Dreams

2008-05-09T08:48:00.000-07:00

Dream 76: Double Trouble and A Shelter for Deaf Lesbians
P and I were at a gig. There was no stage but the edge of a dance floor. There was microphone off to the left then a couple of screens promoting the gig then a couple more mics on the right. I was about to go off and get changed when P suddenly went up to the mic on the left and started the gig. He did some of his usual set, leaving out the bits where I come in. He was getting some good laughs but part of the audience weren't going along with it. He then tried to adapt a routine to the venue/place. I could see what he should have done/said, but he got it all wrong and it didn't make any sense. Lots of the audience still laughed and P was pleased with himself, but a section of the audience shouted out, that doesn't make sense and not funny. P finished and went behind the screen. I went to follow him but he went over to the mics on the right and started saying something else to finish off. I turned to go back to my seat as I didn't want to get in the way of 'the show'. Then he finished again so I chased him back behind the screen. I was about to get changed, we're supposed to be a double act, I said, why didn't you wait for me? But he just shrugged. I told him that part of it didn't make sense but P just said he'd enjoyed himself. He was pleased that the reaction had been good (ignoring the dissent from one section of the audience). So I said well fine, you can do it yourself from now on and walked off. As I walked off I was upset, but thought I can do some sketches with other people and do more acting etc now....
(I told P this dream and he said he never do that and that he loved being a double act - just in case anyone was worried!).
I was in a home full of women. I was assigned to a bed. It was a very crowded room, I met one of the woman close by and we got on very well. Many of the women were deaf. Next day I was due to have a kind of marriage ceremony with this woman. She was attractive and fun and we seemed well suited. But something happened right before the ceremony and she was taken away. An older woman stepped forward into the middle of a circle which had formed. I'd seen her before and I liked her but I didn't fancy her. She was offering herself and I didn't want to leave her in the lurch in front of everyone. I think if you didn't have a partner you were ostracised. I sensed she'd been rejected before. I stepped into the circle and gave her a hug. So we would be married at some point. I was disappointed. I went into the bedroom area and saw that amongst what I thought were single beds there were double beds. Now I was to share the older woman's bed. I thought I don't mind sharing the bed, but I don't want anything physical with her. I noticed that she was lying on another bed with a baby in her arms (someone else's baby). She went under the covers and was silently crying. I went under with her and held the woman and baby in my arms, we all fell asleep.
I woke up the next day (in the dream) to find we were in a different shelter. I was officially the older woman's partner and everyone was very deaf. I had to pretend I was deaf as well. I was aware that I mustn't react to sound and only seem to be able to hear when people were in front of me ie lip reading. I kept trying to remember if I had kept up the act earlier or not. It was my partner's birthday and she wanted a certain dish for dinner. There was a computer where you selected what you wanted for each meal from the menu. She wanted porridge oats and jam. I said I think that's a breakfast dish, but then I found it for dinner and changed her order. I scrolled through trying to find something I could eat. I was annoyed because I had food at the other home and I wondered if they'd brought it over. There was very little on the menu for me.
We were due for a music session, it was a special therapy for the deaf to feel the rhythm and learn an instrument by rote/sense. I realised I had left my flute on a sideboard at the other house although someone told me they were bringing it over. Again I had to remember to respond only when I could see someone speaking to me. Then I was taken to get some clothes, mine had gone missing. There were lots of items that were unsuitable or didn't fit me, but then I found some loose, colourful 'hippie' style pants and I started to try them on. I was watching to see if they were trying to catch me out for not being deaf. I wasn't sure if I could keep it up and I wasn't that happy with my partner. She was nice and kind, but we didn't have a connection and I felt doomed to a mediocre existence.

2008-05-09T08:03:00.000-07:00

Dream 75: Bloody Thirsty Monsters
I had this dream several days ago, it was extremely graphic, highly detailed and visually explicit. The dream opened with P in a street. He'd been driving but had crashed into several cars and shopfronts and left a trail of carnage down the road. Car doors hanging off, bikes strewn, debris all around. He had been completely oblivious and was amazed when he turned around and saw the devastation behind. I was on the opposite side of the street trying to catch up with him. I shouted across 'What happened?' but he didn't seem to know. Then I was an alien. We were very blood thirsty and continued down the street hacking into innocent people and killing or maiming them. It was supposed to be to get blood and/or flesh but I didn't see anyone actually drinking blood or eating flesh! I began to realise that this was wrong. We couldn't go around like this and would have to find an alternative way of getting food. When we attacked someone, we had a choice of whether to convert them into one of us or leave them to die. There were a few people who were on the point of turning into one of us, but I decided it would be kinder and more manageable if they didn't. I set fire to some of the bodies (the standard method apparently). The body elongated, expended all its fluids in a steamy gush and shrivelled into a brown dried up mess. Like a large dead lizard which has dried out in the sun.
Inside I felt I was an amphibian of some sort but also vampire-ish. Every now and then my insides would gurgle and shift as if uncomfortable in a human body and there was a constant threat that I would go back to my normal form. I was trying to stop the others from indiscriminate killing and to find a way to work with the people on earth. I had just stopped a particularly blood thirsty attempt and was holding a young girl on the floor. The Father came and stood over me with a huge kitchen knife. He brought it down towards my throat and held it just to my right. I thought, this is a dream he won't cut me, or I'll wake up. But he very slowly brought the knife against the side of my throat. I could feel it very intensely. Then he proceeded to cut through my neck. It went quite slowly, but the knife was sharp. I could feel it going through the flesh, it was deep into my neck. It was quite odd, I felt a momentary sensation of shock and panic and then as it was cutting through I wondered how it looked and whether any blood was showing yet, there was no artery burst. Then I realised that he couldn't kill me this way, we were very hard to kill, but at least it would make him feel better that he was defending his daughter, so I let him go right across my throat.
Sometime later I was posing as a young man in rooms at Cambridge University. Many of us had almost assimulated into human life. We were having sessions with a Don who was trying to educate us in literature. There were three of us who had just handed in an essay each. The Don commented that although technically correct, we had not put any soul, emotion or opinion into the essay. He was trying to get us to be passionate about our subject, but not being human we would not be capable of such emotions. I had tried to leave clues that we were in fact aliens. I hoped the Don would be intelligent enough to find us out. I wanted to let him know that the only way to kill us was with a special silver sword which I was going to leave somewhere strategic. I realised that although some of us were civilised there were still too many killing and terrorising people and I wanted to help them to get rid of us.

2008-04-20T09:01:00.000-07:00

Dream 74: Show reel
My friend KB wanted to show me what she was going to put on a show reel. I went to her house to watch a rehearsal. It was in a room that was a large vestibule between the other rooms. It had a raised area that was like a stage with a step up all around a kind of large loop shape. I remember thinking how ideal it was for putting on a performance, although there was very little space for a seating area. I wondered why the room was not used as a lounge area but then there was another room which was the lounge. So KB started preparing for her role. She was dressed as the character but looked very much like she does in real life only with darker hair.
She started to perform the part. It was going well but then on a screen to the side was a film version that she'd made. In the film she had blond hair which was shaved short in the middle from the forehead to part way back. Then the sides and back of the head were long thick locks pulled into a loose pony tail. She was heavily made up complete with false beauty spot and had long fancy painted nails. She was absolutely the part and relishing playing the character. I kept looking at the film and trying see if it was really KB. Even the shape of her face had changed, but then I'd catch expressions that were hers. It was very mesmerising and I was switching back and forth between her on stage rehearsing and the film and trying to workout how she could recreate the film in 'real life'.

2008-04-18T06:35:00.000-07:00

Dream 73: Bits and Pieces.....
I know, I know it's been ages. The few loyal readers I had have probably abandoned me now... Been so busy and the few dreams I remember have been a real hotch potch. Here are a few samples....
I was a heroin addict in one dream but it was a very odd addiction because I didn't actually use any heroin but I behaved like one, or at least lived an on-the-edge kind of lifestyle with some other addicts.
I moved back with my first proper boyfriend CH. It was a nightmare. In fact I've had this dream on and off over the years, maybe every two or three years. Just when I think I'm happy with my partner/husband etc I meet up with C and we end up moving back. I feel so terrible in the dream, like my life has been crushed and there's a sense of foreboding and failure, but it also seems inevitable that I'll be stuck with him for the rest of my life. I was so relieved when I woke up and realised I was still with my beloved P!
I found some bones. They were human but were in odd shapes, squares and rectangles and so forth. The were intricately carved like fine ivory and were beautiful. When I came across them I thought, ah at last I've found my bones. I was going to examine them to find out what I was really like. I was quite pleased they looked so artistic.
I was lying in the street perpendicular to the pavement, my feet in the gutter my head into the road, my arms out at shoulder height in a cross shape. I was in a deep sleep, well more like a drunken stupor. I'd apparently been out the night before and then crashed straight back into the road and fallen into a dead sleep. When I woke I rose onto my feet with by body completely straight as if I was pulled up erect. It didn't take any effort at all and I was ready to go to work. The people around me had been tutting and commenting on my behaviour and were amazed when I got up and appeared to have no ill effects and in fact was more alert and ready than they were.
There were some more odd bits but I've lost them now. Will try to keep up a more regular input if you're interested.. or even if you're not!

2008-03-11T03:03:00.001-07:00

Dream 72: Stool Racing, Carrots and Hairy Armpits
Just a few snippets to be going along with... I'd been in some sort of show or film and I was talking to JS (real life colleague) about his forthcoming gigs. He was due to do some big projects with well known people and I was wondering who his agent was. We were travelling along some country roads riddled with pot holes and puddles and trying to figure out the best way home. There was a narrow country lane off to the side. Colin Firth showed up with some wooden stools with wheels on the bottom. We jumped on and set off down the lane at a fast rate trying to avoid the major puddles and chatting happily all the way.
Next dream I was living in a commune it was very chaotic with rooms every which way and clothes draped and strewn on every surface. It was war time and we had to make do and mend, hence the large variety of clothing. It was more like a kids dressing up box with colourful garments totally inappropriate to daily life. There was a man in the commune with dirty blonde hair and a worn face. He felt very sinister although outwardly seemed welcoming, laid back and cool in a hippie way. I knew he wanted to kill me. I had taken over his room and there had been a large sack of carrots which had clothes on top and mixed in with the carrots. I'd sorted them out and taken the carrots to the kitchen. The man kept hovering around wherever I was, so I started trying to avoid him and to disguise my look by dressing in very different stuff. I then started watching him secretly. I knew there was going to be a murder that he would be the one to commit it. I saw a tall slim girl dressed in black; hat, short jacket slightly fluffy and tight pants like thick tights and little pointy boots. She looked very cool and the man was talking to her. I suddenly felt that she might be the victim because he didn't know where I was and she was wearing black. I went to my room and he showed up asking about his carrots. The girl and a couple of people we standing nearby. I was pretending to casually sort through more clothes and he was smiling as if being friendly. I answered very lightly that I'd put them in the kitchen as I thought that's where they belonged. Everyone laughed as if it were a joke but the man's eye's were boring into me with hatred and malice.
My Mother was describing how in WW2 they had only one uniform and very little time or amenities for washing either themselves or their clothes. She said that instead two or three times a day they would just put deodorant on. Then there was an extreme close up of a big dark very hairy armpit being lavishly covered with a powerful roll on deodorant.

2008-02-08T06:32:00.000-08:00

Dream 71: Killing Cats and Opening Night
Before I relate these latest dreams, just to say I’ve been having quite a few travel dreams (a very recurrent theme of mine) usually trains and aeroplanes/airports where I’m thwarted and sent hither and thither. But they become blurred and distorted on waking and I can’t capture them. Also had a few odd dreams about playing different kinds of games or doing complicated tests but again I haven’t been able to piece them together when I wake up. We have moved bedrooms recently which seems to have slightly affected my dreaming and my ability to recall them, plus the usual problem of disturbed sleep, when you’re jolted awake suddenly your dreams tend to disappear completely!
So, I had several dreams last night these are the two that remain with me. In the first an aunt had died and we went to her cottage. She had a lot of cats and we had to put them down. They were beautiful cats all different varieties but well kept, sleek lithe bodies and healthy coats. They were also very friendly and trusting. I didn’t understand why we had to kill them, I kept thinking of alternatives but for some reason we could do nothing else but destroy these lovely animals. Under instruction I prepared a solution. It was white gooey stuff in a plastic tube which we would use to pump the stuff into the cats. It was like the sealant you use on windows or similar and the tool was also like you would get in a hardware shop. We had to prepare the goo then take each cat and pump some into their mouths. The cats were so trusting and pliant they let us. In fact more cats kept coming to us for the ‘treatment’. Then the my ex housemate from the 1980’s, S, was in the kitchen and when the cats were falling alseep from the goo they’d been given she gently took them and put them into a large frying pan. The cats were curled up as if asleep and S made them fit exactly, one at a time, into the pan which was very slowly heated for a few minutes then the cats were put in a pile together. It was meant to be the most humane way to put them down and they did look peaceful, but not all of them died at once so S had to keep taking them back to the frying pan. It was all very calm but I felt so awful inside.
In the next dream it was the opening night of a show I was in. It was a big theatre and I had a reasonable part but was not one of the main cast. We were doing various back stage preparations and last minute directions were be shouted and reiterated. It seemed to be the first time we had full costumes as there was a lot adjusting and complaining and people running about with bits of flapping material.
Then there was a big fanfare, the show was about to start. I had in my minds eye my main scene which was later in the play, but I actually didn’t know much about the rest of the show. A small group of us were ushered through some corridors and shown with a flourish into the back of the auditorium just as the show started. I was quite excited as I was going to get to see what was going on. It was also part of the spectacle of opening night that some of the cast was in the audience and people were turning to look at us. The show commenced. It was a depicting a film shoot. There was a small crew, cameraman, focus puller, director, AD, boom operator and sound guy. They were crouching around a spot and fussing as if to prepare the shot for a big star. There was dialogue the gist of which was that whomever it was was late, but that they had to be ready. I wondered how on earth this fitted together with the scene I was in. The next scene was to change to be a stage show and I wondered if the play was about an actor. I started to make up a story myself. A sort of day in the life where a well known actor is supposed to film a commercial or something during the day then go to his play in the eveing where he’s doing a fairly long running season. However he’s stuck in a terrible traffic jam in a violent storm. A bridge ahead has collapsed and other storm related calamities occur on the film set, at the theatre and around him on the road. He manages to avoid all the disasters, but ends up helping to save people around him, even though initially he stays in his limo making calls about how his day has been totally mucked up. I realise this had nothing to do with the play I’m in but I still can’t figure out how my scene fits in either.

2008-01-22T07:09:00.000-08:00

Dream 70: Back to School and KT Tunstall
Had a dream last week where I was back at school, but still my own age. I’ve had similar dreams before, but this was different in that when I was semi-awake I thought it was true.
I was going to classes and unlike previous dreams I had done my ‘O’ levels or equivalent and was just about to do my ‘A’ levels and would be leaving school in a few weeks. The other students were all 17 or 18 and I was trying not to draw attention to the fact that I was in my 40’s! As I was waking up, my real brain starting saying things like, but I can’t be at school at this age, then answering itself by saying, but you’ll be leaving in a few weeks, just hang on and then you can get back to normal. It was as if I had to complete the school exams before I could get back to what I was doing before. But I still couldn’t work out why no one thought it was odd that I was in an actual school with teenagers, when I should have gone to a college or something at my age. It was very real and took me a few moments for my mind to come back to real reality and confirm to itself that I was NOT actually going to school at this stage of my life!
Last night I was dreaming about being in a home where my Granny (Dodo) was living (my Granny died many years ago). She had gone away on holiday and I was waiting for her to come back. I knew where her room was but I couldn't get in. I went into the other rooms such as the lounge and the dining areas. It was like a very high class hotel. I was pleased that Dodo had such a nice place to live. P and I were getting ready to play some music. We had set up the PA, but I needed to change. I was trying to get into Dodo's rooms but couldn't. I tried a few other rooms, I was going to sneak into an unoccupied one but there were too many staff so I kept wandering around with the clothes draped over my arms.
Then P and I were in the street. We went into a shop entrance and we looking at the window display. There was some music playing and we were watching something (don't remember what). KT Tunstall was next to us and she started singing along. It was one of her own songs and I started to recognise it as one which had been played on TV in a big series. She was getting to the chorus and we both started to sway at the same time with out shoulders touching. I told her that we had been at the Outsider Festival - she had played there. She nodded. Then I said that we'd been trying to do comedy in one of the big tents when she started her set. I explained that we were entertainers. I then tried to tell her that her song had been featured in the TV show. But she kept going on about a film in which her music as to be used. I had the feeling she didn't actually know about the TV show and she may be due some payment. But I couldn't get my point across - we just kept talking at crossed purposes.

2008-01-07T06:12:00.000-08:00

Dream 69: Spiritual Matters and Hippies
Had this dream a few days ago - problems getting online... These are parts of a very long dream that meandered from one story to another. I was in an open air car park which looked to be somewhere in the US. I had just completed something or other and I was coming back to my car with great success, people whooping and cheering. There were three or four young men in the front of a dark modern van. They were a famous group who were watching me. I took my track pants off but had no knickers on underneath. I had a long T-Shirt on which I thought covered my bits, but the group in the van shook their heads and indicated I should put my track pants back on. We were laughing about it. I looked across the parking lot and saw the group on a huge billboard. They were doing their trade-mark signature which was having their backs to the camera, turning their faces back to look back over their shoulder, while bending over as if to give us a mooney. But instead of a full mooney they just showed the top of their cracks in a builder's bum style. They had similar track pants to mine (plain black) so when I was putting mine back on, I did a builder's bum crack moon at them. They loved it!
Then I was in a meditation place in some mountainous region. It was a cross between a museum and a retreat. We were on a tour, but also participating at times. In one large room there was to be a meditation session. I was with J and she was whispering what various things meant and what to do next. The session started off quiet and reflective as one would expect, but then a women leapt up and started flinging her arms around and singing. The rest of the room mimicked her. They were dancing around singing and some were chanting, others looked confused. It was the loudest most chaotic meditation I'd ever seen. J was trying to explain it to me while I looked into the face of the lead women. She was wearing pastel orangey-pinky flowing garments and she looked ecstatic. I thought it was all too hyped for my liking.
We walked on into some small rooms which had ancient artifacts and shrine-like displays. There was some writing on small pieces of stone and slate. They looked like hieroglyphics but as you read them they changed to letters and words, but not ones I recognised. J started to read from them quietly. It was very impressive. We went into another room and I said I didn't know she could read Sanskrit. She told me she done a retreat some years ago with a guru who guided her. She did not need to learn, because no one can teach it, you either have the gift to read or you don't. But the guru had seen the gift in her and she was able to do it. J said the guru had been very impressed with her. We then went into another room which turned out to be a gift shop, in fact a series of gift shop rooms which contained not just things to buy but also interspersed with museum artifacts so you had to be careful not to touch certain items and displays. J had disappeared by this time. It was very colourful, lots of pastel shades and nice new age style gifts, clothing, crystals etc. Some of the stuff was quite tasteful and appealing, I picked up a couple of bits I thought I might buy. Suddenly there was a commotion. A older man who looked like a hippie from long gone days, long lanky hair, flowing orange sarong and a black slogan T-shirt, had opened up a sacred object. It was an elaborate scent burner. It had cages or baskets in it, but it was centuries old and not meant to touched. But the hippie bloke acted like he had one at home and used it all the time. He was saying he was just trying to improve the atmosphere and light some scents, he had some with him. He couldn't see what all the fuss was about, people getting carried away with possessions, he was just trying to improve the vibe of the room. Meanwhile the shop assistants were shouting and talking about getting the police and so on.
I walked to another room. I was sort of on the hippie's side. They were over reacting. All they had to say was please don't touch that it's fragile and he would have respected that. But they were berating him and threatening all sorts of legal action which seemed unnecessary to me. I then came across another ancient artifact. It was a sort of doll-like figure in a complicated structure like an elongated long square cube which was suspended between four sticks. I dismantled the structure, took out the doll and wrapped something around it. It had the feeling of being something like dope, slightly illegal but not serious. It was meant to be a sign for the hippie bloke, he would see it and know there was support for him. He may even take the doll as well - it wasn't very clear. I'd almost finished when someone walked up to see what I was doing. I just pretended to be admiring it, turning it so I could see. Luckily I'd just managed to get the doll back so the wrapped stuff didn't show and they were non the wiser. I walked nonchalantly away. There was still a commotion around the hippie bloke. So I decided to walk out without paying for my stuff. I never intended to, but I thought it would serve them right for being so horrible. They were supposed to be promoting peace, love, spiritual well being and yet they were being outrageously horrible to the hippie. I was about to pick up another item to steal just to spite them, but then decided against it because I really wanted the two or three items I'd picked and that was all.

