Then slowly lifts a crossbow and takes aim..at me !

Recurring Dream Films

I have two favourite recurring dream films. Well OK, one is a TV thing...but you know what I mean.

Dead Of Night (1945)

Architect Walter Craig, seeking the possibility of some work at a country farmhouse, soon finds himself once again stuck in his recurring nightmare. Dreading the end of the dream that he knows is coming, he must first listen to all the assembled guests' own bizarre tales.

(from imdb)

This is a standard anthology horror film, little stories linked by a framing story - the recurring nightmare. One of the stories is quite famous - it's the one where the ventriloquist dummy comes to life. But the framing story is just excellent and really chilling, as the architect realises he is stuck in the loop of the recurring nightmare and even predicts things that will happen later in the film. Go seek it out.

Hammer House Of Horror: Rude Awakening (1980)

The real estate agent Norman Shenley (Denholm Elliott) hates his old wife Emily Shenley (Pat Heywood) and wants to divorce her to marry his secretary Lolly (Lucy Gutteridge). When a new client wants to sell an old and isolated mansion, Norman begins to have odd nightmares, and he becomes confused between reality and dream. When Norman awakes, a surprise waits for him.

(from imdb)

This really gives me the willies. Denholm Elliot is just awesome, and as his confusion and desperation rises, the whole thing is just frightening in the great way those seventies/eighties horrors do. The cycle of his recurring nightmare goes on and on with similar scenarios, but with people playing different roles each time. Track this down, I think there's a box set DVD somewhere with it in.

Now I look at these two films together, it looks like the older influenced the younger. Or maybe it's just coincidence.

(I have a recurring nightmare I've had since I was around 6. I hardly have it anymore, but I'm not ready to share it yet.)

Work anxiety dream

Although I dream quite a bit, they tend to be very fugitive once I awake. Here is a curious one that stands out in my mind though. This dream has happened a couple times. I dream that I am dreaming but my dream is cut short by my alarm clock. It is time to get up for work. I dream that I think it can't be time to get up for work because I'm too tired. I dream that I sit up in bed and look at my clock to confirm that yes, it is that unhappy time.

Then I actually get up, shut off my alarm (that I have dreamt is ringing), and actually stagger off to the shower..... On both occasions I have showered and have been half dressed before I realize it is something like 2:00 in the morning and I have become way dislocated in time. On both occasions, I'm sure the dream was related to some kind of work anxiety.

This was so odd

I do not dream often , or i just never remember them ..
But last night..
I was staying at some really posh hotel..and i grabbed two towels to go take a shower..
I just wandered all over the hotel looking for a shower..
And it was that really spooky irritating slooooooow mooootion walk.
And yes i was fully clothed in my dream..
Thats it..just me walking all over a hotel looking for a shower..
god

OK - this one's for the books

I have in the past kept dream journals and I have really bizarre dreams. Last night's is up there with the uber-weird.

In the dream I am with a much younger partner (who is not Kate) and we go to a mixed gay/lesbian club called Extreme. Mostly lesbians in the club. I don't like the club, but my unnamed partner is very happy to join in. She makes a play for other women while I am in plain view of her.

My parents as well as my sister and a new boyfriend are also at the club. I go to them and we talk. They want to leave the club as they don't feel comfortable. So I go find my partner and she's with a group of young ladies and is clearly not interested in me. I say: "We're going." She says "Stop being a stromo," (which I took to mean a stroppy homo... no idea...). I respond with, "You and me? We're over." I walk off to find my family.

I ask my sister and her boyfriend to stop by the apartment I share with this partner. I tell them I am leaving her and I am packing up. They take me to the apartment, I walk in and there are these big steal coffins with pipes siphoning blood coming out of them. These tall women in black PVC are overseeing the operation. (Very menacing and very Silent Hill, even though I've only ever seen the trailer for the movie) I tell them I am here for my stuff. They say our bedroom has been turned into an operating theatre - I check and it is - and my stuff's in the kitchen. My sister and I go to the kitchen and I grab the essentials, I just want to leave and don't mind leaving stuff behind because stuff is replaceable. I throw a fit about a bottle of brandy I bought which the partner has drunk most of. As we leave, the partner arrives with a new conquest and demands to know what I am doing.

