Last night in a dream, Freya sent me a joke by email. It went something like this:
A guy has a parrot, an exceedingly rude, obnoxious, foul-mouthed parrot, probably confiscated by PETA from the last peg-leg pirate. The parrot is completely insufferable, the worst thing being that it won't shut up for a second, it spews a steady stream of obscenities like the proverbial faucet. The guy tries everything to make it behave: begging, pleading, threats, spanking, ignoring, fingers in the ears + "La la la, I'm not listening!", hiring a parrot whisperer, he even does a 30-day trial of not cursing himself, to set a good example. Nothing works.
Finally, out of options, short of ripping the parrot's face off, he takes the parrot by the scroat and throws it in the freezer. The stream of verbal abuse is muffled and then a minute later unexpectedly dies out completely. The guy is curious, and a bit worried, so he opens the freezer door. The parrot comes out and apologizes eloquently and profusely, promises it'll never take that tone of voice again and will be the most well-behaved pirate parrot the world has ever seen. The guy is completely mystified. As he picks his jaw up from the floor, then the parrot says, "Just one question. What did the chicken do!?"
And that is the first joke I've ever been told in a dream. Thanks Freya!
Showing posts with label dream. Show all posts
Showing posts with label dream. Show all posts
Thursday, November 8, 2012
Saturday, March 10, 2012
I dream of Dima
I read my dream diary today. I wrote in it on and off for around 6 months, mostly off judging by the amount of dreams recorded, and it is a pile of diamonds in the rough, though quite soft to sleep on. It reads like a collection of sci-fi microstories. Some of the stuff doesn't ring any bells, some sounds awesome and vague memories bubble to the surface, some was written with the wrong side of the pen and requires a seeing paw dog to read, and the rest are written in Dima's* handwriting and will probably never be deciphered. Still, you've got to keep those scientists busy or they get restless, and if there's anything I've learned from sci-fi movies, it's that scientists with free time inevitably end up responsible for a nuclear/chemical/fashion apocalypse.
Favorite quote out of the successfully (and possibly correctly) unscrambled notes:
"Took time slices of two apples to make sure one was traveling."
If only I'd taken a time slice of that dream and stuck it between the pages of the dream diary.
*One of my early childhood traumas. Grandma Mila was teaching me math. I had the makings of a great mathematician, evident in the fact that I wrote all over the page in anywhere but between the lines and all in some futuristic alphabet. Grandma Mila patiently tried to show me the light:
"You write like Dima and Dima writes like an idiot!"
Since then, as much as we love Dima, we can't help but abuse him verbally at each and every opportunity:
"That's not how you cut watermelon! You're holding the knife like Dima!"
"How'd you like my poem?" "You sure Dima didn't write it?"
"Look, everyone's a Dima when they first start, but don't worry, you'll get better."
He'll understand, once it goes viral and he gets his cut of the profits.
Favorite quote out of the successfully (and possibly correctly) unscrambled notes:
"Took time slices of two apples to make sure one was traveling."
If only I'd taken a time slice of that dream and stuck it between the pages of the dream diary.
*One of my early childhood traumas. Grandma Mila was teaching me math. I had the makings of a great mathematician, evident in the fact that I wrote all over the page in anywhere but between the lines and all in some futuristic alphabet. Grandma Mila patiently tried to show me the light:
"You write like Dima and Dima writes like an idiot!"
Since then, as much as we love Dima, we can't help but abuse him verbally at each and every opportunity:
"That's not how you cut watermelon! You're holding the knife like Dima!"
"How'd you like my poem?" "You sure Dima didn't write it?"
"Look, everyone's a Dima when they first start, but don't worry, you'll get better."
He'll understand, once it goes viral and he gets his cut of the profits.
Friday, February 20, 2009
Who is Obama?
I was peeing today and I noticed something kind of weird. My pee smells exactly like Cheerios, and not the Honey Nut kind, the regular. I'm not sure what this means for my relationships with Cheerios and urination, but I sure hope I don't have to quit doing the second to keep the first.