2007-12-22T08:42:00.001-08:00

Dream 68: Peeing in Public
I was playing tennis at some courts I've played at before in dreamworld (they are not ones I know in the real world). I'd been playing for a while when they asked me to stand in on a match with a visiting team. I really needed a pee but the amenities were miles away and there wasn't much time. There was a sandy bank nearby and I popped down about halfway and squatted. This was quite a standard thing to do as far as I remembered, and I just thought my pee would be absorbed into the sand.
I was squatting and started to pee, but it went on and on and on, in torrents. Soon there was a channel carved into the sandy bank and my pee was flowing freely and fast down the slope. It reached the bottom and formed a little ravine then ran off to the left and across a footpath where people were walking. And still I was peeing. It was gushing out and now the opposing team were arriving and coming in up towards the sandy bank. People were looking at me. The people on the path looked up to see where the flow was coming from, but I couldn't stop. Eventually the flow eased and one of our team came over and said kindly, 'Um the toilets are just up there.' I'd got the courts mixed up! There were some courts where the toilets were miles away but at these ones they were just on the other side of the fencing. Well I felt very embarrassed!

2007-12-19T08:02:00.000-08:00

Dream 67: Billy and I
Many apologies to the two or three people who read this blog! But I've been busy and ill and my dreams have been flitting off into the ether and leaving no footprint (carbon or otherwise). Hopefully things will settle down and I'll be able to recall my dream world again soon. In the meantime here's a little bit from last night.
I was at a Billy Connolly gig. I was sitting off to the right in quite a small venue. I was slumped on a chair with my duvet covering me (the cover was the same as in real life). Billy was doing his thing and walking around quite a lot. I knew he would pick on me and I was bracing myself. He did come over and had a chuckle and said 'What's wrong with you?' I told him I was cold and he laughed a bit but did not pick on me and was nice about it.
Later I was in a bar/social club made completely from timber. We were playing a game with a hockey ball and little round disks which you held in your hand (similar to the game on a table where you shunt a disk back and forth and try and score a goal - don't know what it's called). It was a complicated game but no one was playing consistently or enthusiastically. The ball would be shot back and forth and then we'd stop. Someone would retrieve it and then a few more shots before we stopped again. Billy came in just as I had to retrieve the ball from under a platform behind a partition wall. It was as if it were under some one's bed but also like under a house and there was all sorts of debris and dust.
Billy was hanging around chatting, I didn't want to impose as if I knew him, but he included me in the conversation and we started chatting as if we were friends. Then I jumped up and showed him my tattoo - the gecko/lizard and then the foot prints. I said I thought he might be interested as he's been getting more and more tattoos himself. We compared feet, he had garlands of flowers on his. Then I showed him our wedding rings and explained that P had enough trouble having that done and he didn't want any more. I had another three tattoos but I thought that was enough now. It felt easy and comfortable as if we'd been friends for a long time.

2007-11-21T07:23:00.000-08:00

Dream 66: Firemen and Picnics
Still having trouble holding onto my dreams (usually from interruptions!). These are two snippets from the other night.
P and I were training to become firemen. We'd both gone through the initial basic training and were in the station becoming familiar with the layout. Then P was taken off with the men for further in-depth training. The women were not allowed to do this training as we were not permitted to become full firemen. We were only allowed to work in the station itself and do admin and put out a fire if it was actually in the station - what were the chances of that! I was very annoyed. I tried to argue that I would make a better fireman than P. I was fitter, younger, more agile, not afraid of heights or climbing ladders and in fact had climbing experience. But they wouldn't listen. Every so often I would catch a glimpse of P doing some training. He seemed to be enjoying the bonding with the other men, but he wasn't much good at the tasks and was very uncoordinated. I continued quietly stewing.
Then I was taking part in a camping holiday. I was both an adult and a teenager at the same time. I set up my tent and had quite a lot of accoutrements; bits of equipment and little comforts learnt from many years of outdoor adventuring. There were leaders who kept bossing us about and telling us what to do and when to be at certain places. I was getting very sick of them and I didn't think they knew all that much about outdoor activities. Later I was escaping the teams by going for an illicit picnic. There was a man with me and we tried to find a suitable spot. He wanted to stop at the corner of a field - more like a dry vineyard, the ground was very dry and the grass was faded yellow and dying from lack of water. There was a dusty track which went off past the corner and up towards the homestead and a few trees where we could sit in the shade and hopefully be out of sight. Just as we stopped and put the basket down a woman came hurrying out of the homestead to tell us it was private property. But I knew the place and was going to argue that it was ok for us to be there.
Next I was back at the camp. We had to pack up and move out in a hurry. They hadn't warned us beforehand and most of the others were packed. I was trying to gather up all my bits and pieces. I needed to pack them carefully in a certain way otherwise they wouldn't fit. But I was being hassled by the leaders and people were trying to help me so I was missing things and I couldn't keep track of where things were going. I was flustered and annoyed and being hurried and I knew that some of my things would be lost.

2007-11-11T08:35:00.000-08:00

Dream 65: Secret Service
I enjoyed this dream immensely, although much of it has been lost. The gist of it was that I was a highly skilled secret service agent. I worked for several agencies though, sort of freelance and I had bands of men and women in different communities all over the world. I was a bit like a superhero and I'd go from place to place fixing this and that, using my contacts, leading groups to overthrow the baddies and to meddle in the best possible way in international politics.
It was very swashbuckling. I was able to leap from buildings, up and down stairwells, walls, fly planes, helicopters and other devices and speak numerous languages. The groups which were my loyal supporters/workers in each place varied a great deal so that some were like pirate or Romany groups and others were corporate, IT experts or other spies. I had several close escapes where I had to perform super human feats and protect or rescue my group or some VIP. The storyline was quite clear when I was dreaming it, but now it's a jumble of leaps and flights and daring do. But it was fun!

2007-11-11T08:16:00.000-08:00

Dream 64: Ich Liebe Dich
Been hard to hang onto any dreams for a while now, I had this one the other night, I wrote some notes and now I can't understand some of my them, but here goes...
I was in a class studying old films/videos. I had a limp which became gradually worse and I ended up in a wheelchair. The other people in the class were helping me although I felt I needed to do more on my own. Later I got out of the wheelchair and found I could walk again with no limp at all. I was very pleased but when I went to the class they all snubbed and jeered at me. They thought I'd been doing it to trick them, but I hadn't. I felt upset and angry that they would think I was the sort of person to do that. I was wearing leather pants and I had to go to the loo, before I'd had help and I wouldn't have been able to wear my leather pants. When I went to the loo I had enormous pants on and I couldn't figure out where they started and ended and I didn't manage to go.
Then I was in a house with extremely elaborate, ornately decorated rooms. I was playing a violin which was more like a steel banjo, but I was playing it as if it were a violin. There were some texts which we had to translate. There was something to do with a bal and a ball and I was arguing with someone about which it was and what it meant. We were split into groups and had to find a translation for I love you, but the client writings didn't match up. It was very confusing as we argued over words. Then we were given very large photos and we had to guess which client they belonged to and work out the meaning. I matched a photo which was Ich Liebe Dich, but no one believed me. I knew I was right as it was the only meaning possible.

2007-10-23T04:40:00.000-07:00

Dream 63: Manipulating Time
In this dream I had either developed or learnt a method of going back in time. It was something to do with drawing lines around a certain scene and then stepping into that scene and going over it again. The rules meant that you could only go back to personal scenes and for a short section of time. You could revisit a time when you said or did the wrong thing and put it right, make it better. The drawback was that whatever you altered wouldn't be allowed to affect your future/current life to any great extent. It couldn't change the course of history so to speak and make great changes, like you suddenly became a different person or gained fame and fortune if you didn't have it. But you could change small things, personal moments, make something a little better, or say the right thing instead of the wrong thing to make someone else's life a little better.
I had a few trial runs in some scenes. The trick was to put the lines in the right place within the moment in time, so you arrived at the best moment to make the change. I had to do one scene a few times to find the right place to make the best changes, but it worked out in the end. It was like editing a script whilst playing the out the scenario in real time. The other people didn't realise so you would try to steer the scene in a certain way yourself - didn't always work the first time! Non of the changes affected the course of my life, except to make me and those involved a little happier; take back things said in the heat of the moment, or explain something that was misunderstood. Small changes which had enormous affect on our well being. Quite a nice device really......

2007-10-18T07:46:00.000-07:00

Dream 62: Mere Glimpses
Apologies dear reader(s)... I have been having disturbed and disrupted sleep for some time now and although I'm aware of dreaming, I haven't been able to hang on to any of them. This is because of being woken by a certain person making certain noises at night... when I wake with a jolt I just lose everything!
All I can recall from the last couple of weeks are a couple of images. One was of someone holding a toddler and I was going to have to take the child and tell it I was the father. I remember thinking in the dream that although I was me and a female, somehow I was this child's father and I had to take responsibility and also telling the child at this time was crucial. I don't know what the sex the child was. I can see him/her in my mind's eye, light blond hair, dressed in a blue jacket, but I don't know whether it was my daughter or son.
Another little snippet which has remained was that I had invented or was in the process of founding a new religion. It wasn't a religion where you worship a deity, it was more a philosophical approach to life and those around you. I was trying to explain the difference to a group of people. I think I was interviewed by the press at one point. I was being revered by various groups, but that was really the antithesis of the idea. The press were trying to have a go at me for having followers of what was a non religion and I was arguing very rationally pointing out what I really meant and that the followers had rather missed the point.

2007-09-25T06:44:00.000-07:00

Dream 61: Becoming a Witch
I am in my old home, where I grew up (pretty close to real life). I'm a teenager. At the turning of the stairs (larger than in real life) on the landing, someone has laid out a small round table with several candles and other lights. When you look from above you can see circle and triangle patterns formed by the lights. The lights are just there, glowing, they aren't part of anything like a lamp or candle they are just little round glowing spots of light. It's night time and the space has a magical, mystical feel to it. I am on the stairs looking at the spectacle in wonder. My Mum (nothing like the real life one) tries to dismiss it as being some everyday sort of nonsense and carries on with the laundry (although I get the feeling she is keeping a close eye on me and the display). Then my Gran shows up (also not like the real one). She has brought along two broomsticks. The brush part is pretty sparse and with only a few twigs, although these are quite thick and bound by some natural material like bark. She jumps on one and flies about the upstairs landing and over the banisters. She laughs a bit and tells me to try the other one. I pick up the broomstick and immediately know what to do. Soon I'm flying around upstairs too. 'Thought so' said my Gran to my Mother who has been secretly watching. 'You're Mum's one too but she pretends she isn't' says Gran, 'but we're all witches my dear.' I'm thrilled about this and I go back to study the lights which seem to make more sense. Unfortunately I wake around this point. Later I had another travel dream where P and I were getting in a terrible mix up with a lot of trains, but I can't recall most of it now.

2007-09-24T05:43:00.001-07:00

Dream 60: Flying in the Past
I was in a WW2 aircraft. We were flying on a mission when something peculiar happened and everything folded and collapsed in on itself so all that was left was a bit of oddly patterned material. There was an Italian feel to it but I can't say what or why exactly. My sleep was interrupted a few times last night so it may have been to do with that.
Then I'm back in another plane, still in the 1940's. The war is still going on, but it seems to be near the end and we are flying over crowds of people who are out on the street. They are not celebrating yet, but it feels imminent. We are doing some sort of display flying. We do some elaborate manoeuvres and then leap from the plane. We don't have parachutes but make patterns and strange movements which slow our progress. Then the plane flies in front of us and hovers just above the ground. It drops a wide rope ladder/net and we land on it and climb down to the ground. The crowd have been watching in awe, but then just go about their business. Then I'm back on the plane. The ladder/net is hanging down and I go onto it. We are preparing more manoeuvres, but there is an enemy now on board. The controls of the plane are just above me at the top of the rope ladder, but the enemy is standing on the platform to the left of the controls. As I'm hanging onto the ladder and trying to control the plane I can't look up properly to see him/her. I can just see the body but not right up to see the head. They are wearing purple clothes, in fact he/she is dressed in my purple fleece jacket (from real life). I am confused since the dress is modern but we're meant to be in the 1940's. Also I can't tell if they are male or female and if it is actually the future me. There is a certain menace to the figure but they are not actually doing anything. The plane is careering all over the place and I have to try and get past the figure to sort it out. Then I wake....

2007-09-22T06:48:00.000-07:00

Dream 59: Football, Running and Playing for your Supper
I was playing football as part of a team. It was an unusual field in that it seemed to be high up on top of some castle ramparts and it wasn't a full football pitch. The crowd, coach, manager and so forth were down below. They could only see odd bits of the game as the field tilted or dropped down every now and then. The ball kept going over the edge and would get thrown back up, usually with a barrage of instructions from the manager. It was quite stressful, I think it was an important game but the field made it difficult for us to maintain any sort of rhythm.
Next I was running through the countryside. P was a little way behind me and we had undertaken a running tour of some country we were visiting (highly unlikely!). I was wending my way along a path and enjoying the sun, breeze, fields, trees and so on. The path went along side a small river and followed it for a while. The running was easy. I knew P did not want to go at my pace, but he wasn't far behind and I was keeping an eye on him. I met a man in a battered blue van, he had a group of kids with him. He was trying to tell me something in broken English, but I didn't understand what.
The banks of the river opened out and more paths appeared. There were a few people on the paths and as I ran on, more and more. I was commenting on how many people there were when I suddenly came across a great long queue. There were some tents and huts in the distance and the queue was to get into them. The people were very patient and had quite a lot of camping and climbing gear with them. They let me through since I was on the running trip. I stopped to chat to one person (who looked a bit like J). She told me they were on a special hiking and climbing trip which was popular and prestigious. I told her that I had done quite a bit of climbing and she invited me to join the queue. I tried to explain that didn't have any of my equipment with me, and that it would be impossible to join them without even the basics like my harness and climbing shoes. By this time we were at the head of the queue. I knew P wouldn't be interested in climbing but I was torn between carrying on our trip and joining the new one. By this time P had arrived too. We chatted to one of the women in charge. She was talking about us doing a gig for them, in exchange I could do a hike or a climb. P and I said maybe we could do one comedy show on the first night and then do some singing the next night. They would also give us a bed and food etc. I hesitated as we normally charge a fee as well, but then we thought it might be ok this time. We had P's guitar but I wasn't sure where our other equipment, costumes etc were going to come from, but no one seemed worried about that as things just seemed to turn up when required. It was very crowded with people still trying to get into the event, but it was very calm and good natured and I thought we'd probably enjoy the gigs and staying in the camp/huts.

2007-09-20T04:38:00.000-07:00

Dream 58: Recruited Spies
P and I were picked to become spies. We had a several secret messages telling us what to do. We had to pack as if going on holiday. We were supposed to meet up with our agent but we had a gig booked. We decided that we had to do the gig since they only let us know an hour or so before and it was impossible to find a replacement. After all it would blow our cover before we'd even started. I was worried that they would think we weren't going to join them and that we could be in trouble, or maybe even thought of as traitors. We had our suitcases as well as our equipment for the gig. We were on the gig and I was looking for signs. P said it was their own fault for not telling us soon enough and they should have known. I had visions of some angry official secret service bod coming up and telling us the security of the country is far more important than a pub gig!
We were then told to go to a house. We were moving in with a woman who would be our guide/agent. She had a little dog which kept getting in the way. We spent some time unpacking, including our equipment. Then we had to pack again and go to the airport. I was standing in a check-in queue and thinking I've only packed warm clothes and I don't know if we're going somewhere hot. I made a mental note to pack shorts as well next time to be prepared for every eventuality. It was all rather confusing and we never managed to get to the point of our assignment, or even find out what our assignment was. We didn't end up on a plane, but had to go back home. This time it was another place and our things had been moved but were spread all over in chaos and mixed with other people's stuff. There were some plants, I had to figure out which were ours and water them. I was expecting to find a message. I watered some other plants as well as they were dying. At one point I was in a crowded area, waiting for something. I got chatting to a woman who seemed to know who I was. There were two other women behind me who had eastern European accents. They wanted to be introduced as well but I decided that wasn't a good idea and sneaked away, although I was near the head of the queue for whatever it was I was supposed to collect. I went back home and our agent had arrived with a car load of stuff and the mad little dog. We spent more time unpacking and sorting and I wondered if we'd actually been recruited as dogsbodies rather than for espionage purposes - I wanted to get on with our mission!

2007-09-10T04:34:00.001-07:00

Dream 57: Travelogue
I have travel dreams on a regular basis. I don't tend to write them up as they become so confused and often repetitive that it seems pointless. However this time I thought I'd include it as an example so to speak.
I'm working in an office and am told that my boss (there's is a feeling that it's a real person EC-T from the 90's, but I don't actually see her) is sending me on a trip. I'm quite excited. We have been moving offices and I'm not exactly sure where my room is and what my extension is. But I need to go home and pack and prepare for the trip. There is a constant feeling that I need to go to my office to sort things out there before I go and I need to leave a message on my 'phone to field the calls. It seems to be late at the office, I've been working late, but I'm also leaving early to go and pack. I think I can ring in from home later and leave a message on my work phone remotely, but then I still don't know my extension number.
Next I'm at the airport, I don't have my ticket. I get a flashback to the office where someone showed me the envelope in which are the tickets and itinerary, including my work duties. I think that if I go to the desk and explain they can re-issue the ticket, but I need extra time to do this. I have three carry-on bags, one has my new ukulele in it (this is from real life!) as I want to practise in the evenings. I realise I need to check in one of my pieces of luggage but I'm already passed the passport check. I still haven't sorted out the message at the office either, so there are all these things left undone. I start to think about the trip. I was excited about going but I'm not sure whether I'm going to Japan, Singapore or Korea. I realise I'm returning to the same hotel from the last trip. It wasn't very good, we'd had trouble with the food, service, rooms and language. I thought oh well maybe it will be better since I know some of the problems and it will only be for a few days. I actually don't know when I'm coming back, there's a suggestion that it is nearly a week, which means a weekend. I'm both pleased since I get extra time to explore and worried as it was pretty bleak last time, plus I might have work to do at the weekend as well. There is a general feeling of being confused and disorganised (which is mostly the opposite of how I travel in real life!). I'm in a waiting area and there's a group of tall young men around 18 to early twenties. They are mucking about around me. I'm about mid twenties now in the dream. They start throwing this thing around, it's hard white plasticky rubbery stuff and is multi sided like a three dimensional pentagon. They are almost teasing me by throwing this thing above and around me. I decide I can either be a sport and join in or pretend to ignore what's going on. I join in and at one point catch the thing. They are mostly accepting of me. Then we start to head for the gate. I am still worried that I haven't left a message at my office and also that I have too many bags to board the plane, I'm not even sure where I'm going. I follow one of the young men. They are still throwing this thing about. It keeps going over my head, but then it bounces in front of me. I grab it then I throw it back over my head knowing one of them will catch it. The young man in front of me arrives at an intersection. There are escalators going off to the right, centre and left. Above each one are signs with Chinese-style symbols and some numbers. I don't know the flight number, but the young man does and he leads the way towards the central stairs, saying the flight number. I realise I only have one of my bags with me now. I look back hoping that the men from the group are bringing them, but I can't see them in the crowd. I feel totally confused and unready to travel, I don't know where I'm going, I'm not prepared for whatever work I'm supposed to do and now I don't have all my bags. I'm trying to keep up appearances with the group as they will not help me if they think I'm lost and hopeless. We head off through the airport to what I anticipate as a disastrous trip.

2007-08-31T11:48:00.000-07:00

Dream 56: Prince Charles, Nac Mac Feegles, Gyms and Hairdressers
I had this dream on 29 August and I'm just writing it up now a few days later. I made some notes but not all of them make sense - here goes....

We were having dinner with Prince Charles it was fairly informal and we chatted pleasantly for a while until there was an elbow incident. I can't recall exactly what happened but it revealed us to be frauds. Prince Charles was then drugged and fell asleep. Me and some others were plotting his kidnap it had something to do with retrieving some paintings and we were to use Prince Charles as ransom, but there was disagreement on how to go about it. The paintings when we looked at them were enchanted. They seemed to be ordinary portraits but as you stared at them they became animated and turned into creatures called Feegles which looked like small odd people or a nice-looking Golum - they had googly eyes! Through these creatures you could then communicate and travel across worlds. The paintings had mistakenly made their way into the Royal collection and we had to try and get them back.