I wake up.

3/9/06 Dream

I guess since giving up the sauce over the summer, it was inevitable I would have a dream like this...

I'm entertaining at home - some kind of house party. And in the kitchen I pour wine for everyone, and then, on automatic, test one to see how it is. Then I take a tray of glasses of wine back through to the guests.

Pretty boring dream. But I've spent the last few days confused as to whether it really happened, or was a dream. The sensation was extremely vivid. And I've had a feeling of disappointment in myself. That I let myself down. Even though...it only happened in a dream.

(for the record & those who don't already know, the whole giving-up-drinking thing was not a medical, religious, moral or AA based decision. And in truth it would make no difference if I started again...apart from the snoring).

Childhood nightmare

I'm lucky I have rarely had nightmare's however one sticks firmly in my mid form when I was about 6 or 7 years old. It's one of the few times I have actually woken up screaming from a dream to find myself being comforted by someone.

It was set in the next village along from where I grew up, and I was alone, next to this river surrounded by lush pasture. Alone except for two dogs on the opposite bank of the river. Not ordinary dogs but ones which had huge fangs which were dripping drool and saliva everywhere. I shouted out for help. Then I remembered everyone else in the surrounding villages were dead, having caught rabies from these dogs. I have vague memories of the dogs jumping into the water and almost catching up with me as I ran. That's when I woke up, o maybe was woken up ny my mother.

It might explain why I still feel nervous around dogs. I think the dream was a result of those public information films they used to show at the time of people coming in to land on a deserted beach with a dog. The story behind the film being that they had been abroad, and had brought their dog back with them secretly without going into quarantine.

Metal and models

(Note: The boys from metal band Trivium kept popping up throughout this dream at the most inopportune moments, discussing what the best tracks for their forthcoming album would be.)

I have made it to the final five contestants in Britain's Next Top Model, and today's task consists in putting on a full face of make-up in five minutes. As soon as a faceless task-master shouts "Go!", we all head to the pile of make-up products in the corner. When I look around me, I realize that I am the only one who has picked a certain brand. I succumb to peer pressure, return to the make-up pile and choose what everybody else has chosen. I feel very uncomfortable, partly because I know that after this task we'll be asked to remove the make-up and do a close-up beauty shot au naturel. I am concerned that my skin is not up to the scrutiny of the camera.

Just as I am about to start putting my make-up on, the contestant who was voted out in the previous week comes crying into the room. She makes a beeline for me and, still sobbing, she goes on to tell me how unfair it was that she was booted out. I don't know if she implies that I deserved to be the one to go, but I just try to console her and tell her that I myself have no hope of making it to the final two, and that it's been a good experience that will serve us well in the future anyway.

Then, a fellow blogger I have never met in person (but of whom I have seen pictures) pops up. She has amazing teeth. I am hypnotized by them, they are so white. I compliment her on them, but on closer inspection it is not the teeth that are white, but the fabulous clenching inhibitor she is wearing. I am in awe of it: mine is nowhere near as flashy as this. Then I notice it really sticks out at the front, like the lip of that Indian chief who used to hang out with Sting. And I think to myself, "That can't be comfortable."

Gangs and trains

A small group of gangsters is sitting on the sofas and enjoying drinks in a club. A party of young girls (in paper hats) and guys moves from their table to the dancefloor, but in doing so, they cross in front of the gangsters, which the latter take as a personal slight.

They decide to exact their revenge. The two main guys go to the bathroom to weapon up. Now I can see that the leader is French actor Vincent Cassell and I am the other guy. Vincent is looking for the weapons he had stashed in the bathroom a few days before, but he can't find them. However, there are two brass golf clubs hanging on the back of the door, so we arm ourselves with these. We separate.