Coincidentally, I had another bathroom dream today, where I can't find a satisfactory place to do my business no matter how hard I look. My bathroom dreams are riddled with obstacles that video games don't even dream of.
I was getting a tea bag out of the cupboard today, and I was failing miserably to get the flavor I wanted, or rather anything but the flavor I didn't want. Having taken an algorithms course at MIT, I knew that randomized algorithms kick ass. I'd pick a box at random and select a tea bag from it. If it was African Red Bush, I'd put it back and repeat the process. Assuming I remembered which boxes I already checked, this should have worked just fine. Unfortunately several circumstances were against me. First of all, when it comes to tasks like these, I'm your Guy Pearce from Memento. I never once remembered which box I already checked, so I was probably just checking the same box over and over. Secondly, the odds were against me: every single box was African Red Bush. When I finally realized this devasting truth, I had an interesting thought. Based on the given information I had no way of telling whether I was living in a house full of African Red Bush lovers or haters. Both scenarios made perfect sense. If the family is suffering from an African Red Bush fetish, then we probably buy truckloads wholesale. If we hate African Red Bush, we're probably still making our way through that one truckload from 1991, and drinking everything else first.
Now I'm thinking this probably applies to most situations, which is why we have the privilege of witnessing such wonderful misunderstandings. I'll be looking for more of these.
Madelyn sent me a hilarious image yesterday: it's a Google Search's Auto Complete giving suggestions for the typed-in phrase: "I am extremely"
Among the ten or so suggestions, was "I am extremely terrified of Chinese people," with 300,000+ results. I thought it was a joke at first, but then I tested it in my browser and it turned out to be true.
Curious, I decided to see what else the Google user base is interested in. Here are the results. In quotes we have search phrases typed into Google, and below them, Auto Complete suggestions:
"chinese people..."
chinese people eat babies (617,000 results)
"i..."
i can haz cheeseburger (956,000 results)
"why do..."
why do men have nipples (456,000 results)
"why is..."
why is my poop green (346,000 results)
"what do i..."
what do i do (550,000,000 results)
what do i do with my life (103,000,000 results)
"what if I..."
what if I am a black woman (10,400,000 results)
"what the hell..."
what the hell is Kwanzaa (119,000 results)
what the hell does a vegan eat (1,360,000 results)
"when did you..."
when did you stop beating your wife (681,000 results)
"who is..."
who is obama (126,000,000 results)
I kind of wish I could use Auto Complete for the sentences that come out of my mouth. That would make for some interesting conversations.
More great quotes from the Orient:
Pei: I don't like love
Coincidentally, I had another bathroom dream today, where I can't find a satisfactory place to do my business no matter how hard I look. My bathroom dreams are riddled with obstacles that video games don't even dream of.
I was getting a tea bag out of the cupboard today, and I was failing miserably to get the flavor I wanted, or rather anything but the flavor I didn't want. Having taken an algorithms course at MIT, I knew that randomized algorithms kick ass. I'd pick a box at random and select a tea bag from it. If it was African Red Bush, I'd put it back and repeat the process. Assuming I remembered which boxes I already checked, this should have worked just fine. Unfortunately several circumstances were against me. First of all, when it comes to tasks like these, I'm your Guy Pearce from Memento. I never once remembered which box I already checked, so I was probably just checking the same box over and over. Secondly, the odds were against me: every single box was African Red Bush. When I finally realized this devasting truth, I had an interesting thought. Based on the given information I had no way of telling whether I was living in a house full of African Red Bush lovers or haters. Both scenarios made perfect sense. If the family is suffering from an African Red Bush fetish, then we probably buy truckloads wholesale. If we hate African Red Bush, we're probably still making our way through that one truckload from 1991, and drinking everything else first.
Now I'm thinking this probably applies to most situations, which is why we have the privilege of witnessing such wonderful misunderstandings. I'll be looking for more of these.