Then I was in a gym. I kept trying to get to different classes. It was very busy and every time I turned up at a class the instructor wasn't there, but there was a class going on in another studio which I couldn't get into. One of the instructors was JP (a real life comedian) she was in another room and being very hyper, energetic and to be honest irritating. I went to one class which was meant to be low impact but the exercises were so weird I didn't want to do them. I tried to get some water at a water bar but that didn't work out either. I then went downstairs and under a balcony there were little cubicles which you sat at and looked into. There was a display of Nac Mac Feegles (thanks to Terry Pratchett!). It was a tiny landscape which looked at first as if it were made by kids with bits of left over household rubbish. But if you watched very closely you could see it was real. This was the Feegle world and the more you watched the more you were rewarded. Initially there were little light displays then more sophisticated signals came through together with sounds and then the Nac Mac Feegles began to go about their lives as if by allowing you to watch it was a gift. I was enthralled. In a booth next to me was JS (another real life comedian). We nodded to each other as we had discovered the secret. There were people having drinks above us on the balcony and they were deriding anyone down below looking at the 'stupid toys'. J and I exchanged another knowing look. After an elaborate display a drinks tray came around in front of me. A gin and tonic was poured as if a thank you or reward for watching.
Then there was rumour of a running class, I wasn't sure if I was up for running since I hadn't done much recently but it was supposed to be taken by Jimmy Saville and there was a buzz about the gym. I followed groups here and there but to no avail there was no class. I got a brief glimpse of Jimmy Saville but that was about it. I ended up back at the Nac Mac Feegle display. However this time when the drinks came round it was offering tea, but someone had sabotaged the display and the cup was missing so the tea poured everywhere and ruined the Feegles little world in a flood of brown liquid.
The next part of the dream was like a TV program where parts of the dream I could see but I wasn't in. So for instance in the 'program' I saw there was a body buried under a floor in a house, however my character in the dream had not seen this scene. I suspected there was a body and I had to work out the clues to prove it. I was in a town scape where some houses and people were set in medieval times and some were modern day. There was a hair dressing salon around which the drama was centered. I was well known in most places and had to disguise myself in order to discover where the body was and who had possibly murdered her, it was not clear if she was dead or alive. I was plotting to cut my hair very short and jagged. It was white blond by now and I was going to use the excuse that my little sister had started to cut my hair by mistake and I desperately needed it fixed. The hacking of my hair was supposed to be enough to disguise me from those who knew me. I had to find the body and possibly save her or save others. I kept seeing parts of the program I wasn't in and trying work out the clues to reach her.

2007-08-31T11:41:00.000-07:00

Dream 55: Unhealed Wounds?
Sorry for the gap in transmission - been at the Edinburgh Festival and there's little time for anything let alone dream blogs. I did manage to remember a couple of dreams I had whilst there, but mainly fell into a (too short) exhausted sleep with little or no dreaming potential.
Some time in the first week of August I had a dream where I had wounds on my body. From them emerged these little white wormy/lice like creatures. They kept coming out and getting longer and longer. More and more wounds appeared on my body and they became larger. I was very frightened because I knew I was sick and it was very serious. I was with P in the street and I told him I was ill and needed doctor badly. He said it would be ok, it wasn't that serious. He was trying to make me feel better but he wouldn't look at me properly because he's squeamish and I knew he was also trying to protect himself from thinking the worst and dealing with my illness. I was crying and pleading with him to help me and take me to a doctor but he just kept saying it would be ok.

2007-07-26T05:46:00.000-07:00

Dream 54: A Twisted little Journey ends in Gore
I was back working with my old boss ECT. We were in a meeting with another colleague about the finances. I had done a lot of background work and had already told ECT some of my prognosis. However she was listening more to the colleague who she seemed the think was more of an expert than I. When the other person said something about how we were going to hit problems in the future I said to ECT, that's what I told you before. She glanced at me with her don't interrupt look. I felt slightly cheated. I thought she doesn't trust me anymore. She used to rely on me almost completely but because I've been away she thinks I don't know what's going on. I realised it would take me longer to regain her trust.
I was leaving work then with a short man who was an old work friend (only in the dream, he wasn't someone from my real life). He had a phobia to do with walking home a certain route at a certain time. I followed behind him to make sure he was ok. We got to a distant car park and a set of stairs which marked the end of his phobia. He turned and smiled and I walked up and put my arm around his shoulders congratulating him on getting through. He was grateful I'd been there just in case. I was going to give him a lift the rest of the way in my car which I thought I'd parked nearby. Then I remembered I'd parked it in the underground section at work. The short work friend said he knew a quick way back. We ended up going through some old buildings but we climbed up and down walls, banisters and corridors from one level to another in a labyrinth style journey. I thought it's a good job I have climbing experience. The man commented on what a good friend I was (funny I didn't know his name!). We arrived at a large hall where they were having an after show supper. It was one of the science Faculties which had put on a classic play (probably Shakespeare). Me and the friend had seen some of it and were joking between ourselves about how awful it was. One of the senior academics came up to me and was expressing his disappointment. He told me the students in the cast were upset and ashamed to be part of such a bad production, so I said well they could act better and then it wouldn't be so bad. They had been directed by a science bod who knew nothing about it and they had no affinity with acting themselves it was doomed from the start. The academic then mentioned something about climbing. I made some comment and he asked me what qualified me to comment on both acting and climbing - not directly it was implied in his tone and question. Just at that point I'd taken a bite out of a vol-au-vent. I indicated I couldn't talk just then. I wanted to reply but the vol-au-vent became incredibly chewy and sticky and I could get a word out. The academic kept spouting on and I wanted to explain how I did actually know about these matters and wasn't just being bitchy.
I left the party and was on my way down the street when I caught a glimpse of an enemy on a broomstick. I flitted quickly and quietly down a side street and saw a few of my gang scattered around. We were all aware of our enemy, but she was flying erratically and in full view, not the way it was done at all. We were keeping and eye on her while hiding in and out of gardens, hedges etc. About three of my gang were in an alleyway (it was in the suburbs, all homes) and a bus came by. They hid beside the bus and the enemy sort of crashed into and merged with a couple of them. They manage to extract themselves and get rid of the enemy's broom and send her on her way as I watched from across the road. We met up and one of the gang was disparaging about the enemy saying she hadn't a clue how to fly and use her broomstick. We were flying ourselves by this time. Another gang member said yeah you have to start by going down. I was puzzled, how can you go down if you're on the ground. But she pointed to a roof top and an hill and said you have to fling yourself downwards otherwise you have no control.
I then arrived at my brother T's party in a posh hotel. I was late and I didn't want to drink too much so I sipped on a glass of something and mingled. My other brother then arranged to take people home in taxis. T came over with a load of different drinks to hand out to those left. He gave me a soft drink and asked if I'd drive which I said was ok. But then a taxi came back. T was annoyed that Brother had sent one back. He wanted to carry on the party and have more drinks. He went outside to send it away. I was standing near mother who was sitting on a marble bench near the side of the road. There was a commotion in the street. A small crowd were around an old man with glasses and a red jumper. He as falling. He was not only drunk but also probably not well either. He was passing out and as he fell they tried to grab him but they were old too. T shouted 'He's a DONOR, keep him UPRIGHT'. But it was too late. As the man rolled onto the ground on his back he suddenly had no glasses, a blue jumper and was very much awake. He viciously grabbed another man's hair/head and hurled him through the air across the street with tremendous strength. The man's scalp ripped off and was left in the other man's hand. I looked across the road and there was this pile of blood and gore where the thrown man had landed and disintegrated. There was also some white-ish fur around him where an animal had been run over earlier and it was all mixed in. It was very shocking that he could be killed just like that. I had a horrible feeling in my guts. When T had shouted about the donor I had a brief glimpse of a half memory about working in a home with older people and some of them had this donor quality, but it was all very hazy and happened in a fraction of a second. I looked away from the gore and back at mother. She had also just looked and was in the process of fainting. There were a few onlookers next to her and some broken glass on the pavement. She was slumping forwards and sideways in slow motion, but I couldn't get to her in time. I called 'Mother, Mother' as I went towards her then woke up.

2007-07-26T05:30:00.000-07:00

Dream 53: Grapes, currency, washing lines and audiences
Several snippets from the other night... I was working with some people packing grapes, red seedless ones in small plastic carry bags as used in supermarkets. However grapes were a type of currency and were extremely precious so it was like working at the mint. Each grape had to be accounted for and had to be packed to go out, no sneaking any for yourselves. A man had worked out how to cheat the system, I was in on the scheme. We went to a bank teller and when a bag of grapes was passed through the little trough under the window he'd throw in a ping pong ball thing with a string attached and pull it back through at the same time as the grapes. There was something in the ball which made the grape transaction not register, so as far as the system was concerned you had not received any grapes and none had gone out. The timing was crucial. He had a few misses before it worked but then it started working a treat. We didn't do it too often but the potential to become very rich was there.
Then I was in a house, the phone was ringing and I found it eventually in a drawer and I could hear my mother talking through it while it was still ringing. Next I went to hang some washing on the line as I walked out there were a few other people trying to hang their washing and suddenly my mother appeared wearing a bright yellow towelling beach dress. She hovered above us and walked across the washing lines humming and singing to herself, quite happy and unaware that she was hampering our hanging out of the clothes.
Next I was in a show. We'd done a few nights and I was vaguely aware of some success but had been concentrating so much on my performances I hadn't taken that much notice of the audience. Backstage, a fellow cast member told me there were 46 in that night, but he said that was pretty low and that on previous nights there been many more. I thought 46 was a reasonable crowd since it was a small room and was surprised and pleased that the numbers had been and probably would be even better.

2007-07-11T05:49:00.000-07:00

Dream 52: Performing, Flowers and a Letter from India
I had several dreams last night, but these are the three I remember. I had just done a show somewhere and dropped into a theatre nearby to meet a friend. I went back stage and across a wooden and metal walkway which seemed familiar. My friend greeted me effusively saying I was just what they needed as one of the cast hadn't showed up. They told me hurriedly what to wear and what to do for the first scene. Luckily the characters I was standing in for had few lines. We did one scene in a bit of a blur then came back across the walkway and put down our props. We all got changed for the next scene while the main actors carried on on stage. My friend was one of the main actors so the others told me what to do. We did this several times and I felt I was just about getting away with it since I wasn't a main character and I could get the gist of what the scene was about and play my part convincingly with a bit of help from the others. It seemed to be a mixture of styles some comedy and drama. We had mock Tudor, medieval and Victorian style costumes. At one point we had the cliched spear carrying role!
The play finished and was a great success. We went for a drink afterwards but were told to go back to the theatre. The producer had been in and had left flowers for everyone. He was a (real life) friend of ours, CW, and he was sitting at a table congratulating the cast. My friend (dream friend only) did not receive the largest bunch of flowers as she should because she was the main star. The female co-star received the largest and brightest bunch so there was some tension. There was a small bunch for me too. One was in the style of the other bunches and were exotic orchids but the card had the other actor's name crossed out and mine put in. But the stage manager had decided this wasn't good enough so a big bunch of yellow daisy-type flowers were produced instead and the other bunch was left to the side. CW apologised as he hadn't known I was in the cast - well neither had I 'til just beforehand! We sat around for a while then went off somewhere else carrying our flowers. I told my friend that I had had dreams where I was suddenly in a play where I didn't know my lines or character, but this time it had really happened and had been a total success.* She then told me we were going to live together. I was about to move out of my place and so was she. She said she had the perfect place and that we'd be great together. I had reservations but she kept going on about how quiet she was and that it would be much better than whomever I was living with now.
Then P and I were visiting New Zealand. I took him to several places I knew in the South Island and pointed out various things. We were getting closer and closer to Queenstown and I kept saying this is near where JR lives. There were mountains in the distance and I said you can see those from JR's place. We went along a road and saw the houses were he lived and I pointed them out. I realised I was going on and on about JR but I knew P would understand that I was just excited about being back where I went climbing etc and not anything else. Then P was piloting a helicopter. We were flying right over the hill where JR's house was and we got closer and closer. I told him which house it was and he flew right up over the back yard and even under the trees, I was going to warn him to be careful but he already was. There were several people in the back yard having drinks and a BBQ. They looked up at us as we flew very close to them but JR wasn't there. I told P that it was his house but I remembered he was renting it out now and that he'd moved to Christchurch.
In the next dream I received a battered letter from India. I had sent off a short story to the BBC there which was also a script for a play. There was loads of paperwork. My script was included. It seemed very old now as I'd sent it years ago, the type-face was a bit faded and looked like it was from a printer from the early eighties. I was trying to find out if they had rejected it or wanted to use it. I had an excited/nervous feeling inside that they had liked it. As I went through the papers there was were very vivid brightly coloured scenes of Indian rural life. There were a couple of tea towels with these scenes on them and a title below. They seemed to be gifts. In between some pages of the script were some vivid drawings as if these could be used for the storybook or perhaps just be inserted as scene breaks. I kept going through the paperwork and trying read some notes. Finally there was a strip of paper with red biro writing on it and a very old style typed letter. It was hard to read but the first line read that I was very talented and that the story was very imaginative. Then there were lines in about ten different languages. It would have the name of the language in English then the sentence in that language. For example there was Finnish, German, French etc. I wondered why they had done this since I wrote the script in English. It was as if they didn't want me to not understand what they were saying. I found the English line but it was faded. The room I was in was dark so I went into the room next door where P was and opened the curtains to let some light in. I had the strong feeling that they wanted to commission my story but I needed to find the actual line that said so. I told P I think the BBC in India want to make my story then I tried to read the rest of the letter, but I woke up before I could!
* this talking about or referencing dreams within a dream has been happening a lot recently, will have to investigate.....

2007-07-09T07:53:00.000-07:00

Dream 51: Bits and Pieces
I've been travelling and working a lot so haven't had much time to keep my dreams up to date. Here are some snippets from the last week or so.
I was in a city shopping area with several different shopping centres. I was on a break from work but I don't know what sort of work, but it felt like I had limited time. I was trying to buy some lunch but all the food places didn't have the type of food I eat or wanted to eat. Later this woman started following me. She was a personal style advisor like Trinny and Susanna. She was becoming rather irritating asking me a load of questions. I was trying to be polite but not give anything away and I was sending plenty of signals to say I was in a hurry and really NOT interested. She kept with though. In the end I just told her I wasn't interested, I had my clothes for my job (like a costume) and then at home I wore comfortable stuff like loose trousers and baggy t-shirts. She hung around for a while then I lost her.
Next I was at a concert. Phil Collins was the musical director/conductor for two black vocal acappella artists. I was right at the front of the stage, with a great view. Phil had sprouted loads of light brown/blondish shoulder length hair and looked rather dashing. The two men had fantastic voices and we singing amazing songs. I suddenly got an extreme close up view of Phil Collins conducting them. Really he had his back to the audience, and although I was still in the audience I got a special close up view like you would on TV, except this was still live. As he conducted he was mouthing the words as MD's tend to do. I was fascinated. I also had a big crush on him (in the dream, this is not replicated in real life, although I don't mind him). I'd get a close up of the singers then flash back to Phil while I watched. On one of the close ups of Phil he started to mouth the wrong words. He was doing it on purpose as an in joke. The singers carried on singing the right words as Phil tried to put them off. He winked at me as he did it. I felt incredibly special to be in on the joke. I didn't even realise that he'd noticed me. Later we were walking together in the city. He was treating me like an old friend or an equal because he knew I was also a performer. We chatted about various things and he asked me where the best places were to go. I was so chuffed to be this close to my dream idol.
Had another dream where I was learning to drive a bus and one where I was running a new theatre venue and had to explain all the safety regulations but I kept getting interrupted..... mmmm wonder what influenced that one!!

2007-06-27T08:03:00.000-07:00

Dream 50: Mother in Trouble
I dreamt this while away for a few days. I was busy with some work or other when I received news that Mother had done something very bad. I had to finish what I was doing but would go to her as soon as possible. However it was all hush hush and to be kept within the family. The TV was on, I was still busy but caught a glimpse of something which seemed to be about my Mum, however I didn't catch it all and hoped that the story was about something else and I had got the wrong end of the stick. Next thing I see a newspaper front page headline, I think it was also on TV, like a late-night news program showing the papers' front pages for the next morning. My Mother took up the whole front page. She looked a bit like the Queen as she was wearing a green hat and coat. I can't remember the exact wording but the gist was that she'd killed her husband (my Father) in an horrific and blood thirsty way. The photo showed a close up of her face and her very blue eyes had tears welling in the corner, she looked upset and curiously innocent. The story seemed to sympathise with her because she'd put up with years of abuse, however the severity of her retaliation was shocking. I was mortified as the story was now worldwide. It was not only not kept within our family, but the story had caught on across the world - mostly due to the amazing pics of my Mother. I had to get to her quickly.

2007-06-14T04:13:00.001-07:00

Dream 49: Real Riding
I was looking after a couple of horses for a friend who had gone away. I mucked out and groomed and then went for a fantastic ride on the large dark bay horse. He was beautiful to ride, very well trained and responsive, light on his feet, excitable and fast. It was a lovely day in the green countryside with the sun shining. I had such a wonderful time. I got back and put the horse in his stable, wiped him down and finished checking them both. The other horse was a smaller older more hackey sort off horse who was a companion for the other who was basically a show horse. I went back home and was thinking about looking after the animals and how much I was enjoying it, having been away from animals and horses in particular for many years. I was planning what I would do the next day, then I realised it wasn't real. I was very disappointed. I kept examining the scenario in my head trying to find a bit that could be real or some way to make it real. I was thinking if I knew anyone with horses. Or maybe if I'd actually had a nice ride recently that I was remembering, but try as I might I couldn't get past it being just a dream. I went back over it several times, but the result was always the same. (I was still dreaming while all this was going on).
Later on I had a few other snippets of dreams. At one point I was sitting around a very long table. There were maybe half a dozen people scattered around the table, but there were loads of chairs free. There were also a few people coming and going around the table, in the room and doing things but able to listen in on any conversation. I started telling them about my dream about the horses. I went through and described the dream, almost as above. And when I got to the bit were I said I realised it wasn't real they were lots of amused chuckles from everyone. When I'd finished, some of them were walking around smiling and repeating, it wasn't real, I wanted it to be real and then having a giggle.

2007-06-14T03:59:00.001-07:00

Dream 48: Time Travel
I had this dream a few days ago now. I was with SC and we were travelling through time. We kept using the term travel back in time but we were actually going forward. It was a weird process. As we'd stand at a table these blue/white lines of electric light like a film effect would come around and into our head. The were like mini lines of crackling lightening, dancing and pulsing about our mind. Our bodies stayed at the table but our minds then received images of the future. We were living the image vicariously and they weren't whole memories just snippets, but I suppose enough to tell you what might happen and where. I only travelled one or two times. But later SC showed up and he was incredibly old. I said you've come back as the wrong age. You should be the same as me in this age, but you're all wrong. He hadn't even realised he wasn't right. He went back to try and correct it, but I thought it was because he'd become addicted to the time travel and his body was becoming confused. I think I saw myself as an old woman as well, but I hadn't been time travelling. SC had to go back several times before he arrived at the correct age for the correct time.