Now I'm on my own, looking to smash in the head of people who have done nothing to me. I also realize I'm in the corridor of my school in Italy, which runs all around the perimeter of the building, around an internal courtyard. I don't have a beef with anybody, so I dive into another bathroom and splash some water on my face. All the toilets are blocked with small chunks of burned wood, and overflowing.

Next, I'm looking down two train tracks. A train is coming towards me, and I can see a black man on a stretcher as he falls from the train on to the tracks. Fortunately, the stretcher remains upright and the man is not injured (further). However, the stretcher has now become a runaway vehicle on the tracks. Another train approaches; it's on a collision course with the stretcher, but the latter somehow manages to pass underneath the train carriage. Then a man comes out of his car and stops the stretcher.

strange places

well here is a long one, almost epic. very confused.
somewhat nightmarish as it almost involved me going to nottingham.

i am with some friends, we are visiting another friend. it seems the friend we are visiting is the black sheep of the gang, the rogue who is always getting into trouble. he has various letters, newspaper clippings and what not on the walls. they all tell of his misadventures, his rejections, his excuses etc. they make for interesting reading.
somewhere along the line we all decide to go and visit someone in nottingham but first we are going to go somewhere else. we all pile into a car that one of the gang has just gotten. it is no more than a banger, with the seats more like those overly comfy armchairs you have that are all sag. we drive to get something to eat. we park and pile out.
we come back the car is now trapped in a square all the exits from this rather plush posh square are blocked, ours is the only vehcile there.
only there is an escape route if you drive over the pavement.
it seems the group has grown and we all can't fit in the car.
i stay behind they are going to come back with a bigger car.
i am thinkingi i will catch a train to nottingham, i have a slip of paper that tells me it is only £49.
while we were eating i was shown a camera we called it a lomo camera (it wasn't but hey that is dreams for you), i now seem to have the camera. i am using it to take photos. i start wandeirng out of the square and into a desolate run down area of the city, but it is like a ghost town lots of buildings, large and close together, all seemingly still in perfect nick, a few windows missing here and there. no one around. i turn a corner and here is a large empy space (a lot) bordered by two large white buildings. the shadowa are greaat. i set up a tripod. i start taking photos. the area i am in is all wet and muddy. i hear a voice. i turn and see a black man starign out the windon he has a gun in his hands. i put my palms out and shrug. i start to get my tripod and movie. more blackmen are coming out of the building. one of them reminds me of yaphet koto.
i try to run.
they catch up with me.
it turns out that i know one of their friends.
the guns they have in their hands are all toys.
i take some photos and chat to them all.

wake up.

iDream of singing and songs

Is it a cop-out to post a dream I had three weeks ago and that has already been posted on my blog? I so rarely remember my dreams, so I'm going to use this one as my introductory post. And I promise not to cop out again. Sorry. Thanks.

I sometimes have some weird dreams, just like many people do, I suppose, but it's rare that I make any special effort to remember them. And to be honest, I haven't had any worthwhile ones for some time. But the one from this morning (8 August 2006) was funny. I woke up and wrote it down in detail, because I knew it was fading fast. Here it is.


I'm in a classroom, in which people are singing and performing songs one at a time for their peers. Some guy gets up to do "Peggy Sue Got Married" by Buddy Holly... on the clarinet... singing at the same time. It's an interrupted performance at best, and the lyrics are all wrong, so I say, "Dude, let me help you out," and I go up to sing with him. The classroom contains several people who know me (1), and I hear one guy say, "Can you believe the balls on this guy?" (2), meaning me.