Madelyn sent me a hilarious image yesterday: it's a Google Search's Auto Complete giving suggestions for the typed-in phrase: "I am extremely"
Among the ten or so suggestions, was "I am extremely terrified of Chinese people," with 300,000+ results. I thought it was a joke at first, but then I tested it in my browser and it turned out to be true.
Curious, I decided to see what else the Google user base is interested in. Here are the results. In quotes we have search phrases typed into Google, and below them, Auto Complete suggestions:
"chinese people..."
chinese people eat babies (617,000 results)
"i..."
i can haz cheeseburger (956,000 results)
"why do..."
why do men have nipples (456,000 results)
"why is..."
why is my poop green (346,000 results)
"what do i..."
what do i do (550,000,000 results)
what do i do with my life (103,000,000 results)
"what if I..."
what if I am a black woman (10,400,000 results)
"what the hell..."
what the hell is Kwanzaa (119,000 results)
what the hell does a vegan eat (1,360,000 results)
"when did you..."
when did you stop beating your wife (681,000 results)
"who is..."
who is obama (126,000,000 results)
I kind of wish I could use Auto Complete for the sentences that come out of my mouth. That would make for some interesting conversations.
More great quotes from the Orient:
Pei: I don't like love
Friday, February 6, 2009
Idiots Don't Wake Up
All this meditation must be doing something because lately I've been having really long and plentiful dreams. Time to put some paper near the bed again so I can write them down as soon as I wake up. I'm pretty sure I see around 4 a night.
There was a beautiful one today that had almost no action - not usually my favorite recipe - but this time was very satisfying. I'm in Cambridge, looking over the Harvard bridge, and I watch as the last few cars get off the bridge and only the illegally parked ones are left. At this moment, a pair of headlights lights up the horizon from the Boston side, but the car responsible for them doesn't come into view, mostly I think because I don't want it to. At the other end of the bridge there's a castle instead of Boston, and the headlights put it in a perfect light. It's really majestic - the kind that deserves some poetry from someone other than me. I decide to take a picture with my cellphone.
The camera on my phone works really weirdly - this is where I should have gone lucid (if not when I saw the castle instead of Boston): for some reason (I'm thinking in the dream), the camera input is coming from satellite, and it's coming in really slowly. So first I see the view of everything from above, and then it slowly gets to me, and then it starts moving towards the castle. I keep snapping shots as this little movie plays out on my cell screen, all the way up until the view is moving up the castle walls, discovering towers in the darkness and whatnot. It was like a movie director's wet dream.
Another dream today had to do with two groups investigating some mystery concerning a giant mythical creature. The two groups were the Smart People and the Beautiful People. By some hideous flaw in the system, I was placed with the Smart People (how could I not have realized that I was dreaming? Just the fact that I didn't should have eliminated me from the Smart People group!). Anyway, the Smart People were in charge of figuring stuff out, and the Beautiful People were the ones that got all the action and took all the credit. But the two groups didn't cooperate well at all - I guess we wanted credit too, because the whole dream was really about running away from the Beautiful People and not giving them our intel. There was this really stupid door scene that reminded me of Signs - where the all-powerful aliens with their hyperspace drive and Kosher pork and whatever other crazy technology, can't get through a two-inch-thick wooden door.
Hopefully there'll be more dreams tonight. Hopefully I won't be an idiot and I'll realize that the third arm sprouting from my nose isn't normally there, and will go lucid. It's about time.
This online Chinese dictionary I'm using is too good to be true. It gives you example sentences for each word, and these examples are exactly the kind you want to be using on a daily basis. Take the word "guy" for example. In Chinese it's 家伙
Common usage examples:
他不是那种和你一样的坏家伙。
He is not such a bad guy as you (are).
这个平时温和的家伙简直发疯了, 开枪打死了十个人.
This ordinary quiet guy just freaked out and shot ten people.