2007-06-03T05:09:00.000-07:00

Dream 47: Scams, Waves and Misunderstandings
Just moved into a new place and these are the first dreams I've been able to recall (hung my dream catcher up yesterday too...).
I was carrying my bags which I usually take for work along a street. There were some people with clip boards whom I avoided. There was a lot of noise and bustle. Later I was crossing a large modern city plaza. There was a man with a clip board and a few youths hanging about nearby, but otherwise no one near. He came to talk to me. I tried to avoid him saying I was on my way to work. But he was very persistent. A voice in my ear kept saying insistently, it's a scam. get away, he's trying to rob you. I was trying to go past but was hampered by my bags. I was then surrounded by the man and the youths. They got one of my bags and were threatening to hurt me. I tried to swing my larger, heavier bag at the man's head. My movements were in slow motion and the man was easily able to dodge me because he was moving in normal time. I was very frustrated as I tried in vain to land a blow. Part of me just said let them take the stuff, it's not worth it. But the rest of me wanted to fight and to stop them doing it to anyone else.
Later I was in a car with P we were boarding a car ferry. There was quite a bit before this moment, but this is all I can retrieve now. We had been directed to a section of the ship for parking, but something had happened and we were going back to the main parking deck area. We were feeling relieved because we'd escaped something bad in the other section. There were a few other cars also following us back and in the main deck area, but not that many. We were just turning around when there was an enormously loud noise, crashing, tearing and the rush of water. A gigantic wave surged into the harbour down the side of the ship, crashed into the harbour wall and then formed a huge wall of water which burst through the stern of the ship where the cars were coming in. A wave of fear passed over me as I saw the water coming up behind us. I was in the car, but also I saw us from the outside as the water swamped us, picked up the car and swirled us around like a toy. Inside the car we were submerged in the turbulent water and were tossed around mercilessly. We crash-landed against one side of the ship with the rear of the car halfway up the wall and us hanging in our seats looking down and across the deck area as the water vanished. I pantingly asked P if he was all right. He had somehow been forced into the back seat. We both seemed ok if very shaken.
After waking a couple of times, I had a final snooze and came up with this. We were on holiday I think, visiting castles and the like. We came to what seemed like the exit to one place, there were a few souvenirs, but not a full shop like most places have these days. The woman in charge was an ancient craggy old hag. Her speech was so drawled and gnarled it was hard to tell if she was speaking English, never mind what she was saying. She wanted us to pick something off the table, then according to what we picked she would tell us about ourselves. I just wanted to leave at this point so was annoyed at being held up. I didn't think she had any great insights or powers. She just seemed to be doing run of the mill stuff that could apply to anyone. She was also annoying because so incomprehensible that it took several goes to understand what she wanted and what she was saying. I picked something I would never normally pick just to stuff her up. She kept trying to ask questions, but I really couldn't be bothered and said I wanted to go. She gave up on me and went to the next person. In the dream she was my friend, but she wasn't anyone I know from real life, except she reminded me of Rico's wife from Six Feet Under. She was very anxious to hear what the woman had to say, and I thought to myself she believes in this stuff. Next P's parents came up (P wasn't there). They were nothing like his real parents, but were there in the dream as such. P's Dad hadn't a clue what was going on and was being a cantankerous old man. He couldn't understand what this woman was doing asking him questions when he wanted to leave. He had a walking stick with him. The woman wanted him to pick something off the table but he refused, mumbling and complaining all the while. P's Mum, B, was trying to placate him, because she too believed in the woman and wanted J to benefit from her. The woman asked J where he was from. There followed a long argument with lots of misunderstandings, they were both shouting, because both were a bit deaf. In the midst of it the woman did actually come up with a few facts about J's life that seemed to be genuine insights. Then J was lying on a long chair partly under a bench in the shop with his legs going up the wall. He was trying to aid his circulation and give his legs a rest as we'd been at the castle (or whatever it was) for a while. All the time the woman was trying to get J to answer her questions. But her speech was bad and J's wasn't much better with a heavy Irish accent so that the conversations went on for ages with each miss-hearing the other. At one point the woman asked 'Your father was a Duke?'. J looked up and back at the woman from his lying position and shouted 'I'm not stupid ya know!'. He tried to rise as if he were going to strike the woman with his stick. B tried to stop him and explain that the woman hadn't insulted him as he thought but was trying to say his father was a Duke. After a while things settled down. We went to leave and the women offered some spiritual sort of cards things, which may have also had a CD in them. They had chants, prayers and sayings as far as I could gather and the front had an elaborate motif on it with 'Spiritual' written into it. My friend (who believed in this stuff), bought a few of the cards as I tried to usher everyone else out of the door.

2007-05-27T04:36:00.000-07:00

Dream 46: Bits and Pieces
Several seemingly unrelated sections of which I can only recall snippets.... I was in an era which was a mixture of Dickensian, Wild West, Modern Times with a bit of Mafia style 1940's thrown in. In the dream it was a recognised time/era and I realised what it was straight away. There were loads of people milling about generally and later it became a party in a large rambling house. PMG was there and I was hanging around him. He was wearing a hat (cross between a trilby and a pork pie) and looked gorgeous. Eventually I signalled with a raise of my eyes and a nod of the head that we could go to my room. He nodded his assent much to my surprise, I never thought it would be so easy. We got to the bedroom and were in bed, then it was like a film, we just cut straight to us waking up in the morning! We were talking about his brother. I asked him what his name was and he said Carlos. There was a flashback to me chasing Carlos. I was either a gangster or a cop and he was running. He wore a similar hat to PMG and at times looked very like him and then other times not at all. In the flashback I was threatening him. I bailed him up in the corner of a room and stuck a gun under his nose. I was very close to killing him but something made me stop. Perhaps I realised he must be related to PMG. People kept changing their appearance in this era. I was walking behind PMG down some stairs and his hair was yellow blond and all stiff and sticky from being loaded with gel. Next thing he was back to his black curls.
In another section I was on a train, it was made from old grey wood and was very rickety. I had to go through several carriages to find the loos. I did find them and had an enormously long pee, trying to hang on and point it in the right direction. But I still needed to go (because I did in real life I suppose - normally I don't get to actually pee in a dream, I just keep trying to find a loo, so this was unusual).
Then I was on a veranda with P (not PMG). The buildings were wild western town style and there was a big dusty road in front of us. A group of circus performers turned up and were playing around with various bits and pieces, a ball and some soft toys they used for juggling. The ball came over towards us. P missed it, but I hit it back. Then a toy rabbit shot over. P stood on it. And I told him to flick it up, he tried but couldn't. I had a go, stood on it, flicked it up with my feet then kicked it back to the group in the dusty road. P said where did I learn to do that. I said I didn't know I could, I'd just watched the others and had a go.
Then I went for a pee in real life. When I came back I was running late for a yoga group. I went in and joined in part way through. We seemed a close-knit group and had been going to the sessions for a while. But the next time we went there had been an incident. The yoga teacher said we had to complete a survey before we could carry on. I was late again and several people had finished. There was a package for everyone which included food, a menu, the questionnaire and some pants made from special material. They were for warming up or after the sessions. They were blue and had a logo and were sort of rubbery, plasticky and fleecy at the same time. I decided I'd put mine on later because I was already warm and in my yoga gear. However this seemed to indicate a non-conformist attitude. I gathered they were trying to establish whether we believed in the yoga philosophy and way of life or whether we just did it for the exercise. Apparently they were cracking down on who was allowed to participate. I would have liked the food but as I was running late I thought it would interfere with my yoga if I ate it so close to doing it. The food was all vegan, so instead of sampling it and answering the questions I just wrote 'I follow a vegan diet'. Then I tried to answer the rest of the questions. There was some commotion as everyone wanted the teacher to start the group. She was hesitant because she wasn't sure of the results and whether she was allowed. In the end we didn't do any yoga. I was annoyed because I could have eaten the food after all and now it had gone cold and a bit rubbery, plus I was hungry.

2007-05-17T03:35:00.000-07:00

Dream 45: Losing My Head?
Earlier on in the dream I was travelling through a city on some sort of transport which was also like a fair ground ride, so there was a lot of ups, downs and twisting around with glimpses of the city above, below and around. Not a bad idea really, make commuting a bit more exciting!
Later on I was in a large house with some family and friends. It was all a bit chaotic. I was in a room watching something. Could have been a large TV or maybe a live performance, not sure. I was standing near the back of the room watching, but I was also standing behind myself. I was a bit taller than me and I noticed a small balding patch at the back of my head - like some men start to get. My hair was covering it but it was definitely thinning. I went to a room with a mirror. I was back inside myself now. I moved my hair aside and found a large bald area which was white and rough. When I touched it , it was dusty. I put my hand on the patch and all this dust came away, like fine plaster dust. I was horrified and scared. I went to find P. I grabbed him and said I need to show you something. He could see I was upset. We went into one room but there were people there. We kept trying to find a room where we could be alone. Eventually we ended up in the corner of a hallway. I was just about to show him my head when my brother came up, all smiles and asked what we were up to. I said I needed to talk to my spouse privately! I was very short with him and he left rather offended.
Then I showed P my head, loads of dust came away and there was a sharp edge on the side of my head which you could feel now some of the dust had fallen off. I made P feel it. He felt around the dusty/powder stuff and the ridge. I asked him if he could feel it and he said yes it was keratonin, but very thin. I was worried because I didn't have a doctor I could go and see. P tried to comfort me and say it was going to be all right, but I could see he was as worried as I was and whatever had happened to my head was serious.

2007-05-15T05:45:00.000-07:00

Dream 44: Einstein and I
Thoroughly enjoyable night of dreaming. Started off in a hotel, a regular theme for me, most of it is lost now, but usual things of rooms being changed, sharing rooms, finding towels and so forth. Then I took part in one of the activities, we were walking on this giant rocky outcrop or tor. It didn't involve climbing as in ropes, harnesses etc, but it was extremely tricky and potentially very dangerous. We were very high up and the views were spectacular, there was a crisp breeze but the sun was shining in a brilliant blue sky and only the odd cloud. I was in my element. Our tour leader was Einstein. He was pretty much as you'd expect from the photos, although his hair wasn't quite as mad or as thick on this occasion and he was a short, slender, agile, wise, oldish man. He was telling us all sorts of things about the rock and the route, and was extremely patient and kind. He gave off the feeling that he found everyone to be intelligent given half the chance and that he wasn't especially more intelligent than anyone else. Yet his aura was immense. You knew you were in the presence of someone great but you also felt like you were his special friend and at peace.
We were going along a particularly tricky section with these built in staircases and steps as well as the natural and sometime treacherous rock. There were shear drops of hundreds of feet every now and then. Einstein was there to show us the way, but we also had to figure it out for ourselves like a puzzle. There was a woman in front of me who was trying to get one bit right. Einstein had been chatting to her more intimately and I wanted her to get on with it so it would be my turn. He hopped down some man-made steps on to a ledge, asking the woman if this was the way to go. She hesitated as there was another lot of steps with a rail going another way. She started to follow but he trotted quickly back to her, saying she shouldn't follow him on that bit. He was trained and skilled, but that was actually the wrong way and she would have fallen, he didn't say to her death, but she probably would have.
We continued on. I looked across the valley to another rocky ridge. About halfway down under an overhang was a steep path cut along the scree. I could see figures running up it. Looked like a team of extreme sports people doing some training and they were trying to compete with each other up the slope. I looked around at the rest of the view and drank it all in. We came to a break in the rock and looked out at a different view. The woman was talking about her ancestors and Einstein nodded as he listened. Then she said well of course you know V's family history goes way back to.. she was going to say William the Conqueror, but Einstein cut in with yes the something of Cornwall. Is wasn't Duke or Earl or a title I'd heard of but as soon as he said it I recognised it. I wondered how he knew so precisely our ancestral line, most people just new generalities, but he had pinpointed an obscure predecessor and far removed from the Northern England regions which were more well documented. I was impressed and flattered. He just smiled slightly impishly. We were impatient to move on, but Einstein suddenly trotted off down a grassy slope with some boulders scattered around. It was steep but looked innocuous enough. He grabbed something from the bottom, like a jacket or fleece then trotted back up like a mountain goat. I wondered why we couldn't just go down that way, but there was an unspoken rule that although it seemed an easy route it had taken years of training and skill for him to be able to trot down and back, and really he'd just taken a short cut because he needed his jacket. We still had hours to go before we would reached the bottom.
Then it was my turn to be next to Einstein, he led the way calmly with occasional reference to me to make sure I understood the puzzle and chose the right the pathway. He told me all sorts of things about the surroundings and about life in general. I felt wonderful. I had a glimpse of a future where I could tell people that I actually knew Einstein, and we were friends, because I genuinely felt we were by this time. He talked much more freely to me than to the other woman. We were climbing quite sharply and just as we got to the top of a little plateau I said I just can't believe.... and he jumped in and said you can't believe this isn't real? I said no, everything feels so real, my legs ache from the climb, I can feel the sun and breeze, I can touch the rock and see everything so clearly, plus the conversation was very real. He said yes I know but that is part of everything. He didn't actually say 'relativity' but the word was hanging in the air. I was thinking, but this isn't like my other dreams, it seems to be happening in real time, everything is so clear and sharp, not muddled and jumping from one thing to another. There were no strange close ups of things and weird scenarios (!). Then we came to another descent. There were rocky steps that disappeared to nothing. Einstein trotted down then must have gone down another lot of steps underneath the overhang that we were on. I knew this was the last part of the journey and I didn't want it to end and I was trying not to think about it being a dream. I pulled off to one side and P was there. A few people came up behind us talking and one man turned to speak as he was going down the steps. He put his foot into mid air, then realised and quickly adjusted. The steps were steep and very deep, sort of squarish boulders with huge gaps between seemingly suspended in mid air. If you just kept going you'd walk off into nothing. So I figured you had to spin around at some point and find the other steps underneath where we were standing. This was the last test and it looked like the others might not make it. I was nearly ready to leave when I had a really sharp pain on my right big toe. That was very real too! I yelped and P tried to help. When I looked down my foot was bare and was in a puddle from an indent in the rock. There was a large bug thing on my toe. It was a cross between a crab, a cicada and a huge flying beetle. It was very colourful and spread it's wings to the side. I got a close up of it and thought, here we go back to dreamscape and I felt slightly disappointed to have left the 'reality' of the previous part of the dream. The bug let go and flew off, but there was another one which latched on to my toe, again with the same painful consequence. They seemed to be hatching from the pool.
That's all I can remember from that section. A couple of snippets from later dreams include my bed being in street, parked like a car. Some bloke came up, a cross between a policeman, spy and an IT advisor. He stood at the head of the bed and said I don't expect you have broadband. I awoke very hazily and looked up over my pillow and said in a very slurry, sleepy voice, I do have broadband but I can't speak. Meaning that I was still half asleep.
Another snippet was my brother and I were sitting in a lounge room. We were watching a larger than life couch with three men on it. We were sitting at odd angles to the couch and each other. The people on the couch should have felt very uncomfortable with us so close and under such scrutiny. But they were actually from a sitcom. They were normally on telly, but we'd somehow got them in this room, live, but not so we could interact with them. I exchanged glances with my brother. I think I quite liked the sitcom, although it was silly, but he hadn't seen it on the basis that it was too stupid. One man on the couch had just had a baby with his sitcom partner. The baby was on the couch with them and he had his two best mates there. He said I know guys, (looks all around) we'll share the load! Huge laughter and high jinks as this was a running joke for them although this time he was referring to the baby. I smiled, I didn't think my brother would get it but he seemed to be amused too. We continued watching them as they did more humour seated on the couch.

2007-05-11T04:37:00.000-07:00

Dream 43: Transport B2
So now I'm driving a bus! I'm quite new at it and I think I'm on my first solo run at this route. It's going ok, although every now and then the bus feels slightly out of control but I have this blinkered feeling of not wanting to check or look.
I left the depot to go on the route, the next time I pull into the depot there is a sign blocking where I'm supposed to park. I half pull in and a waiting passenger at the stop shouts through the open door that I'm supposed to go around to the other side. She follows me around the depot and points to the place I'm supposed to pull in. She apologises for telling me what to do saying it's a liberty on her part. I say no it's fine, I needed to know where to go. I'm at the door of the bus and an inspector comes up to me. She asks my name, I tell her and say I can get my ID if she wants. She tries to write on her clip board and then asks me if I have a pen. I open up a bumbag and find a pen, my ID is there too but she doesn't ask for it.
There follows a whole ridiculous sequence with change. I don't know the purpose or reason now, but she was trying to take handfuls of change off me and she kept dropping coins. Then she owed me and I owed her, we exchanged coins for ages and in the end we were square except a £2 coin had dropped which was mine. I was trying to help the inspector put her change away so I thought I'd get it in a minute. Just as I was about to pick it up a large women in a blue anorak swooped in and took it. I said excuse me that's mine, I just dropped it. But she said finders keepers and went to get on the bus. I was full of rage and tried to punch her, but when I hit her middle the punch had no strength as it disappeared into the folds of her belly, she didn't even notice. She climbed on the bus and sat near the inspector. I went up and asked the inspector to explain that the coin was mine. The inspector brought out one penny and said it was only one cent. I said no it was two pence realising that this wasn't right either, but I couldn't remember the word for pound. The woman and inspector chuckled at me wondering what all the fuss was. I was annoyed with them both but couldn't do anything about it.
Another driver got on the bus, a black man (the inspector was also black). I was about to protest that this was my bus and I was supposed to drive it, but the inspector said this was a special test. I had to sit with the passengers. The design of the downstairs area was not like a real bus. The seats weren't in the usual place and it was very modern with a large vestibule area with panels where no one was allowed to stand. There was a counter behind the driving capsule and a bench with sandwiches, chocolate bars and crisps, they hadn't been there before. Most of the passengers had helped themselves. The driver set off and announced along the way about the food, it sounded like he was going to sell it. The inspector tutted and said he's not supposed to mention the food, but he has to get the passengers to take it. She marked something off on her clipboard.
We stopped and the driver announced in a light hearted voice that we were part of a test for some f****ing inspector, so that's why we were f****ing stopped. The inspector appreciated this, smiled and nodded. The driver came around the bus saying we have to watch some stupid film, however we should watch it while eating these as a treat. He pulled out a bag which looked like real bananas but were actually some confection which sprouted a chocolaty, crunchy top as he pulled them out. The bottom part was a hard chewy sweet so you ate the banana skin as well. It looked vile. I didn't want to take one, I hadn't taken any of the other food either because it was all stuff I don't eat. The inspector was staring at me with a fierce expression on her face. If this was another test then I was about to fail, but I couldn't take the banana.

2007-05-11T04:15:00.000-07:00

Dream 42: Transport B1
I was at the coast in a quiet almost enclosed bay/natural harbour. There were people swimming, diving, boating etc. My family had gone off for the day but I had wanted to stay back on my own. I then decided to borrow my brother-in-law's boat, a small cruiser. I'd seen him drive it loads of times and I was pretty sure I could handle it.
I was out in the bay manoeuvring around all the other recreational activities. The boat was going a bit faster than I wanted, but I wasn't at the controls I was at the side looking over and sort of steering from there, but trusting that people would get out of the way. There were some close calls with a group of divers and some swimmers, but part of me refused to look and I just trusted that the boat's path was clear and safe. I was heading for the open sea, I thought I'd go out and then come back in at the next bay which linked up to the same car parking area.
I came up to a part of the bay and a man in the water shouted up at me that I'd better throttle down. I reluctantly went over to the controls and pulled the two levers back a notch or two. The boat then went through a narrow, shallow channel which I hadn't noticed before. It was quite tricky and doubt came into my mind about going out to sea. I went back to land. There was a concrete channel for boats to travel through to the next bay - no water in the channel. I was taking the boat along there thinking I would go to the other bay this way. I thought I'd have a little trip around there and return the boat and no one would ever know I'd used it. Again the going became awkward. I felt bad about being in the boat so I took it off the concrete channel. I was in the boat but also carrying it up the concrete ramp which ran alongside the boat channel (It's a reasonable sized boat, don't you love it when you can do impossible things in dreams!). I was almost to the top when my brother-in-law S showed up. He pointed to a cleaning bay and said I'll give you a hand V. I was mortified that he'd come back before I'd put the boat away. The rest of his family were there too. He started to hose off the boat and I said 'I'll do that' and took the hose from him. He went around tidying and cleaning the boat. He seemed very good natured about it, but I was sure he must be very angry and I was looking for signs. I said to my sister 'I thought you were gone for the day. You didn't have to come back early.' I think S replied (or someone else) 'Well we heard you had the boat out so we decided to come back.' Again no one seemed to be angry but I thought they must be fuming. I felt awful, I know S trusts me with certain things, but this was taking it too far as I didn't really know much about driving boats at all. With everyone being so nice about it, my feelings of guilt and self torment were worse of course!