So I get to the front of the class, and I pick up the lyric sheet (even though I know it's wrong), and I say, "Okay, give me the intro." He does, and I start singing, keeping half an eye on his lyric sheet. Fortunately I know the lyrics, so I don't have to rely on his "interpretation". (3)

Before long, I turn the page to continue singing, and there are no longer any song words; instead, there is a comic strip (4) set in a jungle. (5) A bunch of guys with beards are fishing from a boat. They catch some big spiky-toothed fish and cook them over a camp fire.

I say to the guy, "Stop, stop, stop. What's going on here? Firstly, the lyrics aren't right, man." And he (he's Dutch) says, "It doesn't matter what words I sing, as long as it sounds right."

"But, dude," I say, "this is a really really really famous song and the words are really really really badly wrong. People will know. And what's with this comic strip? Who are these people?" I look at their faces again; there's not a bespectacled one among them, so clearly it's nothing to do with Buddy Holly.

He points to one of them and says, "That's Tonky" -- I'm perplexed now -- and he points to another and says, "And that's Beckmann," and I'm like ?!?. We get to the end of the comic strip, and it says in the final panel something like "This is the true story of how 'Jungle River Trip' was written." Now everything falls into place. I turn to the guy and I say, "Dude, this is The Monkees, (6) not Buddy Holly," and he replies, "Oh yeah, The Monkees. That's who I meant."


Footnotes
1. People with whom I've never actually shared a class, though.
2. Clearly this is from my most recent Lebanon post.
3. The only bit of his words that I remember is: "Red red rose that's been in almost all the songs", instead of "You recall a girl that's been in nearly every song".
4. In Italy I've been reading almost nothing but comic books. More on that later...
5. Bizarrely, just after typing this bit, I had an e-mail from eBay, saying, "I'm writing to you from the depths of the jungle." Seriously.
6. I have no idea whether The Monkees ever wrote such a song, or went to the jungle, or counted Tonky and Beckmann among their numbers, but I doubt it.

snippets

i seem to dream only in snippets, or more likely that is all i remember.

two recent ones.
i am looking at the most amazing train kit you have ever seen. it is huge, it is amazingly detailed but it is a like a flash gordon meets frtiz lang - does tokyo type cityscape. with the train lines going all over the place and at different heights. you can see people, you can see cars, look through windows into offices etc. the trians whizz by. it is awesome.
but to one end of one of the trcks there is a guy, in unform, i think he is black and bald is crishing the trianlines with his hands, the bits floating down to the ground like polystrene cup pieces. once he has broken a chunk of the line he replaces it with a much cruder bridge type thing. above where the trains will run is a cuddly toy marching band. they look absurdly out of place, so so retro in this gleaming shining future and of course they are not even close to scale.

the second snippet is even more of a fragment. i am climing up some stairs, almost tiptoe like. i can see the landing light on. i know i am going to meet someone. it turns out i am to meet a sexual sensual hattie jaques who appears at the top of the staris in a black flmsey dressing gown, that leaves nothing to the imagination. but my eyes are drawn to her shiny spikey high high heels.

like i say small glmpses of what the dreams were.

Bible Belt dreams

I rarely dream..
But once I was in bed , listening to the radio..and waiting to fall asleep..
the radio was playing some southern preacher, hollering about the end of times..crying and talking about how angels were going to blow the horns and the rapture was gonna take place...
It was very fire and brimstone..and extremely frightening
I was all drowsy and I can remember that I couldnt open my eyes..no matter how hard I tried.
I tried to turn off the radio..but I couldnt see the dials ( cause I couldnt open my eyes)
And I fumbled and twisted..then finally I pulled the cord out of the wall..

The radio show STILL played!!

I HEARD angels singing and blowing trumpets ..

And then I woke up!...thank god it was a dream..
But the radio was still playing ..
the good reverend telling me and all other sinners how we were going to hell.

The missing telly

I kept dreaming that my t.v was stolen in a recurring bizarre dream. In the dream I woke and noticed the telly had gone but then thought I was in a dream and went back to bed thinking I'd wake up and the telly would be there. Every time I woke the telly was still gone and I'd shake my head in disbelief and go back to bed thinking it was a dream. The thing is, it was all one long dream, eventually of course I did wake and the telly was there. Did you get that?

But some git had nicked the milk money!

13/8/06 Dream

Kate is staying in my parents house. I want to find a way of engineering it so that I can have sex with her, in an empty room somewhere. We keep texting but somehow can't find each other. I catch glimpses of her, giving me wry smile before disappearing.

Downstairs, my sister (still alive) is trying to play a trick on me as I sit in my Dad's chair. She is pretending that she could easily spill red wine from a bottle onto me. In mucking around though she actually spills the wine onto my khaki trousers, and I am pissed off and bawl her out over it. She looks on sulkily as my Mum makes me take off the trousers and we can see that the wine has stained through to my leg. With scissors, my Mum starts cutting off strips of flesh from my leg, removing the offending stains. She gets to the strand of main vein at the back of my leg and smiles and says "I'd better not cut that, eh?".

And then I wake up.

11/8/06 Dream

We've decided to go and see the stage version of Chicago, which appears to have Catherine Zeta Jones in it. As we walk into the theatre a man comes up behind me and starts to move my arms and legs for me, walking me straight up onto the stage. I go along with it, realising it's got to be something to do with the show and although I hate the humiliating way some shows use audience members for laughs, I don't want to appear to be a bad sport. I end up having to do a huge dance number with Catherine in front of the audience, but do quite well to my surprise. I get a standing ovation.

Then suddenly I'm on my own and visiting my old school friend Luci who lives in a remote and almost derelict house in the countryside. But instead of looking as I remember her, she looks exactly like...a naked and pregnant Samantha Janus. Also, her face is contorted slightly which makes her look extremely cat-like. We talk as normal though.

Whilst we chat, I look out of the window and see Pauline, a lesbian girl I was at college with, as she chases a stray dog across a farmer's field.

And then I wake up.

4/8/06 Dream

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the worm

a recurring dream

a worm is trying to get out of my body. out of my navel. i always look at it, and i always feel both panicky and completely calm. sometimes it's more like a snake, but most of the times it's just a small thing. it keeps struggling and struggling and never manages to quite get out. my navel keeps it in. this dream comes to me four or five times a year.

last year, i had this dream one last time. one night, after much tossing and turning, the worm finally struggled free. i woke up with a start. i lay there, panting, feeling both scared and happy. the worm had finally gone.

but where did it go? and will it come back?

(this worm is unrelated to the very real worm that did actually come out of my skin one day, although luckily it wasn't my navel, or that would have really freaked me out)

3/7/06 Dream

Something to do with Eskimos...I'm skinning seals and there's blood everywhere...

1/7/06 Dream

After the nightmare (see last post) I went back to sleep...

It's Comic Showcase's Closing Down day, and everything is being packed away into boxes. The walls behind are impossibly white, and I stand and watch as old staff, customers, friends help out. Paul stands in the centre of everything, beaming.

And then I wake up.

1/7/06 Nightmare

I'm out with the family, and for some reason we stop at a service station.

The kids wander off to play, and this gets me agitated. I turn to Sasha and tell her that they shouldn't muck about round with all this dangerous stuff nearby.

When I turn back, I can see Felix playing with a sheet of metal about a foot square that seems to be on fire. I say to her "You see, he's quite literally 'playing with fire'!" and watch as the fire spreads from the metal onto him. I run to him, but by now he's completely consumed by fire. I cover him with my coat and put out the flames, but underneath he's horrifically burnt.

I get out my phone and call 999, telling them to get her as soon as they can, as my son has had a terrible accident.

On the other end, the person says "We're not coming. He's Ginger...and narrow."

And then I wake up.