2007-05-08T05:14:00.000-07:00

Dream 41: Espionage
I haven't had one of these types of dreams for a while and most enjoyable it was. It's like watching and being in a film at the same time, with complicated plots twists and strange scenes. This dream is now a bit hazy but it involved me going to a vaguely middle eastern country to assimilate into the community and find out about 'Iraqi matters'. The country wasn't Iraq, it wasn't a specified place and it ranged from mountainous regions with old temple-like buildings to quite modern Europeanesque towns and cities and back to third world style towns and villages...
There were several scenes of me being with groups of people trying to ask discrete questions, but as a woman it was quite difficult and we were always on the point of being caught/found out. At one point me and a colleague had to report an impending incident (possibly a bomb attack). We went to a modern building which was the reception for a helicopter service. This was a safe building where we could link up with our headquarters. We also needed the helicopter to take us over areas so we could take photos. Our time had run out in this region and people were beginning to suspect. We had to wait for a plane (the helicopter seemed to have disappeared). There was a suspect hanging around us. I think it was a man but this was not certain. We were playing a kind of cat and mouse game. He suspected us of being spies and we were pretty certain he was part of a group of criminals/bombers. It was a question of who would make the first move.
We were ready to leave and suddenly s/he had on these high heel sandals, but they had little wheels in the soles. I knew they were bombs, because of the way s/he was rolling, every once in a while they would sort of skip. It could have been put down to the rough pavement but I knew something was fishy. I had to find a way to alert our people without giving ourselves away and also to be able to catch the bomber without harming anyone else. Not quite sure how but we got the shoes, but we did. When we looked at the bottom, there were these thin pink plastic wheels built in, but there were pieces cut out of them to accommodate the device. It explained why they kept skipping and proved my theory correct. The shoes ended up in a bomb oven, a place where certain explosives could be let off safely. The problem was that it only took a certain force and we couldn't open the shoes to find out how much explosive was in them without getting blown up ourselves. There was lots of discussion about whether to explode the shoes or not. If they were within the limit then the oven would contain them. If not then the oven itself would explode, possibly injure people, but more importantly alert the other side to our presence and our operations. The rest of this is a bit hazy, there was yet another exploding device which had to be dealt with, but we had to get back into the field.
Next we were at an airport. There was lots of waiting around and being shunted from one place to the next. My friend J was there this time, with a small group of friends. Finally we were allowed to board the plane. It was a very modern one with different seating sections. J wanted me to go ahead and get good normal seats, but I spotted a new section which sat sideways along the plane with a table in front. J didn't want a table seat so she went off into the normal sections. I thought it might be nice to have a table and it could even be possible to sleep with your head on it later. I was worried that I had the wrong ticket but no-one challenged me. I ended up talking to an academic bloke about some form of art. Can't remember all the details now but it was quite fascinating. I still had my spy persona but it was as if I was returning home and was now off duty.
Later we were in another airport and I had to get changed. Something to do with my usual clothing versus the local garb. I was trying to put some trousers on and had on normal knickers. A local woman saw me and thought I needed undergarments. She unwrapped a great long piece of cloth from her crotch area and gave it to me. It had some very slight staining, but she wanted me to take it as she thought I had my period and my need was greater than hers. I tried to explain in gestures that it was ok. I was horrified at the thought of putting on someone else's undergarments, but also touched that she would unconditionally try to help another woman whom she felt was in need.
At some point P and I were on a holiday which was also reconnaissance. We took loads of photos. Later in the dream I was playing them back on my camera/phone and instead of just still shots they were little moving vignettes with some family and other people whom we didn't even know had been there. They were very detailed and graphic. Fantastic buildings, gardens and landscapes, the photos seemed almost better than it had being there. There were loads more scenes and snippets but these are all I can remember. When you write them down they seem more logical and clear cut than in the dream, it was far more mixed up than that and also the feelings are hard to capture. The sense of adventure, stress of being caught, the wonder of new places and customs, the strange convoluted conversations, trying to get plane tickets, passports and so much more...

2007-05-05T05:21:00.000-07:00

Dream 40: Dancing Man
I was in a musical, a huge West End production, but I was appearing as a man. I was still me, but I was in some sort of disguise which allowed me to be a John Travolta-type all singing all dancing man in this show. There was a real male lead who was doing most of the show and then I was to do the last few big numbers and the finale. But no-one realised there were two of us and that I swapped in towards the end.
I went on and did the finale which went great and felt wonderful, but then the crowd were screaming for an encore and they wanted a particular number from earlier in the show. We were told to do the number again, but it wasn't one of mine and the other performer had already gone. I'd watched the number earlier and thought I could do it. It was a 50's style rock 'n' roll song (Buddy Holly-ish) and the choreography was spectacular and included a huge leap in unison with the female lead, it made a great tableau and was a highlight of the show which is why they wanted it again.
I was confident I could do it as I'd watched the scene pretty carefully and knew how the other actor danced etc. I also had the big leap in my mind and knew just how to do it. The number started off with the male dancers coming through the audience as the song started. I was leading the way, but there were these channels or pathways we had to go down (it was through and around the audience, but not). The ones which were open to us were the ones we had to go down, they were lit in a dim blue light, there were other lanes but these had fluorescent blue springy ropes zig-zagged across them at ankle height. I started off leading them down the lanes ok, then I took a wrong one and had to sort of dance around over and between the ropes which added to the performance but was taking more time and was wrong, the other performers had gone down the correct lines. Then I saw the ramp leading up to the stage and I knew I had to go up there and explode onto the stage as the song really took off. I did it just as I seen the other guy do it and there was a huge cheer, scream and applause from the audience. I danced through the number and it is was fantastic. We got to the leap. We were up on a platform and had to leap off and land on the main stage. It was a leap upwards first so we were high above the stage, then we had to hold our hands high in the air and twist our lower bodies to one side and bend up our knees. It was me and the main female lead and we were frozen in this tableau with just a spot on us for a split second that seemed to last longer as we suspended in the air, then landed together and finished the dance. As we did it, it felt brilliant, we timed it perfectly even though I'd never actually done it before, with me leaping slightly first but holding as she joined me. The crowd went even more crazy.
Afterwards I was chatting up the female lead. I was thoroughly enjoying my role as a bit of a macho male and I grabbed her around the waist and spun her around. I did feel a bit bad that I was fooling her because I was really me and a woman, but I thought that when the other male lead returned he could enjoy the benefits. I seemed to be far more outgoing and forward than the real man and so it was going to be noticed by the other performers perhaps that I seemed to have two personalities...

2007-04-24T04:21:00.000-07:00

Dream 39: Misbehaving Horses and Singers
P and I were meant to be doing a show as B & K for a group. We'd done the place before a few times and they kept joining in. It was more like a social party than a gig. Different tables were talking or trying to do bits of the act. I wanted to do some new material but it was impossible. We decided to have a break. I went to some glass doors which looked out into a stable yard that was part of the centre where we were playing. There were three nicely turned out palominos, although the colouring wasn't quite correct for a true palomino. Three young girls owned them, mostly for their looks. It was obvious they didn't know how to look after them properly but were there to pose on beautiful ponies and be part of the beautiful people set. One girl was already mounted, another was holding a pony while the other girl tried to get on. The pony backed away and the girl holding his head let it so the girl could not mount and in the end they got dragged about and ended up on the ground. The third palomino was loose by this time and trotted off into the distance dangling its bridle. I was very annoyed, firstly the girls should have been supervised and secondly if they didn't know how to look after their ponies properly they shouldn't be allowed to have them. Especially as they just seemed to be accessories for a certain look. Too much money and no sense or responsibility.
I was just thinking how badly run the stable was when another large bay horse came over towards the door with no bridle, just a saddle badly put on. I stepped out to see if I could stop him but as I did so an agent friend of ours, D, said 'No, no, no,' very disapprovingly behind me. I was dressed as K and as I opened the glass doors the horse shied away. A woman holding the rope of a halter on a smaller darker bay horse came over to the door. I offered to take the horse and let her go and sort out some of the mess happening in the rest of the yard. She handed him over with thanks. I took off my K shoes as they were high heeled and glittery, not really appropriate for a stable yard. I took the horse back towards a pen where several of them were kept. The lady from the stables came with me instead of going off to sort out the others. I explained to her that I used to work in a stables and I knew what I was doing. We got to the pen and I let the horse in. It was a sort of balcony with a fence at the edge. There were several people sitting around and the horse stepped through and around them and down a couple of steps to the straw covered balcony area where some other horses were standing around.
Next I was back inside, we were about to go on and a group of women (who may have been part of the stable) requested that we do our song called Bunch of C*nts. We didn't really want to do it as it seemed the wrong song for the occasion, but they started singing it. When they got to the chorus they had changed all the words to suit them and their work situation, inserting names and scenarios replacing our lines. This meant the song no longer had the line Bunch of C*nts in it and ceased to be either our song or offensive.
Then we were going to do some recording there was a woman with a guitar and I think she was recording one of our songs. She sang one line for a sound check. I got the level ok on one mic but needed to set the second. She wouldn't sing the line again. She'd sing one note, half a word, then stop, or she'd do a little squeak or croak. I told her to sing the line like she did so I could get the level. But she kept on squeaking and not singing. I said you have to sing it as you are going to in the recording otherwise the level will be wrong and the recording will be crap and a waste of time. She wouldn't do it. I snapped at her and said just sing the bloody line! P was standing by and could see I was getting angry and that the woman was clamming up. I tried to be nice and patient and asked her if she was feeling sick or something. I told her she had already sung the line once and she was going to have to sing it for the recording. But she said she'd have music then and there were all these people. I told her I wasn't worried about how she sounded in the rehearsal, I just needed to check the volume and I was going to be looking at the needle on the meter so it didn't matter how well or badly she sang the line. I made all the people who had gathered around go away.
Next I had to go and check another amp we were recording on. It was completely different and it took me several false starts to find the meter. There were about three other things which looked like meters until you got close and they turned into something else. When I sorted that unit out, I went to a third recording station further away, more in the open. There were several young men we knew and they looked like they were all set. I asked them if they knew what they were recording and one man said that GM had a list and he would be there soon. A ute turned up with supplies and an enormous picnic. This group were going to make a day of it and have a party while recording. I was frustrated because I didn't want to be organising everyone I wanted P and I to have a recording session for ourselves. There was a huge box of bread in the shape of footballs being unloaded and I was slightly jealous that they were going to have a good day.

2007-04-16T03:52:00.000-07:00

Dream 38: Lecturing
We were to attend a lecture. It was very full but it wasn't in a lecture hall it was more in a part of the building inbetween rooms so it was a disjointed setting, a bit of a vestibule, stairs, corridors and so on. We had to sit under some stairs. I was trying to start a new system whereby new lecturers or lecturers who were going to do a particular lecture for the first time could have a rehearsal lecture. This would allow them to practise what they were going to do and make some adjustments if necessary. Also students could attend either the rehearsal or the main one. I was trying to explain that it was the only way to get the lectures to a better standard and it would help students to give them a chance to attend at a different time and to see how the lecturing process was worked through. There was talk that there weren't enough lecture halls and hours available to schedule extra ones, but I pointed out that the rooms weren't in constant use, there were plenty of free hours and besides, this one wasn't even in a room.
There was another part of the dream after this which I spent quite a lot of time memorising - it was far more interesting than the above. Even in semi dream state I was recalling and working out how I should write it up. I remembered this first bit as an after thought, then I drifted off again and now all I can remember is the first bit, very annoying! I usually just need one image to remain for me to recall the whole dream, but if that image goes then there's nothing much I can do to get it back. I do remember when I drifted off again having a dream about some office work. My boss invited a couple of work colleagues and clients to his house. AD turned up, he used to be a real old boss from the 80's. When he arrived he recognised a Dali print on the wall and commented on it. It was a fairly obvious print but there were two more obscure ones. He did notice one, but I had to steer him towards the third in amongst some other artworks. I invited him to take a seat on the sofa, but I was pretty blunt and casual and this seemed to shock the other work colleagues in the room. I guess they didn't know that I knew him. I was folding some white sports socks at the time (just like P's in real life). We were meant to be doing work, but it was just a flat and wasn't set up for it and it was frustrating having to step around domestic items and mess while trying to conduct business. (Mmmm wonder what that can mean?!).

2007-04-11T04:47:00.000-07:00

Dream 37: Betrayed By Song
In the dream I was in a ‘backstage’ area which was basically a small vestibule at the bottom of some stairs. I was working on a script and some new jokes I was going to try out as my character K. P had just gone on stage. He was going to try out some new bits too and instead of doing our normal act together we had agreed to do bits separately tonight. It was going well for P and I was pleased. Then he started doing a bit about songs. He sang a well known line from a popular song, but it was in the wrong style and voice. He made some joke about but what if they were from ... he said something inappropriate (eg the North or another country). Next thing this woman got up and sang in the style he just said (ie with a Northern/foreign accent). The crowd loved it. She was another comedy act, but also a really good singer. In fact she was more of a singer than comedian, so even though they were doing the song in a daft accent she was singing it very well, belting it out. Then P did another one.
I was backstage dumbfounded. My friend J was sitting further up the stairs, she was busy writing herself. I went up to sit next to her, I needed to talk about what was happening on stage. I explained that I was meant to be doing the singing with P. I told her we’d had a rehearsal planned. As I was telling her, the story of what I was saying played out like a film. I was narrating while I saw P drinking. It was around his birthday and he’d been drinking heavily for a few days. We’d scheduled a rehearsal at the venue we were now in and turned up at about 3pm. He was very reluctant, complaining about being there and saying he was drunk and tired and so on. I said that he was the one who wanted the rehearsal and that it was his idea we were working on. I wasn’t that convinced about his idea. I explained to J that it didn’t seem like much of a joke. It was an excuse to sing and show off accents and seemed a cheap, easy way to get the crowd on side. Also once you’d done one song, the joke was done and doing it over an over with different songs again seemed a cheap way of entertaining the crowd. Besides it was sort of the same joke twice within the one song. P sang it ‘wrong’ then the woman did too. I thought it would be better if he sang it straight then they did the silly accent/style or whatever. It seemed to be just the sort of thing he disliked in other acts. Still I had turned up at the rehearsal to give it a go and to set the keys for the songs, but he was so reluctant and grumpy, in the end I said we'd better forget it and he went back to ‘celebrating his birthday’ by drinking some more Guinness (this was about 3 days after his birthday).
By now on stage they were up to around their sixth song. They kept doing the same thing, P would start off with a really well known lyric, he was doing Johnny Cash in his JC voice, then he'd say but what if, and she would belt it out in another accent. The crown went mad first when P sang as they recognised the song then even more so when she did it. It was more like a pop concert. J and I listened from backstage. I knew she was a far better singer than me, but I was annoyed he’d gone ahead without me. If we’d had the rehearsal we could have maybe improved it or found another way. I was saying to J that I wouldn’t be able to tell him what I thought of the act because it had gone so well and he’d be all excited and very pleased. I was also upset that he had used this other woman. She was a great singer, but he hadn’t told me, he hadn’t given me a chance to do it with him and we were supposed to either work together as a double-act or try bits on our own. Now to bring in someone else was just confusing the issue and taking us off in a different direction. Because it was such a crowd pleaser it was going to be impossible to criticise it without looking like I had a bad case of sour grapes. Which I did, as well as being legitimately critical of the act! While I was talking to J, they were still doing songs on stage, the same joke over and over and it wasn’t even a real joke. I looked up the stairs and out onto a small balcony/landing which led to other stairs and buildings. They had Chinese style lanterns hanging and large Guinness effigies which sort of glowed, but also looked like real oversized pints of Guinness decorating the banisters. I thought it was ironic as it seemed to be the Guinness which had got me in this mess in the first place. Then the front door buzzer went so I woke.... pity, would have been interesting to see what happened when they came off stage!

2007-03-26T09:30:00.000-07:00

Dream 36 and 37: Hotel Acrobatics and a Slithery Problem
Been on the road again and during a disturbed night's sleep last Friday morning I had the following two dreams.
I was in a hotel room when some people came in to perform for us. P and I were in the bed and the performers were prating about on the carpet. They were hopeless. At one point they had these short thin slats of wood and were prancing about with them, crouching over and placing them on the ground like poor walking sticks, or trying to make out they were twirling them like batons but they weren't, they were just waving them about. Completely amateurish and almost laughable if it hadn't been so pathetic. I just wanted to go to sleep. They made as if to pack up and I crossed over to the other side of the room, I think to help herd them out of the door. But once I was over there, they started to do individual acrobatics. Each of them had a delineated strip on the floor and they were doing different tumbling routines and balancing. One of them took the thin slats of wood and did a handstand, balancing then walking on the slats then doing other tricks. Another had metal triangles and was also doing upside down balancing tricks and a third was doing extreme contortion movements. They were incredible. I was stuck on the other side of the room staring back at P. We made faces at each other to say, what's going on? But it was enjoyable to watch them once we realised they actually knew what they were doing.
I woke up for a while then had the next dream.
We were in a house, around the communal kitchen dining area. A man was telling us how to catch snakes and the techniques he used. He was demonstrating that there was a right way, but most people did it the wrong way. Suddenly a snake appeared, it was a cross between and brown and a tiger snake (both pretty poisonous). He was pleased because he could demonstrate with a live sample. The snake was super fast. Even faster than in real life. It shot off almost so you couldn't see it and reappeared on the other side of the room. It was very close to me. The man went over with his special snake stick, a bit like those tongs with a long handle used for picking up rubbish. But the snake was too quick and smart and moved off again. I was moving around the room trying to keep away from it. At one point I was standing right next to it. It was by a table leg and I couldn't get around it. I was scared it was going to strike because it had been annoyed by the man and so I stood as still as I could hoping it would move off. It did eventually but then every time I thought I'd found a safe place to stand it would appear again.
Then there was a black snake with tiny little white marks on it. The marks turned out to be little diamond shapes I found out later. It too was deadly. A young man who was part of the group grabbed it, not paying any attention to how the man had been trying to teach us. The young man looked vicious and was up to no good. He looked a bit like an actor from East Enders (young ex army bloke). He wanted to be bitten by the black snake and he was. The snake unhinged it's jaws and opened them wider and wider until it sort of swallowed and bit most of the young mans arm, but across the arm, not with the arm going down into the body of the snake like you expect. After a short time the snake had put so much venom into him they had merged into one being. He came over to me and before I could get away he grabbed me. His arm was turned into the body of the snake, and now I could see the little diamonds. The arm/snake made a kind of bite on my arm. Then there was a dressing type arrangement where the wound was and the arm/snake was attached to my arm through this dressing. I was stuck to the man/snake.
The first man who had been teaching us how to catch snakes came up behind him trying to help me and to prise the snake/man off me. I looked at him briefly trying not to let on that he was there. For a split second I saw his head morph into the brown/tiger snake and back. He had let himself been taken over by the brown snake in order to defeat the black snake. But unlike the young man he was in control of his snake self and would be able to take an antidote/anti venom and turn himself back. The young man/black snake was going to die but I needed to be prised free first. It was quite scary, but I knew I'd be all right in the end. Very graphic images, probably doesn't come across as well in the relating...

2007-03-21T06:27:00.000-07:00

Dream 35: Reckless Driving
I was driving with P in the car we are currently borrowing, as sporty little red number. It/me kept going too fast. It was night and we went past some road works, they had hurdle-like structures blocking the two inside lanes and we were following a line of cars in the outside lane. Later in the dream we were at the same roadworks. Again it was night, but as we moved into the outside lane there was a hurdle barrier there too. The car in front crashed into it and I swerved to avoid it, but ended up running into the middle lane and crashing through a whole row of barriers. They were red a white striped, quite thin bits of wood which were flying off in all directions as I was still going too fast.
We came to the end of the road works after I been through all the barriers. And surprise, surprise a police car was behind us, pulling us over. One policeman approached my window, I was thinking of getting out, but you're not supposed to do that these days, plus it was raining, dark and cold (your average English evening!). I pushed the button to open the window and the policeman said he just wanted to ask me if I'd dropped my wallet. He showed me a black wallet and a very cheap plastic camera. He said he'd found them back on the road. I said they weren't mine. As he turned to go he said I thought you might be drunk, but your obviously ok, then he left.
I was very relieved! As we drove off I said to P about the policeman thinking I was DUI. We were going over a bridge which was one of those with large iron girders up the side and across the top (there's probably an proper name for them), with a single lane. I was saying to P that the brakes seemed to be a bit funny as the car kept going too fast then I couldn't slow down in time. Just as I was remarking about this we zoomed up to a truck in front and banged into the back of it. It jolted the truck forward and it sped up. We were jolted too, but there was no damage to the car. I tried to steer it straight and apply the brakes, but it was slow to respond.

2007-03-19T06:45:00.000-07:00

Dream 34: A Hairy Affair
Sorry I haven't put anything up for a while. I've been under some stress the last couple of weeks and my dreams have been hard to grasp. I've been tending to wake up thinking of real life problems and any dream images disappear immediately.
One has stayed with me though! Last week the boiler decided not to work just when I had planned to shave my legs, underarms etc. I went to bed that night and dreamt that I was to appear in a show. I was putting on my costume which was a beautiful cream silk number, full evening gown with little straps and so forth. When I looked in the mirror my underarm hair was hanging down over the sides of the dress. I lifted my arms to see these enormously long and bushy growths of hair. I was horrified because I didn't have time to do anything about it and my role was meant to be of an upper class lady hosting an important function, involving lots of open armed gestures where my underarm hair would be on full display. I was desperately trying to work out how I could do it without showing the hair when I woke.
I don't really mind underarm hair actually, but this was in the realm of the werewolf as only dreams can provide!

2007-03-05T01:49:00.000-08:00

Dream 33: Starsky, bird poo and criminals
Starksy's car (the one with the white stripe) was covered with thin brown blankets and dust cloths. The white stripe was in tact but the rest of the panels were battered and rusted and in desperate need of replacement. He drove into a car park (parking lot as per USA) and I went over to meet him. He was explaining about the car as I leaned in through the passenger side window. I peaked under the bonnet covers. There was no bonnet just a very impressive engine which had a large piece sticking up in the middle towards the back. It would have obscured the driver's view but somehow it didn't once you were driving. The whole engine was immaculate, shiny bright spotless silver metal which looked powerful and ready to go.
Apart from being there to have his car panels fixed we were also there on a case. We had to scatter breadcrumbs around several parking spaces to encourage birds to come and also to crap. The criminal we were trying to lure was an obsessive compulsive and not only hated mess he had a phobia about birds and somehow he was going to incriminate himself if we got the birds to do their thing. There were buildings connected to the car park, so some parking spaces were connected to certain buildings, some offices some dwellings, a bit like a motel but not. Other parts of the car park were just for visitors or general parking. We scattered some bread around specific car spaces where we knew the criminal would be parking. Then we went back to Starsky's car. He was sitting in the passenger side this time and I lent in the window and we kissed (very nice it was too!). I wasn't his cop partner I was his girlfriend, but I'd been brought in to help him with the case so we could look like a couple in the car park when our target showed up.
He did show up. He was also with a woman. They got out of their car, which was parked in a different spot to the ones where the bait was. We started to follow them. We got closer to where the birds had been eating the bread and had actually started to drop their droppings. The man sensed something was amiss and he veered off to the side down a grassy slope towards some buildings. Starsky stayed following the woman and I peeled off to follow the man. He took a step as if he was about to make a break for it and run off, but he stepped into a small hole in the grass and fell. I jumped on him and held his ankles together very tight so he couldn't move. I yelled 'Starsky, Starsky'. He came running over.
Then other police materialised. The problem was that although the guy had sensed the trouble and was about to run away we hadn't actually caught him doing anything except tripping on a grassy slope. But we knew he was a bad criminal God-dammit! I was still holding tightly to his ankles while we discussed what to do.

2007-03-02T02:42:00.000-08:00

Dream 32: Lobsters, Crabs and a Horse
P and I were on a beach. I was on a horse and there was a kitchen set into the rocks at the end of the bay. P was trying to catch lobsters at the shore but was getting into all sorts of trouble and was afraid of being snapped by their pincers. There were quite a lot of them with some very large crabs too and they were very lively.
I got off my horse and went to the beach kitchen. There wasn't a stove as such, just the rocks to cook on, but they were hot enough. There were two enormous steel pots and I started to brew up a vegetable stock on one. The other was to have boiling water for the lobsters and crabs. P wanted me to help him catch them but I wasn't going to eat them and I didn't want to be party to killing them either. He was holding my horse and there was a huge crab close on the left on a ledge of rocks. P was trying to reach it. He was going to take the horse over towards it, but I was worried the horse's nose would be pinched by the crab and he'd run off. P held the horse's reins at arms length and tried to grab the crab. He had no idea how to get hold of it and it was snapping away at everything. It had the usual claws but also some extra ones and some very long legs and antennae like things as well. It's body was huge. P was leaping around trying not to get caught and trying to keep the horse away as well.
I then had to scoop some of my vegetable stock into his pan because he wanted some extra flavour although I didn't think he should boil them in my stock and I wasn't sure what else I was going to eat. The stock was pretty thin with not many vegetables in it and I thought the whole meal was going to be a disaster.

2007-02-24T23:38:00.000-08:00

Dream 31: Weird Operations
I was in a hospital and was being shown revolutionary techniques which reduced bruising and swelling and vastly aided recovery after operations. A woman came out, she said she’d had a lump on her spine. She had a normal head but then she was just a spinal column. The vertebrae only, covered in skin as normal but there was no other body there at all (no organs either) and the spine just went down to her pelvic bones. She did have arms and on the top around the biceps and triceps were a series of tubes. They were made from her own skin and they wound out and back into her arm in a tangled confusion like very large fat tubular spaghetti. The tubes were about two or three centimetres in diameter and there was series of switches and taps which regulated them. It seemed to filter the blood and other body fluid so eliminating the swelling and bruising. It was fascinating, very graphic and real, but when I woke up I also realised it was a bit weird.....

2007-02-24T23:37:00.000-08:00

Dream 30: Celebrity Come Pooing
P and I were taking part in the Celebrity Come Dancing event. We were in a large hall with a big dance area and were being put through our paces with other couples. The dance floor was covered in water so we were dancing in the water as well as on the floor. I really needed to poo, but we had one more dance to do. A bit of poo dropped out of my bum (no knickers!) and on to the dance floor. It was floating around for all to see. Then another bit dropped out while I was trying desperately to stop it. There were then several little brown lumps floating around the dance floor, but they weren’t all mine I was sure. It was impossible to tell where they had come from but Bruce Forsyth came up to me to accuse me and started having a big rant. I thought, oh no I’ve blown it in the celebrity community now.

2007-02-21T20:54:00.000-08:00

Dream 29: Peace in Wales
I seemed to spend nearly all my sleep-time dreaming last night. The first was an enormously long complicated affair involving gangs, fights, loads of violence in general, and some criminal activities. I can’t really remember the details now but it was certainly entertaining. There was an interlude in the middle where my dreaming took me on a very different path but that too has gone because I was woken sharply by a noise, which is frustrating...
The next dream involved me and P coming home from somewhere, we were walking down a street laughing conspiratorially as if we’d got away from something we hadn’t been enjoying by making our excuses. It was the sort of relief you get when you’ve been bored to death by an event or party and have managed to leave early but fairly graciously.
We walked past a bus stop. There was an old man with grey stubble on his head and face. He had piercing blue eyes and was full of malice. He stuck his leg out at us but Paul pushed him back, quite viciously.
Next thing we were in a lounge room. The old man was sitting in one armchair right next to us on the couch. Another man was sitting beyond and next to the old man. He was like the big boss. It had the feel of the mafia and the old man was the tough guy. We talked for some time and I realised that P was paying money to their syndicate. I then had a recollection in the dream of some of the direct debits from his account, there was a close up of a bank statement with various debits which I scanned. There was one I always assumed was something else but it was connected with this group. I couldn’t believe P would be involved in anything criminal and/or violent so I wanted to see what it was all about. The old man was trying to menace and threaten us. He asked some question and I replied that perhaps he was too old to be the hard man and that he was pretty ineffectual if his display at the bus stop had been anything to go by. I thought P would back me up, but he diplomatically side-stepped the issue and tried to get onto why we were having the meeting. There was more cryptic chat between the boss and P. It turned out that the fund P had been contributing to was for Peace in Wales. I thought: I didn’t know Wales was at war or under any sort of siege, but it seemed like a good cause and at least it wasn’t funding drug running or something.

2007-02-08T19:36:00.000-08:00

Dream 28: Sushi in the Pool
We were settling into a new house so things were a bit chaotic. We had moved near my family so various family members were milling about (some were more or less like my real family some weren’t). My dream mother announced that they were planning a wedding for us, even though we were already married. To me this just seemed an unnecessary addition to the confusion of setting up a new home.
I went to collect a car. I was my (real) old car which I had sold. I parked the car outside and visited a pool seemingly attached to the new abode, but also part of a resort or hotel. It was pretty busy. I got back to my bedroom and there were two wedding planners there. They had strewn stuff all over the floor in amongst the boxes and general unpacking. I was commenting that our wedding should be easy since we were already married and I didn’t want the usual dresses and so on. The assistant said she had just the thing for me and pointed to a pile of clothes on the floor. They looked like fairly ordinary clothes in blues and greens. She also had a single yellow flower wrapped in a large amount of tissue paper. I couldn’t see enough of the flower to identify it and then she hid it from me, presumably saving it for the ceremony. I started to go out of the room thinking that I wouldn’t worry about the wedding, I’d just turn up and see what happened. Except that I wanted to check with the woman in charge that God was not to be involved or mentioned in any way.
I went back to the pool for a quick dip. It was early evening and getting dark so I was hoping it would be quiet. But it was even busier. There were lots of young people there. One girl was done up in professional looking togs, cap, goggles but she looked nervous. She did a kind of flat back dive and flipped around so her head almost hit the side. I thought she needs someone to show her how to do it properly or she’ll really hurt herself. I walked round the other end to find a spot to get in and swim. Another sporty young woman was sitting on the edge on a towel near the steps, there were a few others with her. As she was sitting there she was doing back somersaults and landing back down seated. Every time she did it there was a slapping sound. It was irritating and she looked like she would do damage to herself, but she thought it was funny.
I hadn’t brought my goggles as I was just going for a dip. I got in but was forced to swim underwater to avoid all the others. There seemed to be legs everywhere. Then I ended up doing a weird style of doggy paddle so I could see and swim and avoid everyone else. It was most unsatisfactory.
When I got down towards the far end, I realised why the pool was so busy, it was Sushi Night. They had these large pale wooden structures which were temporary benches and tables with rows and rows of sushi bowls. The bowls were blue and white, a cross between Chinese and Japanese styles. Each structure had five or six rows of benches on top of each other so they went quite high and there were quite a lot of the structures around the end of the pool. The effect was hundreds of sushi bowls in rows both along and up like some giant sculpture or installation. Only a few people were actually eating, although most in the pool would probably eat later. I swam around the back of one of the structures in a queue of people. We went past a serve yourself coffee area with biscuits and cakes, all still in the pool. Although I was just trying to swim I glanced at an unfortunate cookie thing which had seen better days and somehow ended up with it in front of me on a plate.
Later I was back in the car with P. I started to reverse, but it was slightly out of control and I looked forward to see my old car setting off and turning right at the end of the road. That was supposed to be the car I was driving. The one I was actually driving was similar but not the same. As I was still reversing I was saying to P that the keys must be so alike they worked enough to open the door and start the car, but they were making it drive oddly. I wanted to stop and go forward to catch the other car and swap over. I was slowing down trying to stop us continuing back when a man’s face loomed large in the opposite back window and said you’d better stop there. There was a car behind. I was in the process of stopping when a real life noise outside, which sounded remarkably like a small crash, woke me!

2007-02-07T04:56:00.000-08:00

Dream 27: Murder and snippets
There's been a bit of a hiccup in the posts. Been travelling, not able to access the net and so forth. Also my dreamworld has been disrupted because of the travelling, sleeping in strange rooms and keeping odd hours...
Here are some snippets I can remember from dreams over the last couple of weeks.
I was backstage during a theatre show and I saw a women murder someone. She didn't see me. She was ruthless, efficient, strong and deadly! I think she cut the person's head off, but that scene is hazy now. I was very scared not only for myself but for the rest of the cast. I manage to tell each of the cast and crew about her. Later we were inside a very large shipping container. It was open on one side and we were on a beach with the sea lapping close by. Some of the cast had killed the murderer. She was in various pieces, head, arms, legs etc with quite a lot of gore involved. They were trying to squash bits of her into various boxes due to be shipped. There seemed to be more bits of her than for just one body and finding hiding places for her was tricky. A couple of the actors were trying to dissolve some of her in barrels (of acid presumably). I was worried about getting caught, but I also objected to them killing her. They said it was justified because she'd killed the other person and would have gone on to murder the rest of them. I didn't agree saying it made us just as bad as her.
In another dream snippet I was arrested by the police (not related to the above!) but it was a very odd interrogation involving machines and things. It was discovered I was pregnant and I ended up in a hospital, being examined by more strange machines and passed from one department to the next. There was some mystery about having become pregnant and what exactly I was carrying, it not necessarily being a human embryo.
A further snippet involved my sister in what looked like an old fashioned bell diving suit although it was meant to be very high tech. She had to dive into a large area of recycled water, but it was basically sewerage.
I know I had some other interesting dream escapades, but they elude me now. I hope to get back on track with remembering and recording so please stay tuned.

2007-01-15T12:54:00.000-08:00

Dream 26: Huge Waves and a Cruise Ship
I've been travelling for a few days, not much sleep and no dreams to speak off. Last night I returned to dream world though.
I was walking along a cliff looking down on to a beach. I was with someone, possibly a sister (not a real life one). The waves were quite big but they were building up close to the shore and dumping straight down, crashing on the shore but not travelling up the beach very far. We were commenting that they weren't very good for surfing. There were some people in the water but the waves were becoming more fierce. We reached the beach and started to walk across the bay. The waves were getting larger and larger. We had to walk further up the beach closer to the bottom of the cliff surrounding the bay. A wave crashed very close to us and we had to scramble up the rocks. There were other people trying to escape from the increasing severity of the sea.
We were almost at the top of the cliff by this time and someone shouted that a huge wave was coming. I looked to find strong hand holds on the cliff thinking I was glad I'd had a bit of climbing experience. I was shouting to people around me to get a good hold and grab on tightly. We could see the wave coming. Then it was on us swamping and pulling at us with enormous force. I was yelling at those around to hang on, but also being buried under the water. The wave pulled back a bit and I was aware of an ocean liner, a popular cruise ship being pushed slowly towards us. It was in the next bay but by now were were at the edge of the cliff which adjoined the bay. Another wave was coming in and the liner was going to be carried into the cliff and into us. The wave hit and I was deluged with water, catching glimpses of the ship crashing into the cliff and bodies being dragged off by the water.
Next I was looking down at a small man who had survived the ship wreck. The man was actually me and I was from Singapore. I was watching the man but also being him as the press surrounded him/me to ask me how I had survived. I didn't know if there were other survivors. I remembered what had happened but was very disorientated and I didn't want to speak to the press.

2007-01-05T04:19:00.000-08:00

Dream 25: Arriving Home
This dream involved P and I arriving back at our flat where our friend J had been house-sitting. She explained there had been a few changes. The flat was nothing like any real-life home we've had and was full of people. One of the rooms, which had been spare and had been a connecting room to another flat, was now a band green room and the connecting room was a bar complete with band playing. There were some Jamaican musicians milling around and I could see and hear a sax player blasting out in the bar room.
The lounge room was converted into a bedroom with a double bed and single bed next to it acting as a sofa. J was asking me if I had something, she used a word I'd never heard before and went on to explain it was a type of camp or temporary bed. There was yet another person who needed to be put up. I was extremely jet-lagged and becoming stressed and upset by all these people in our flat. I went to the kitchen and J explained they were preparing a curry to welcome us home. I told them to make sure there was no meat in mine. P came up and produced two tickets to a show. It was for that night and I told him firstly we were too tired and secondly they had this meal planned. I spent the next while wandering about the flat trying to find familiar things. People kept approaching me and asking all sorts of questions. The feel of the place was extremely chaotic and I was getting quite ratty with people, but then explaining I'd spent 24 hours on a plane and I was jet lagged. I went out for a while then came back when dinner was ready.
There were loads of people at this dinner and the curry was being served. They were going to just fish out the vegetables from the main curry dish and give me that. I was appalled. I went down to the kitchen to see what J was doing as she's a veggie too. She was starting to prepare her own meal but didn't have enough for two. I was furious. We'd travelled all this way home only to find it overrun with strangers and J hadn't even made sure there was something I could eat. P then came up with some new tickets for an even better show later that night.
I drove off in my car and went into town. It was very busy with people too. I'm not sure what I did there, but then I was driving back towards the flat and on the bend of a small road P and J appeared. P was waving the tickets saying we were going to be late for the show and thank goodness I'd turned up. J was lagging behind and looking out of breath and red in the face as she'd tried to keep up with P (so not like real life!). I said ok give me a minute then drove off back to the flat, leaving them to make their way to the venue, I could feel J was puzzled and annoyed that I wasn't giving them a lift. I did something or other in the flat, I think I bumped into the musicians again, then went to find P and J.

2007-01-05T04:13:00.000-08:00

Dream 24: New Camera Technique
Fellow blogger Cali turned up in my dream with a professional film camera. She took a shot which was only a few seconds long and turned the focus from wide to extreme close up onto a card. On the card was written some pithy, wise statement about life (annoying that I can't remember it now). It was the sort of statement which is witty but also very true and thought provoking.
Cali explained that the camera had very fast film and the shot was taken very quickly, but when it was replayed at normal speed it would be a long slow pan. She also explained that it would be played backwards, which would logically mean you would start off at the card and pan back, but actually in the dream it was somehow the other way round.

2007-01-05T04:04:00.000-08:00

Dream 23: How Many was That?
I was lying in bed counting the number of people I had had sexual encounters with (not including teenage fumbling, just the hardcore ones!). I reached a certain number and thought I'd remembered everyone (there aren't that many, but enough....). Later I suddenly remembered another one. A very clear picture came to me of an encounter with a nice looking bloke on a beach and I thought to myself oh I forgot so-and-so. I was surprised that I'd forgotten and added him to the list. The picture in my mind of the event was so strong it wasn't until last night when I happened to be thinking about it again* that I realised it must have been a dream! I don't know so-and-so's name now and there was no such encounter on the beach (well not with him). It was quite odd because I'd started off thinking about my 'list' while I was awake - I was having trouble sleeping and it came to me for some reason - then I must have fallen asleep and dreamt up another one. I suppose he represents the encounters I've had with dream lovers....
* please note I don't make a habit of this pastime!

2006-12-30T06:59:00.000-08:00

Dream 22: Friends with Diseases and Walking with Parrots
I was looking after a friend who had a degenerative disease. She was sitting in a chair in the TV lounge of my (real life) childhood home. The disease made her limbs wither and become distorted so she was curled up in the chair in an awkward manner. She was sweating a lot and losing fluid from her bladder too and I was trying to get more fluids into her. At one point my Mother came in. She was trying to be helpful, but didn't know enough about the disease so her suggestions and actions we counter-productive and I was getting annoyed.
Later another friend turned up and she too was in the early stages of the same disease. She sat in the other main chair in the lounge room and I was looking at both of them wondering how I could care for them and thinking I might have to make the house an official care home to help them.
In the next part of the dream I was going for a walk. I didn't have my walking boots or appropriate clothing so I didn't want to do a walk involving too much scrambling about or mud. I was wearing my (real life) first pair of leather trousers, burgundy ones with normal shoes. We decided to go on a walk I'd done before because it had a path most of the way whilst still being through nice countryside. When I had done the walk before I'd started at a different point so the first part was unfamiliar to me. The pathway lead off through some open fields then turned into woodland. It was becoming a little muddy, but generally the path held up ok. We then went through another open area which looked like some water works, purifying or something (but not sewerage works). We had to go along a criss-cross of metal walkways and bridges before we got back to the country path again. I was becoming annoyed because we hadn't even got the the part of the walk I knew and that was going to be a few hours from there. I had been led to believe this first part was only short. We went through some more woodland and crossed a small lane into a series of meadows. Again the path wound backwards and forwards and seemed to turn back on itself, making me cross. In the meadow section a loud group of walkers started on the path. Because it was winding back and forth at one point I looked across and a rough-looking woman met my eye. She was ranting about us spoiling their walk by being ahead of them. I wanted to walk faster so they couldn't catch us up later and I didn't want the peace to be spoiled by their shouting and yahooing.
We came to a grassy hill, it was a very verdant green and the grass was long and flowing. One of the lads from the other group had run up behind us. He did a great whoop and launched himself down the slope. He slid all the way down on his back making a dent in the wet grass. I walked carefully and quickly down the slope worried the others would also catch up. My feet were getting wet and muddy, threatening to ruin my leather trousers. I was now annoyed that I started the walk at all since I wasn't in appropriate gear.
We came to another winding path amongst some trees that led into a valley. By the side of the path I saw a large colourful parrot. It was mostly yellow and reds but with some blues and greens as well. It hopped along the branches right next to me. I called to P for him to have a look as it was beautiful and unusual. As I did it jumped up right next to me and started pleading for me to take it further along the path to a spot where it couldn't be seen. It was afraid of the group coming behind us. P was trying to tell me what to do when the bird jumped up onto my shoulder and turned into a woman. She was exactly like the parrot, the same colouring and so on and was quite slim and small. She was balancing on my left shoulder and I was trying to hold her with my left arm bent up around her. She was pleading with me to take her along an unused section of path away from any prying eyes. She wasn't too heavy, but still awkward and bulky to carry in that way. I could feel I was using my back to much to counter-balance the load. I wasn't happy about ruining my back as I was sure I would if I had to go too far, also I felt again that I wasn't dressed right for this type of thing. I contemplated carrying her in a different way but there was some confusion because of her being both a parrot and a human at the same time.