(fortunately when I woke up he was snuggled right next to me in the big bed, so I could reassure myself by squeezing him as hard as I could)

26/6/06 Dream

I'm at the top of Totnes, by the car park that is outside the Bull Inn. And I am making Rose, the beautiful pregnant Pre-Raphaelite girl who used to work in the stationery shop, cry. I can't remember what I was saying, but she was very upset. Her boyfriend was sitting on the bench nearby holding their child. Yet she is still pregnant. And beautiful. I'm not sure how this is happening as they moved away from the area last month. I continue to be mean to her...in some way.

And then I wake up.

Spring 2006 Dream

(from notes)

Walking through Manhattan after 9/11 with M from work. I cry at the devastation, which is strange as while conscious I'm pretty unsentimental about it. She's American so it affects her more.

Later on we go to a Dan Clowes (creator of Eightball) talk being held nearby.

brighton

i do love brighton. years ago it was one of the few places that i went on holiday with my mum and dad (we were never a close family).
last night i had a dream about it. i was going there because of work, for some stupid reason i had booked into a hotel, realising that i only had enough work for a daytrip i then decied to lose the money i had paid for the hotel and just go back home on the train. due to the machinations of dream logic this became a more expensive proposition than staying the night. the train station was more out of the plains of montana than out of brighton's coastal setting. it was windswept and dreary, the trainline long, straight and desolate.

the worst of it is that as i was having the dream i realised that i had dreamt of this hotel before and that i had stayed there several times before... it seems i have dreamed of a brighton that doesn't exist and i have done it frequently.

3/6/06 Dream

I'm in Totnes and meet an old friend in the street. We get to chatting and he says he has to get his lunch, did I want to come for a sandwich? I agree and we walk to a sandwich van parked nearby, where one of the locals I know is serving customers during the lunchtime rush. We chat and joke about how long I've lived here, and how I'm one of the locals now.

As I wait in line, I can feel that some of my teeth have come out. In fact, most of my crowns (I have many) are now loose in my mouth. I try to suck in and keep my mouth closed, but I hear that squeaking sound that means if I continue to do this it, more teeth with follow. Without saying anything to my friend I walk away, embarrassed and aware that if I were to open my mouth I'd look like a horror film. I decide to walk to the bus stop where I can get a lift to my dentist...but as I walk I can feel more stuff in my mouth, my crowns and bridge appear to have been joined by strange shaped bits of metal and enamel. I use my hands cradled under my chin to try to keep everything, so that it can be stuck back in again by my dentist, but...there's just so much of it. I'm whimpering in distress as I reach the bus stop.

And then I wake up.

of course i have forgotten them

had several dreams over the weekend. which seems only right as it is siggy's 150th this weekend.
one had quasi sexual and religious overtones to it, so naturally i can't remember it. another had me missing a connection somewhere for something.

the one i have most memory of is me opening up a book i had just taken home. was excpect it to be the uncanny x-men omnibus. when i opened it up it turned out to be fantastic four mansions omnibus. much confusion and disappointment ensued. grrr and grrr.

what is odd about the dream is that i did in fact take home the uncanny x-men omnibus (lovely thing) and that there is no such title as fantastic four mansions omnibus.... it seems i now want to own imaginary books.

5/5/06 Dream

I'm standing on an outdoor wooden stage. Next to me is Boris Johnson. He's in some difficulty - his feet have broken through the stage and he's stuck uncomfortably. I gesture to a large crowd of people in the field where the stage is - they're all tabloid journalists. Like a pack of wolves, they're all eager and baying for blood.

"Here he is!" I shout, pointing to Boris.