2006-12-29T05:01:00.000-08:00

Dream 21: Bikes, Old Baths and Drama School
This dream was quite a jumble, but I will attempt to put some waking life order into what was dream scape chaos. I was involved with some kind of work, although it had a feel of being at school as well. There were several times I was on a bicycle going either too or from the work/school place. The first couple of times were quite straight forward and involved the odd road from my childhood town as well as familiar roads from Sydney. Then the route was changed due to road works and things became more complicated.
At one point I was in a dilapidated building which housed some old swimming baths. They were being renovated, I think I had something to do with that. Also by this time I was looking for a venue to start a drama school. I was to be a student but also help with setting it up and running it. I was standing at the entrance to the baths and looking across to a cafe on the corner. It was busy and although it looked very basic and run down it was patronised by the trendy, hip, happening crowd.
Then I was on my bike again, I was taking AM (a real life comedian) home, his home, not mine. We had been working together. At first I thought I was giving him a lift on the back of my bicycle, but when we got to the roadworks and took a detour, he showed me another detour and I realised he had his own bike. We ended up at the rundown but trendy cafe, he was a regular there. I went in and tried to order something. A woman was trying to explain where the baths were. I thought they were across the road where I'd been before, but the orientation was wrong, she pointed towards another road. There was an enormous pile of rubble like a bombed out building, behind that was the old baths, I recognised the clock tower structure and the green plaster, but it also had bricks and parts of the building missing.
Next I was trying to attend a drama class there were a lot of people milling about but no one knew what was happening. LL (real life drama teacher) turned up and took a group away. We exchanged looks. Later again I had grabbed some black grapes and was in the street. P was relating a story as we went along. We came to a door and I knocked, just as P was getting to the climax of the story the door was opened by LL and I spilt some of the grapes. I was saying sorry to P and to LL at the same time. I went into the hallway and still saying sorry to LL's withering look I asked if I could use the 'phone. I looked back at P who was looking puzzled and still trying to finish his story. I apologised again. LL indicated the phone and scowled at me. When he answered the door his chest was bare, as I picked up the phone he turned around and I realised he was completely naked and had probably come out of the shower to answer the door. The 'phone call was important, to do with the drama school I think. P tentatively stepped in through the door too. Then LL's two children turned up and we were all squashed into the hallway. LL came back and it was even more crowded as I tried in vain to make the call.

2006-12-27T07:01:00.000-08:00

Dream 20: Domestics
My recent dreams have been what I term the domestic kind. A lot about food, making it, finding it but not actually eating it! Also lots of arranging going on, sorting things out, cleaning and so forth... Last night I dreamt I was staying with some people and I kept going through their cupboards to find things to eat, a lot of cereal was involved but there was still nothing suitable. I'd also started a job in an office and there were new things to learn, although I was also teaching them what I could do. I had an old (real life) car with me. I had it back in the early 90's and it was literally held together with car putty. In the dream it needed some tyres and I had to find some software for an upgrade, but because the car was so old I had trouble getting hold of a program which was compatible. Rather mundane I'm afraid, can't have amazing adventures all the time I suppose....

2006-12-20T06:32:00.000-08:00

Dream 19: A Dickensian Tale?
Snippet from a longer dream: there were several of us sitting in a large lounge room or common room. There were French doors at the end and it was light and sunny. We were listening to a story narrated by Linda Smith. It was very much like a Dickens story with lots of colourful characters and rich language, but it was set in modern times. Linda was doing the voices. As she spoke the character she was portraying appeared in the lounge room with us. They would speak with Linda's voice and then go quite or disappear during the narration. There was an old man sitting opposite me and another woman. He was in a special chair, there was something wrong with his spine which made him bent over, in the chair he was on his back with his knees bent up to his chest. At first he seemed to be one of the group who were listening to the story, but then the narration started to describe him. He was a very heavy smoker, but because of his condition he could no longer smoke via his mouth. He had to smoke by inserting the cigarette in his bum hole. We couldn't see it in gory detail thank goodness, but he had on green trousers with a cigarette poking out from a strategically placed hole in the crotch of the pants. The man seemed perfectly happy with the arrangement. I exchanged looks with the woman sitting on the couch with me. We both smiled ruefully at the scene.

2006-12-17T10:08:00.000-08:00

Dream 18: A Tiger and An Iron
I woke around 5.45 this morning and had a think over the dream - bit weird even by my standards. I went back to sleep and did some more dreaming but it's the first one which has stayed with me.
I was in a house somewhere warm and sunny. There was a plague of tigers in the area and we had to take measures to keep them away. At some point I went out of the house, I told them to keep it locked but when I got back there was a tiger inside. The tiger was a pretty poor specimen. It was quite small and scrawny, more the size of a malnourished cheetah. It did have tiger-like stripes on its coat but it was generally darker and more dull than the usually magnificent creatures. I think it had to do with there being so many of them, they were poorly made so to speak.
I tried to lure the tiger out of the house as I was standing by the back door. I was holding an over sized clothes iron, about three times bigger than normal, very new and modern looking. The tiger came cautiously to the back door and peered around it. I had the iron out in front of me pointing it at the head of the tiger. He moved out of the house, I slammed the door shut and proceeded to attack the animal with the iron. I didn't see the actually killing of the poor thing in the dream but later all that was left was a long tangled stringy bit of skin, flesh and tiger fur. I threw it out into the back recesses of the garden and a domesticated pet (a non specific dog or cat like animal) chased after it.

2006-12-14T05:09:00.000-08:00

Dream 17: Woody Allen and East Enders
I went to the theatre to see a Woody Allen show, it was a play and film mixed up together. The outside of the theatre had a facade built especially for the show it was a cartoon castle in the style of Monty Python's Holy Grail.
After I'd seen the show I was on the location set of East Enders. Initially it was only the cast and crew on what was a purpose built set, but later it became an ordinary street with the general public milling about it numerous quantities. The director either knew me or took a shine to me and wanted me to be in a scene where two of the young female leads were to have a big fight, screaming, hair-pulling the lot. They were rehearsing in part of the street. I was to be close by as a featured extra. But then Woody Allen turned up to watch the proceedings. I commented that I’d just seen his show. My part was then extended to me saying ‘Have you seen Dr Phu and Miss Mu? You really must.’ Thereby giving a plug to Mr A’s show. By now there were loads of people and the cast and crew were having trouble getting organised. I went to find make-up but was unsuccessful. Woody was sitting at a table, like a high table at school or a wedding, he was chatting with some VIP’s. I went back to the set but they were far from ready to shoot the scene.

2006-12-13T06:54:00.000-08:00

Dream 16: The Affair
I had this dream a few days ago. I half jokingly accused P of having an affair. He went berserk (which he doesn't do in real life)! He was very angry and ranting on and on about how could I possibly accuse him of such a thing and how could I doubt his love for me. It went on for quite some time with me trying to say it was really only a joke. We were still arguing later in the dream while I was in the back of a car and he was outside doing something in the boot. I was crying and looking at him through the window. I said this is so stupid we're arguing about how much we love each other! He came around and into the back seat, he was crying too and saying how much he loved me and me him, then we hugged. Domestic bliss restored, ah.

2006-12-09T05:36:00.000-08:00

Dream 15: Time Traveller
I was sitting in a shed with an older man (I was also a man). We had both seen the film 'Back to the Future' and knew this was the machine they had used but it had been re-vamped since the last time and the people who used it were long since gone. We knew the film, but also knew it had been used for real, but we weren't sure what it entailed. We discussed our plan and I predicted what the future spot would look like, I said something like 'Rain forest, concrete, forest, ice and...' not sure what my final category was.
We started the machine and I said I wasn't sure if the shed was going to have to go at 80mph (or whatever it was in the film) and then have to be fired by a huge surge of electricity from lightening. The shed didn't seem to be kitted out for this so we thought it wouldn't work. But the modifications proved good and we suddenly started to shake and travel rapidly through time. The first thing we saw through the window was rain forest! And I said 'I told you there'd be rain forest.' We sat there watching the window intently. The rain forest gave way to a plantation of banana style plants but they were deformed and wizened. This gave way to a more temperate forest, less moisture and exotic plants but this enormous tree trunk filled the window and there were these large brown tubular growths, they were soft like felt and hung down from the tree and grew very dense as if the tree had dreadlocks. The scene was extremely vivid, like a super fast time delay film when watched back. The browns and greens of the forest were so verdant and beautiful. There was an enormous hill of soft reddy-brown soil which seemed to constantly build it self and be sliding down its own side. I wasn't sure how we got to be at the bottom of such a seemingly huge valley, but we could only see the parts framed by the window so it was hard to tell the bigger picture.
I don't know how far we set the time machine into the future but it seemed to be several hundred or even thousand years. We stopped and next thing I knew I was standing in a forest clearing. Our shed was in amoungst some trees with it's side down flat on the ground. There was a larger old shed next to it, still in tact and I thought to myself 'oh there are still some buildings left.' I then looked around thinking we could be the only humans around, but before I could get my bearings I saw some tall medieval looking figures clad in white-ish thick weaved course robes and with long grey beards. There were some smaller figures with them as well. They were on a small ridge just above the clearing and as soon as they saw us they raised their arms aggressively, some may even have had weapons. The leader marched quickly along the ridge towards us. I shouted 'It's OK we come in peace...' I was going to say more and do submissive body language, but the leader had reached the edge of the ridge pathway at a point where it joined another sloped path down to the clearing. He interrupted me shouting 'I hope you brought the stone!'
I realised we were expected and my stomach sank as I thought what stone? But then I vaguely felt something in my left trouser pocket and a picture of a large gleaming green emerald came into mind. Just as the leader stepped onto the second path he disappeared as if the ground had swallowed him up. The other figures like him kept disappearing too. We were left looking a these little dark blue figures not much bigger than knee high. They were odd looking things as if they'd been melted down from something larger. They had elongated rounded heads as if pointed English Bobby's helmets had been pressed onto them then grown there over generations. They didn't wear clothes but their bodies seemed to be made up from shrunken plasticated material like a uniform of some kind with belts, badges and pockets which were flat now and just part of the design (I'm struggling to describe them as you can tell). Very odd little creatures some of which had blazing bright red eyes and others had glowing dark green bits. Some were carrying skateboards made from the local wood. A few jumped on them and came down towards us, we swatted a few away and I contemplated grabbing a skate board myself and using it to escape. But we were on a leaf covered forest floor and nearly at the bottom of the slope. The little Bobby's were shouting things at us about the stone. We wanted to know where the men in white had gone to.
Then a few normal sized people appeared. One was a pretty young teenage girl in a rustic red dress. Someone told her to sing her song. She sang something like 'When you are young in a time like now, two men will come to see. One will like you' (at this point she looked coquettishly around at me and I realised I did like her very much) ' and they will see that the stone belongs to you'. She was singing and making her way further into the forest as we followed. Up ahead there was a large water hole which looked wonderfully idyllic. I was entranced with the girl as she sang, and a rustic voice came from behind me 'ah you sang that beautifully my dear'. Just as I was starting to enjoy the fantastical forest and the story unfolding... inevitably I woke up.

2006-12-06T04:19:00.000-08:00

Dream 14: Musical Fat Boy and New Driving Techniques
My dreams the last few days have been jumbled around, hard to grasp or had rude awakenings where you loose the lot in one swift inconvenient, untimely ring of the doorbell!
Today I was interrupted (doorbell-wise) twice, but I have managed to hang on to the following bits.
There was a hugely fat boy, in his teens. He was turned sideways facing his right so I could only see his left side and the outline of his enormous frame - think Richard Griffiths only even more so. He was emanating music. We were unable to control the music type or level and I couldn't work out what it had to do with the boy or how, but he did seem to be a human duke-box. He kept re-appearing in different parts of my dream and I kept trying to figure out why. He was playing music I didn't always recognise, mostly current stuff I suppose.
Then I was in a cross between an insurance company and auto service/repair centre. They were going on about car insurance and security to a group of us. They wanted us to get changed for a practical session which would show us a driving technique that was illegal in some countries. We got changed into bikinis and trunks for the blokes. I was wearing a (real life) bikini I had when I was a teenager. It was a mid blue colour and the pants had lost some of their elasticity so were a bit floppy, not about to fall off, but not far from it.
We were driven to these simulators to practice the new technique. You had to pull the brake lever and gear stick back together in a certain way which meant you didn't need to use your foot brakes. I said to P it wouldn't work for us because we drove a Volkswagen and he agreed. Since the technique was illegal in Germany the gear and brake lever were in different places rendering the technique impossible. P went off to a second simulator to have a go, he seemed quite keen, I couldn't see the point. I sat on a step at the edge of a simulator and watched some of the others have a go. The seat was on a rail, like a rowing machine and it slide back as you pulled on the two levers simultaneously while releasing a catch on the break lever at the same time. Some people took a while to get the hang of it. I was thinking maybe this was some advanced driving technique it would be handy to know, then I thought I'd never use it, I'd rather just use my brakes and surely the bit of wear saved on the brakes would be countered by the extra wear and tear on the hand brake and gear stick. Then I thought about car chases and wondered if the technique was part of a handbrake turn, but then I thought it was unlikely I would ever be in a car chase let alone in a car which happened to have the right gear and brake lever. P came back he'd had a go, but I had decided not to. We got into the cars again and they drove off, I was worried they were taking us home without us changing and collecting our things, but then they doubled back.
Later we were trying to tune the TV into a special channel showing exclusive programmes. The fat boy re-appeared a couple of times with his music. We watched the programmes for a while then I was in another house and they were picking up snippets of the exclusive channels as well, which they weren't supposed to. There was a security check going on and we wandered from house to house checking out our neighbours arrangements, it was all quite friendly. I was in someones kitchen just off the lounge room. A man came in through the front door into the lounge area and I went to talk to him. He said, 'I know this house is secure, but I just wandered straight in and I have the police outside.' Then the doorbell rang again....

2006-12-02T08:09:00.000-08:00

Dream 13: Winning an Award
I was at an award ceremony like the Brits but it was something else, quite prestigious. I'd been nominated last year but hadn't won. I'd been nominated again this year along with others of course, for Best Actress. There was another woman in the running whom it was assumed would win. In fact she was acting like she'd already won and was swanning around being a luvvie and visiting the tables of other famous actors. I was at the back of the room watching her and others. I thought she would probably win but was secretly wishing she wouldn't because of her behaviour.
Then came time for the presentation and I won! It was great, the other actress was astounded and really put out, but the applause for me was long and warm. Everyone saying I deserved it seemed genuine. I was given an odd necklace-type affair. It was two long straight strips of some semi-precious metal which went across my chest with a clasp holding the strips together with an emblem of the award on it. When you released the clasp the metal unfolded to form a large square which went across my chest, down each side of my torso and then across my stomach. The square was made up of strips of the metal but also had links in between. I had to wear this everywhere I went as holder of the award. It was rather cumbersome and kept getting in the way.
There were some other bits to the dream but they're lost to me now.

2006-11-29T08:34:00.000-08:00

Dream 12: Home Freezing and Strangling
I was at my childhood home in Harrogate, most aspects of the house were quite accurate considering it was a dream version of the house. There was a huge space project being conducted near where we lived. At one point I think I went into the building where some of the program was being carried out. It was an enormous warehouse/hanger type affair with James Bond style gizmo's tootling about the place and lifts up to various levels which housed numerous secret activities.
Then I was back at home and two men were in the lounge room. They were secret police attached to the space program and they were keeping an eye on us. I went into the hall and as I turned around I felt this blast of cold air. P was coming downstairs and was almost at the bottom, his Mum (she didn't look anything like his real Mum) was just going from the dining room into the lounge room. As I looked around we were all frozen completely stiff then I lost consciousness. We were frozen for several years. Occasionally we were aware, I could see P and his mum stuck in their positions. My vision was as if I was inside a thin block of ice. Another time I was aware of some minute movement. P's mum seemed to be moving very slightly, a few inches maybe per month or even per year. Eventually she disappeared.
Finally we were unfrozen. It was decades later. We had all aged, but at only a fraction of the rate we would have done normally. Unfortunately P's mum had died. Which is why she had disappeared. But someone was explaining that she'd fought against the freeze. She knew she was going to die and she somehow managed to move herself towards the dog in the lounge room. When she died her spirit went into the dog. I didn't know where the dog had gone, but I tried to comfort P by telling him what happened.
I went out to find some food. There was a market outside with loads of food stalls. Everyone was milling about and feeling hungry, we'd all been frozen for years. I met my brother (not the same as my real one), he had lost a lot of his hair, but his face had not aged at all. He was loading up the boot of the car with food. I went to get some chicken for P. There was a fried chicken stall, but next thing I knew I was working there and trying to serve customers. We were running out of stock and I had to explain that we were expecting a delivery, but that we were dependant on the people controlling the space project (and apparently our lives). I was feeling very hungry myself but didn't want to fast food, especially not chicken (I'm a veggie).
Then I was on a river in a large Canadian canoe following another canoe. There was a secret policewoman in the canoe in front. She was very suspicious of me and kept looking back at what I was doing. I was trying to escape. Several of us wanted to break into the space program building and sabotage the project, and perhaps free ourselves from their grip. The policewoman jumped out of the canoe and swam towards me. She was going to get into my canoe so she could stop me doing whatever I was planning. As she came along side I grabbed her by the throat. She had quite a thin throat and it became pliable, like plasticine. It was effortless to squeeze it and I also held her underwater. Again this was very easy to do, but she took ages to actually die. She didn't struggle but she looked vaguely surprised. Eventually she expired and I paddled over to team up with the other canoe and form a rebel group.

2006-11-24T08:36:00.000-08:00

Dream 11: Mixing with the Famous
I was in a very crowded street with P. We were going to see a film or something. There was a big buzz on the street about a man who was very famous for doing shows. He had opened a new show and everyone was trying to get in or get tickets and they were all talking about it. It was supposed to be his best ever. He was in his 70's by now and there were people criticising as well as praising him. We went past the theatre where the show was actually playing to a more than full house, with crowds milling around outside. People were commenting that he was actually in the theatre now performing to the lucky opening night crowd, someone scoffed saying 'yeah if they actually get to see him'. It was rumoured that he was only making a brief appearance and leaving the rest to trained performers/actors. But it was still a show not to be missed.
Next thing I knew the famous man (seems to be nameless), crossed the road and linked his arm through mine. He was tall and slim with grey hair and very erudite. He had immense charm and charisma. He started to chat to me. We strolled through the crowds, everyone staring at us but not daring to come close. They were in awe of him. I tried to pretend that it was quite normal for me to be walking with him and I was trying not to be all starry-eyed and tongue tied. I listened to him talking and tried to say something intelligent when necessary. I decided not to tell him I was a performer myself but just let him lead the experience whilst I tried to take in as many details as possible to remember later.
We ended up round the side of the theatre. The performance was still going on. He let go of me and went to do something. I was then with his long-term partner (not wife). She took me to see some of the artifacts to do with the show. It was like a souvenir shop, but it was filled with antiques, high quality unique pieces. She was explaining to me what they meant and how much they were worth. She encouraged me to ask questions, unlike him who had just talked at me more or less. I asked her a few questions, she revealed to me how much influence she had on his creativity and really she was a large part of his success, but she didn't mind being in the background in terms of the public. However, friends, producers, directors, performers and so on knew how much input she had. She was saying there was a song in the show which was not going quite right. SW popped up (he was in the shop) and hinted that he was a singer and could have a go. She didn't scoff at him, but almost did, inferring that the performers they engaged had had years of specialised training and the techniques and concepts in the show were highly revolutionary, not seen before. She was about to go and I asked if I could give her our card. P and I handed her our BD&K business card and she said she'd look us up. She actually seemed genuine, she seemed to like us. She drew me aside and told me to go to the scent gift shop. Apparently scents played a large part in the show. They were used to evoke scenes, memories and emotions.
I went into the scent shop. It too was busy with people and filled with hundreds of tiny bottles. People were sampling them. I tried a few. P came in and was horrified that I might buy some scents. He didn't like artificial smells, perfumes and so on, he preferred natural smells. So did I but I was trying to explain these were not perfumes per se, they were smells as part of the show and designed to evoke certain scenes etc. I woke up around this point.

2006-11-24T07:57:00.000-08:00

Dream 10: An Octopus and An Alien
Had this dream a couple of days ago. Very long dream. Started off in a house which was part of a commune or education centre. I was living there and trying to improve my house. There was a small octopus which had attached itself to the outside of one wall. It was getting bigger everyday, it wasn't bothering me that much, except that I wanted to do some renovations on the wall which was in a bad state or repair - boards, missing, broken or worn away and the wall cavity crumbling. One day I noticed the octopus had grown considerably. I went to look on the inside of the wall and it had got several of its tentacles through the wall and folded into the cavity. It would soon be able to get it's whole body through and I was scared it would take over my house or attack me. I went to find some help.
I'm not sure what happened after that, but the next bit I remember was that I was a young girl but an alien on earth. Some people from my species had special powers and I was under close surveillance to see if I would develop any of these powers. I knew inherently that I did. In fact I could be very dangerous to the earth and humans. I was the equivalent of a princess in my species but this had to be kept quiet. I was sent away for many years, to be educated while under the strict control of humans. When older I would be used for mundane work and used by humans for whatever suited them. I played at being a frivolous silly girl, emulating human behaviour, but also pretending I was one of my species who was underdeveloped and would not pose a threat, all the time harbouring the knowledge that I would one day break the hold the humans had on us and reclaim our heritage.
When I was a teenager I was given paper to be filled in. At 18 I would be allowed a visit to my place of birth. All of us were allowed a visit if it was thought we were harmless. I was 16 and it would be two years before I could visit. The papers had the dates clearly marked for my visit. I also had to choose a meal. The menu was in Chinese writing. I wondered how I could possible choose a meal two years ahead and in a language I didn't understand. Also I had special dietary requirements and I didn't know how to ensure I'd get what I needed. In the end I chose something from the pictures of the menu and thought I would sort it out later, besides food would not be the most important thing on my mind at that time.
Another couple of years went by with me trying to keep my true identity hidden. I had no-one to confide in, but I had a feeling that a spirit of camaraderie was flowing through to me somehow from my people, willing me on. Eventually it was time for my visit. But something stopped me from going. The humans were suspicious of me and made me do all these tests. I had to work very hard so as not to be found out, to stop them from seeing deep into my conscious and sub-conscious being and working out who I really was.
Finally I was at the check-in for my trip. The date was nearly two years past my original permit, but they either didn't notice or decided it was all right after being vetted. I continued to play at being silly. I pretended not to know how the system worked and was all giddy and excited about the trip. I let people guide me and tell me what to do and where to do. They were very patronising and derogatory treating me with disdain, because I was a silly alien girl. They showed me the menu again to check my meal. The date had been changed on the menu. It was time to get onto the transport, a cross between a space ship and a plane. I was thinking to myself that I would soon be home. Once there I could engage my powers. It was something to do with being able to find and control all sources of energy, I remember thinking specifically of bauxite, but I think it involved all forms of energy the earth used, oil, ore, solar, wind etc. Once back home I could control all these energies and wreak havoc on earth. I would also take my place as leader amongst my own species. I was trying to decide whether I wanted to destroy earth and the humans, or whether I would just control them and keep them restricted as they had been doing to my people.
Unfortunately I woke up before I got back! Would have been fascinated to find out what happened next.......

2006-11-20T09:03:00.000-08:00

Dream 9: Looking After Billy Connolly
Been having muddled incoherent run of dreams recently. One the other night involved me being a horse, but also being me as a human looking after me as a horse. I was a mixture of bay and chestnut, sort of a mousy colour not normally seen on horses and a bit lighter than the hair on my head. There were various problems finding me a stable, food and so forth.
Last night/this morning had a dream that I was with Billy Connolly, but he was blind. I was trying to look after him, but he insisted on gambling with a group of blokes who were ripping him off. I kept trying to warn him, but I didn't want the guys to know that I knew as we could be in big trouble. Billy kept handing me money and telling me to bet on ridiculous things which the men were making up or were changing the outcome to suit them.
Later I was in a show, we were just finishing and P went up to the compere who was foreign (not sure where from), he didn't speak very good English, other than the script of the show. P was trying to get him to do a special announcement because it was the anniversary of his Mum's death and he want a special memorial message to go out. Then he handed me a bottle of champagne. I didn't think it was appropriate to let off the bottle and besides the compere hadn't finished. But the bottle was all fizzed up and it was about to blow. I turned around and everyone ducked, saying "don't point it at the lights!" I was saying, "I know, I know I'm trying to get it somewhere safe." There was an odd slow motion bit where the cork was coming out and I was moving with the bottle at the same speed as the cork so it would stay in the bottle. I managed it for a bit and then I was chasing the stream of champagne from the cork and trying to get that back in the bottle as well. Anyway I had been able to stop the 'pop' with this technique, so no one in the audience knew what was happening.

2006-11-14T08:25:00.000-08:00

Dream 8: Gigging with Monty Python
I was with the Monty Python team working on a script I'd written. There were various suggestions, disagreements and laughter while we worked. I went with Michael Palin to the hairdressers. We didn't like what they suggested and in the end he left the front of his hair the same and just cut the back part of his hair so it came half way down the back of his head with the rest close shaved. We had some rehearsals and there was a sketch which involved one of my bras (a real life bra - odd little detail). I can't remember the whole sketch now, but everyone thought it would go down very well.
Then we were performing the show to a live audience. I was looking on from the side waiting to go on, with a view of the stage set, the flats, uprights and sand bags holding it all together. Eric Idle was on stage doing something and was going down very well. I went on to do the bra sketch, but it didn't go according to the rehearsals as the Pythons were trying to ad lib to make each other laugh. I came out with a few new lines myself. It was all going well, but then the bra was left on stage when it shouldn't have been. The bra was now larger than in real life. I ad libbed something so I could retrieve the bra, and Eric Idle anticipated what I was going to do and joined in to make the joke even better, saying I know, I know, I know. I was telling someone how great it was to work with such professionals who were comic geniuses... they were not impressed saying that it was arrogant just to go around saying I know I know, but they seemed to have missed the point.
Suddenly I'm back on stage having picked up the bra, I go to leave. But I exit through the wrong door and instead of ending up backstage, I end up in a cupboard with some props and bits of set. I turned round to see Michael Palin in there. He was pulling a silly face - wide eyed surprised but dumb. Then he showed me the bits of his shaved head where he had spots and blemishes. We were both stuck in the cupboard until our next sketch or the end of the show.
The cupboard door opened and the actor who played Fraser in Dad's Army was there. He was a guest in one of the sketches and had to get a board out of the cupboard. He was so surprised to see us and he was very frail that he almost fell and we were worried he'd have some sort of attack or fit. Eric Idle rushed over to cover the gaff, helping Fraser to get the board and get back to the sketch. Then I woke up.

2006-11-09T05:50:00.000-08:00

Dream 7: Toothless
One this morning about losing my teeth. I've had this dream once or twice before, different scenarios, but similar events. One tooth breaks, then another comes out root and all. I've got them in my hand and I start wondering around trying not to panic while I find a dentist, still hoping the problem can be fixed. Then all my other teeth break up or come loose. I've got a mouth full of broken teeth and when I open my mouth all the teeth and bits overspill into my hand. The images are very graphic, with some of the teeth in terrible decay, chipped and brown with rotten roots.
Think I'll just go and floss....

2006-11-06T04:02:00.000-08:00

Dream 6: Golf resort, it's all who you know
I was sent to a golf resort as part of a job/my work (not clear what sort work I was doing). We were each given a room to share, I was with an obese woman in her thirties with dark hair. We were also assigned to a golf pro. I was following mine around the course, she was rather haughty as if such an assignment were beneath her. At one of the greens there was a small group of men watching another of the pros. One of them was SL a well known comedian whom I happen to know. My pro went all gooey say 'That's SL, that's SL'. I told her I knew him, at first she didn't believe me but then she realised I was telling the truth and her attitude towards me improved greatly. I was not impressed.
Later back at the hotel part of the resort I had some difficulties getting back to my room. Then I found that my room-mate was not only pregnant but about to give birth. I helped her through it and then went to the local hospital. When I asked for someone to attend her they said she wasn't on record as being pregnant therefore she can't have given birth. I argued with them thinking there was some mistake because she was overweight, although I couldn't image she did not know she was pregnant herself.
Next thing I'm in a room with some men explaining to me that it had all been faked. It was like a virtual reality set up and they showed me clues. One was when were at a dining table and one of the men now explaining had walked around the table, but he'd suddenly jumped from one spot to another, like a jump cut in a film, or a glitch in the program. I remembered the incident as they showed it to me. Also there were little blobs a few inches high under the table which were controllers of the program and they ran around very agitated when the glitch happened. They showed me a few other instances which I had thought odd at the time.
That's all I can remember now although there were other bits to the dream.

2006-11-05T08:14:00.000-08:00

Dream 5: He doesn't love me anymore!
Rather disturbing dream this morning, the finer details are gone, but the gist of it was that P and I had a dispute. I think I was fed up of doing the bulk of domestic chores and so forth and wanted to be on my own again. I told P I was going to leave. I think I did go, but I'm not sure exactly what happened in the next part. Later I was visiting P, assuming he would still feel the same about me. But he was extremely cold. He didn't care about me at all and though I'd essentially left him I felt abandoned by him. I tried to get his attention and to regain what we had, but he refused. He was a different person. I was left feeling bereft, I'd assumed that he would always love me no matter what. I'd taken it for granted that I could be independent but still basically have his support. I was also upset because he'd changed so much and maybe my callousness was responsible...
Of course I am articulating these feelings rationally now I'm awake but the emotions were all swirling around the events in the dream and that's what I woke up with.
I told P about the dream and of course he comforted me and said it would never happen - that he wouldn't stop loving me... ah, don't you just love a happy ending?!

2006-11-01T09:49:00.000-08:00

Dream 4: Travelling without a ticket? Odd Mechanics...
Was rudely awoken around 7.20 this morning (noises from spouse, upstairs clomping on wooden floor and banging/drilling from renovations in the block over next couple of hours!). Annoying, as it interrupted what was quite a good dream and I lost most of it immediately.
What I can remember was that after various forms of travel (an ongoing dream theme for me) I was going into an underground station. I was following a couple of young blokes and they started to run yelling that we would miss the train. For some reason it was important we catch this particular train and I ran after them. They ran through the barriers without a ticket, I think I already had a ticket or a card to get one, but as I ran after them I was implicated as avoiding the fare as well. Later I was on a platform, having been re-directed to several different ones . A man was telling me that avoiding the fare was very serious and that it had something to do with a ghost spirit of a ghost. I didn't realise that ghosts could have ghosts and he was explaining how it happened and what it meant. I remember thinking it was important and fascinating but that was when I was woken up and it all disappeared.
Had a couple of interim dreams between the noises as above, one involved me staying with the family. My brother-in-law S was fixing up a house and I was trying to find the loo and having to scramble over wood, tiles, flooring etc. My Mother was also borrowing my car although I'd sold it and was having a mechanic 'fix' it even though it was perfectly all right. He was cutting large chunks out of it saying there was rust. The car had bits missing all over it. Both Mother and the mechanic were lecturing me that this was the proper way to care for a car...

2006-10-30T04:36:00.000-08:00

Dream 3: Castle Theme Park, Tidal Waves, Strange Religion
Woke up around 5.40 this morning after this dream - a long one. As with most of my dreams this one was extremely vivid, colourful and full of drama. It's hard to capture the essence of some parts because there was a complexity to it with subtle layers and feelings that are hard to translate into words and waking experiences. Anyway here goes - there were some bits leading up to this but I can only clearly remember from here:
I was in a castle which was like a theme park but more sinister as people were actually trapped in there. It had a medieval feel to it, although there were modern aspects. I seemed to be a teenager. I was going from section to section in the castle. There were rooms where different events took place. They made it very realistic and it was decidedly scary. Some visitors could not work out what to do and ended up being trapped in certain sections. At one point I was caught up in a type of courtroom trial. There were sort of caves or cells in a balcony above the courtroom where all the prisoners were waiting. I was in one of those. There was no front to the cell, no bars or anything. When the prisoners were called forward they went to the front of the balcony or down into the court room. It was very chaotic and there was no law or justice to the proceedings. People in the cells were scrambling with each other to avoid being next in line. The other people awaiting trial were dressed in armour and similar medieval gear. There was a strong sense that we were all doomed. Some officials came to drag out the next victim and I leapt out and down over the balcony. They shouted after me and gave chase. They yelled that I was not allowed to leave and that I must stand trial. As I fled for the door I shouted back that I had a certificate and this seem to confuse them sufficiently for me to make good my escape. I ran into some others who had managed to escape from a different section. We briefly compared notes. They said the hardest section was the dog section, a mental picture of the room appeared and I remembered being in there but working out how to get away. They replied that that part was quite tricky but there was second part to the dog room and another mental picture came to me of the same room but with old fashioned school desks with dogs sitting at them and a dog teacher in mortar board and gown. They told me not to go into that room as it was very difficult to get out and there were people who had been stuck in there for ages, some had gone mad or had given up and were just weeping all the time.
By this time I was in an open area making my way towards a gate. I ran across an official dressed in courtier's clothes, I mean as if he were one of the Kings cohorts, a nobleman of some kind. I thrust a bit of paper at him and said authoritatively 'sign this'. He bumbled and blustered a bit but I said it was my certificate and he had to sign it. There was scroll-work on the top of the paper which seemed to match up with what the nobleman expected. He signed it with a feather pen and I snatched it and ran for the exit. Once outside the whole town had a medieval feel and it was dark. I roamed the streets for some time trying to find a safe way home. I had to be careful not to be seen and I didn't know who was trustworthy or not so it was best to avoid everyone. I finally made it back home and got into bed. Shortly afterwards by parents came home, pretty worse for wear, especially my Dad. I pretended to be asleep but they would have woken me anyway. It was in the early hours of the morning and so they said it was officially my birthday. My Dad had made me a card he said. It was folded small in an odd shape with a bit sticking out. I opened it with dread, thinking my Dad was not a practical man and being drunk he'd probably made a complete mess of it. They both looked on smiling and giggling as I opened it up. It unfolded nicely and turned out to be quite large. It was painted a beautiful deep blue with a vibrant yellow duck on it. Like a cartoon duck. It was very well done and I was surprised and touched. They wished me Happy Birthday and went out.
Later I sneaked out early to go and visit my friend T (a friend from my real life childhood and teenage years). We were walking along some cliffs heading for the town. The cliffs lead down to a bay which we had to cross. T was telling me something complicated, being clever and knowledgeable about it. I was looking out to sea. The waves were enormous. One crashed into the bay and threw up large spewms of spray. But there was an even larger one building up out to sea. It was growing bigger and bigger the nearer it came to shore. I could tell it was going to flood the whole bay and maybe even the cliff top. I stopped and tried to warn T. But she had gone down onto a lower path which lead to the bay. Then the wave thundered in. It swamped the bay and the end of the cliff along from where I was standing, the spray soaked me, but the strongest force of the wave had crashed into the cliff below. The water rapidly receded and I ran to the left edge of the cliff and screamed T's name. I threw myself flat on the ground and peered over the edge to see if I could see her, calling her name all the while. I spotted her on a concrete ledge near some steps. There was a lifeguard hut further down below, although it must have been completely underwater a few seconds ago. I yelled for someone to call an ambulance and then rooted around in my pocket for my mobile. I start to call. Then there was a close up of one of the lifeguards. He was an older man and he was already with T. He had a walkie-talkie phone devise and I could see and hear it ringing as I called him (although I was still up on the cliff I was also seeing him receiving my call).
The next thing there are a few of us on a road with the older lifeguard. He was explaining that T was being taken care of and there was nothing we could do. He suggested going to a late night cafe (it was now the middle of the night again) for something to eat, some suggested chips, I wasn't sure about eating chips so late and also not knowing what had happened to T.
Later again I was with my Mother in a flying machine, I suppose it was most like a helicopter but not. I was trying to help her navigate back to the castle. There was a sense that we were going to rescue someone and we had to be careful not to get caught ourselves. We emerged from a tunnel and immediately came up against the side of a huge round tower. I yelled at Mum to go up! Up! We were very close to crashing. She pulled hard and we rose up the side of the enormous tower, all we could see were the large stone bricks which curved in front of us. Then we were above it and looking down at the whole castle. There was an effigy of a man tied to the bottom of the flying machine. It was about three metres tall and made of stuffed white material like a large tailor's dummy with full arms and legs but no feet or hands. It was made to help us fight. But it had slashes down its arms, legs and body and needed repairing before it could protect us. Somehow it swung out away from under the flying machine and out over the furnace part of the castle. A place we all avoided. It was a large rectangular section with no roof and flames, sparks and burning debris leaping out above the high walls. Our fighter effigy caught fire and fell into the large deep moat surrounding the castle. I shouted to Mum that we had to go and rescue it. Then I woke up.
It was about 5.40am and I lay there thinking about and trying to recall all the parts of the dream. About 5 mins later I got up and made a few notes. When I went back to sleep I had several other smaller confused dreams. The only bit I can remember now was visiting a souvenir shop for a newly founded religion. There were t-shirts, badges, cards and all sorts of the usual tat sold in such shops. Initially the religion was known by the acronym M.O.O.T.S, but while we were in the shop it changed to T.O.O.T.O.S or something like that and all the merchandise had to change itself to the new name.

2006-10-29T07:15:00.000-08:00

Dream 2: Coach Crash
Yesterday's dream - would have done it yesterday, but was having publishing problems!
This is just a snippet from a longer dream which has left me. The bit I remember is going down a road and seeing a coach/bus balancing on top of a lamp post. It teetered there for a while then toppled and fell off. The coach crumpled in a heap in a terrible crash and there were bodies all over the place, crushed in the debris. We ran over to see if we could help any one. There was a man who was badly injured, he was covered in blood and bits of his insides were hanging out. There wasn't much we could do. The scene was very graphic and realistic and one felt helpless trying to comfort the injured people.
Don't remember anything else after that.

2006-10-28T10:20:00.000-07:00

Dream 1: Death, Skeletons, the end of the world, Mohicans and more.
I had this dream a couple of weeks ago and made some notes. Generally I hope to write the dreams up the same day so they are fresh.... This was part of a longer dream. My real life friend SC had died in the dream. I went to the funeral. There was no coffin lid as we gathered at the graveside. People we standing around and grieving. Suddenly S sat up and started groaning. We knew he was dead and it was his body moving about but he looked very funny, his arms and torso jerking about but the expression on his face stayed the same, a haunted very much dead look. People started to giggle and laugh at the spectacle. He was a big joker in real life and everyone agreed it was typical of him to have the last laugh. His body settled back down and he was lowered into the grave.
There was then a close up of his face (as in a film) and he started to rapidly decompose. We saw his flesh melting away to reveal the skeleton, it still looked like S. Then we watched his whole body disintegrate. The skin vanishing to reveal all the muscles in perfect definition, these melted away as well until there was just the skeleton left. It was very graphic and realistic, full colour and minute details, fascinating and horrific at the same time.
Later on in another bit of the dream I was in a large house it was a guesthouse or small hotel and I was with a group of people. There had been a huge catastrophy and the earth was in turmoil as if it was the end of the world. This was one of the few buildings left standing and there were differenct factions, small groups of people who were trying to survive on whatever bit of ground they could keep and protect. Lots of fighting going on with each faction very strict about who was or was not a member. I went out to help protect the house against another faction but found myself becoming part of a different group. Then they too were being chased and I was separated. I ran past buildings which had become piles of rubble and desecrated landscapes. I ran up to a bridge and into a river. I knew the group giving chase would not follow me because they were afraid of the water. For some reason I was able to move from group to group without restrictions. After a while I came across some ‘Mohecans’. They were a small group walking in the river pushing some canoes with a child and their few posessions in them. The chiefs accepted me into the group and gave me a pear to eat. This was a great honour as there was little food around and fruit was even more precious. I accepted the gift and ate some of the pear. It was delicious and juicy. I gave the rest of the pear to the child in the canoe. It had never had a pear before and was very excited, happy and laughing. The adults approved of my gesture and we travelled together for some time.
Later on I was in another house. I was being chased by a hard core violent group. By this time I was very skilled at flight and I came to some stairs. Instead of running up the stairs I was able to jump onto the bannisters and go up through the centre of the stairs jumping and pulling myself up from bannister to bannister. It was very easy, I was fit and effortlessly able to make big leaps and jumps. The people following would not catch me. I reached the top of the stairs and jumped over a railing and up onto a ladder leading to the roof where I could make good my escape to another area. Then I woke up.