And then I wake up.

snippets

mostly i have been dreaming about ant and dec being in an S&M movie. say no more.

and being on the bus and being told that i was in trouble because i had entered a differnt zone.

neither were particulary interesting dreams but i thought i would share.

books, basketball and mad mullahs

i can only remember fragments of this dream.
i am out looking for a book. i need this book i have a pressing need for it. i have to have it. (i have no idea what type of book it is or why it is so important...) i am looking all over the place. i am in a big shop that is the main one in the area and i am looking for the book, but it is one of those stores that has a little bit of everything but also appears to be someones front room. (it is a maniac cross between asda, woolies and the local musty charity shop...) i keep looking here and there i can't see the book. i go to ask someone and then i can see that they are taking a copy of the book down from a very high shelf. in order to do it they are using a pair of tongs.
for some reason this offends me and i storm out.
i am in a busy street and i am about to cross the road to look for another shop to look for this book.
i can see a group of people standing on the pavement. they all seemed to be bearded. each of tem appears to have a mouth piercing, but the piercing glows...
as i walk by them one of them says something to me.
i think he is insulting me. i challenge him.
"don't you remember me?" and other such things are said at me, someone who is remarkably like osama bin laden, but wearing an old combat jacket, his piercing glows blue.
i do recognise him. he used to support the same basketball team.
we embrace like long lost buddies and get on with the important things in life and talk about basketball.

exs

i have been having lots of dreams featuring my ex recently. i am not sure why i am dreaming so much about her, it is bad enough i still bear the emotional scars of it all, but to keep having to relive her in my dreams is justs cruel and unusual torture.
i can't remember much about this dream other than the fact me and the ex were naked and were going to get down to doing it, when her son interrupted it all.
i think the reason he interrupted was sort the preulde to an action movie type thing but i can't be sure.


the other dream i had was that i was in an anime that featured lots of fire and caves (oh ok hell) but i was 3d and they were all 2d. most odd.

meals but not on wheels

i am in a resturant with someone from work. we are not out on a work do as i am thinking about how we are going to split the bill - straight down the middle or work out who ate what.
the meal has been very nice.
all the staff are female, and have been exceptional.
we are thinking about going but then we are offered desert. we are tempted. then i notice that a change has come over the waitress. where as before they had been smartly but pimly dressed, now there seems to be an edge of sensuality about how they are dressed. i notice one as she leans over to serve another table, and she is showing a lot of breast. another is showing a lot of leg and her stocking tops are showing.
i am looking at the desert menu. it is all wonderful. big bright colours, obviously all full of e numbers. the deserts are all in wacky shapes and no idea of what they are, but all are tempting.
the waitresses are fliting about, hanging around our table as if we are the most important people in the world. we are enjoying the view.
i want to have desert - partly because it looks so tempting and partly because i want to make this meal last as the eye candy is so scrummy. but i can't work out what is on the menu, the pictures look great but i can't make out what the stuff is.
i ask the waitress, she comes and sits in my lap. whispering in my ear asking me what the problem is.
i ask her what each of the deserts are made up of.
she looks at me oddly, as if to say are you mad or stupid?
she points to the menu, and suddenly i can see that beneath each picture there is a clear description. she gets up in a bit of a huff.
the resturant returns to normal.

wombles

there i am standing outside a shop, not unusual for me. but this is a closed shop and it is an olde worlde style shoppe. i am looking in the windows trying to see what is inside. the little square windows don't seem to be giving much awayy. it is dark inside. in bright paint above the windows are several beautifully crafted signs. these signs in yellow, red and blue proclaim the shop as the best place in the world to buy womble momentos from. even better there have been some signs added on that also tell of the coming of a womble museum.
yet the mystery is that there is nothing of the wombles in view in the shop, still not open.
but a crowd is gathering,
i am suddenly talking to a blonde, she has short hair, a voice like mariella frostrup, wearing jeans and a black t-shirt. she has asked me what do i think of scott. i start to answer and the shop is open! we are stuck in the doorway not actually wanting to go in but now we are hindering the crowd that does want to go in, we battle out of the tide of womble fans. i am a little disappointed as i don't get to see a womble.
we walk, turn a corner and then suddenly we are in a muddy semi dumping ground that also has a babbling brook in it.
i offer the woman a clementine, i warn her that it is sharp and will make her pull faces.
she accepts it.
as she peels it she asks me what i was going on the bus when she asked a question and we all laughed.
i asked her what the question was. she couldn't remember, but that it was on the tip of her tongue.

dream fades and i wake up (sort of).

some of it is related to work. the wombles comes out of the fact i have just gotten a womble cd (indeed and it is well what you expect really) while the clementine was the last thing i are last night and it was sharp and sour.
now if i could find that blonde i would be a happy man,

disturbing dreams

i had one of the most disturbing dreams i have ever had the other day.
it had some very odd sexual stuff at the start (i shan't say what was involved as i appreciate some of you have delicate constitutions). this section was so lewd and depraved that even caligula might have blushed. without missing a beat this transformed into an idylic scene, a tennis court, i was watching children play in a hazy sunlight park with leaves flying all around them. the next thing i know i am fascinated by a bright yellow tennis ball that rolls steadily towards me. scene change. a turkish bath and a buffed up oiled and muscled lemmy of motorhead (or was it triple h of the wwe) is naked and looking scared as a pile of women pounce on him and pin him down. he shouts, stuggles and screams. all goes quiet as john wayne enters - dressd as if he was about to go on the set of the cowboys.
i am sure there was more - but i think i was overwhelmed by that stage.
i gotta stop eating chocolates before i go to sleep.

been having a lot of dreams recently

but in the way of all good things i keep forgetting to write them down.
oh sure i try to remember the important parts so i can tippy tap them on here, but i soon forget.

the one i had recently involved my ex coming to visit me. (now there are a couple of things here i have never gotten over my ex, true a lot of this is a self imposed misery quoient, but it still disturbs me to dream of her. secondly i rarely let people into my flat unless i have to. of course people who have read my blog will know that i am a mucky pup and my flat is a shitpit).

anyway in the dream my ex has come to visit. she is still my ex in the dream, although i still have the strongest of feelings for her. the flat is spot, it is white, it is big it is an mtv crib like place. it has stairs, it has walls that don't reach the ceilings, it has mezzanines, it has ... well everything you want in a white and chrome palace.
i am standing on the balcony looking down at my ex and i can see her in this pristine whiteness of my designer flat.
what i can also see is that the tops of the walls that do not meet the ceilings are getting grubby that there are stains that are beginning to run down the walls, and as i watch i can see that they are spreading more and more.....

strangley many of the dreams i have had recently have involved decay in a household setting.
clearing up my flat has given me nightmares it seems.

Chased Through Camden

Martin (my one-armed co-worker at the Bookshop) and I are in Camden looking round shops. We go to all those record exchange-y type secondhand shops searching for bargains. After a while, we decide to leave and go to find his car which, for some reason, he has parked on top of a flat roofed skyscraper. On the way to the building we are chased by some nasty looking yobs, who shout and imply that they will kill us. As I run through the deserted (?) London streets I spy a police car and as I run towards it the car pulls away, leaving me chasing futilely after...and then I wake up.

(This whole dream no doubt came about as, as I went to sleep, I had to remember to ask Martin for a lift to stocktake the following day...)

Fragments Of This Month...

This month has been such a rollercoaster so far, and so busy that my dreams have been all disjointed and incomplete. As usual I've jotted down bits and pieces, but within this there is a definite trend materialising - me in pretend things:

• I am one of the characters in Lost. I'm on the beach helping with the raft near the end of season one.

• I am in V For Vendetta. I'm not any of the main characters, just around and watching.

In addition to this I keep having boring work dreams (just like Pat has) where I'm...ordering books from a HarperCollins rep, or unpacking boxes. Very worrying stuff.

The only rude dream I have had in over two months was where I was about to have sex with my old ex L and I put my hand up her skirt...and continue until my arm is threaded through her clothes and my hand is peeping out of the neck of her top. And then I wake up.

Even worse is I'm not concerned about the nature of any of these dreams.