你这忘恩负义的家伙!
You ungrateful wretch!
他是个卑鄙的家伙.
He's a scurvy wretch.
他是个笨手笨脚的[古里古怪的]家伙.
He's an awkward/queer old cuss.
你瞧那戴怪帽子的家伙!
Get a load of that old bloke with the funny hat!
Or "kill" - 杀
他们在密谋如何杀害他。
They are plotting how to murder him.
那只骚扰绵羊的狗被杀死了。
The dog that molested the sheep was killed.
因为宿怨，他最终杀了她。
He eventually killed her because of a long-standing feud.
I could read this thing all day, it's like a joke machine. And I can't wait to use all of these in China. Come visit me when I'm back, I'll be the guy in the little urn.
There was a beautiful one today that had almost no action - not usually my favorite recipe - but this time was very satisfying. I'm in Cambridge, looking over the Harvard bridge, and I watch as the last few cars get off the bridge and only the illegally parked ones are left. At this moment, a pair of headlights lights up the horizon from the Boston side, but the car responsible for them doesn't come into view, mostly I think because I don't want it to. At the other end of the bridge there's a castle instead of Boston, and the headlights put it in a perfect light. It's really majestic - the kind that deserves some poetry from someone other than me. I decide to take a picture with my cellphone.
The camera on my phone works really weirdly - this is where I should have gone lucid (if not when I saw the castle instead of Boston): for some reason (I'm thinking in the dream), the camera input is coming from satellite, and it's coming in really slowly. So first I see the view of everything from above, and then it slowly gets to me, and then it starts moving towards the castle. I keep snapping shots as this little movie plays out on my cell screen, all the way up until the view is moving up the castle walls, discovering towers in the darkness and whatnot. It was like a movie director's wet dream.
Another dream today had to do with two groups investigating some mystery concerning a giant mythical creature. The two groups were the Smart People and the Beautiful People. By some hideous flaw in the system, I was placed with the Smart People (how could I not have realized that I was dreaming? Just the fact that I didn't should have eliminated me from the Smart People group!). Anyway, the Smart People were in charge of figuring stuff out, and the Beautiful People were the ones that got all the action and took all the credit. But the two groups didn't cooperate well at all - I guess we wanted credit too, because the whole dream was really about running away from the Beautiful People and not giving them our intel. There was this really stupid door scene that reminded me of Signs - where the all-powerful aliens with their hyperspace drive and Kosher pork and whatever other crazy technology, can't get through a two-inch-thick wooden door.
Hopefully there'll be more dreams tonight. Hopefully I won't be an idiot and I'll realize that the third arm sprouting from my nose isn't normally there, and will go lucid. It's about time.
This online Chinese dictionary I'm using is too good to be true. It gives you example sentences for each word, and these examples are exactly the kind you want to be using on a daily basis. Take the word "guy" for example. In Chinese it's 家伙
Common usage examples:
他不是那种和你一样的坏家伙。
He is not such a bad guy as you (are).
这个平时温和的家伙简直发疯了, 开枪打死了十个人.
This ordinary quiet guy just freaked out and shot ten people.
你这忘恩负义的家伙!
You ungrateful wretch!
他是个卑鄙的家伙.
He's a scurvy wretch.
他是个笨手笨脚的[古里古怪的]家伙.
He's an awkward/queer old cuss.
你瞧那戴怪帽子的家伙!
Get a load of that old bloke with the funny hat!
Or "kill" - 杀
他们在密谋如何杀害他。
They are plotting how to murder him.
那只骚扰绵羊的狗被杀死了。
The dog that molested the sheep was killed.
因为宿怨，他最终杀了她。
He eventually killed her because of a long-standing feud.
I could read this thing all day, it's like a joke machine. And I can't wait to use all of these in China. Come visit me when I'm back, I'll be the guy in the little urn.
Wednesday, January 21, 2009
Those Flat Chinese
Morning meditation:
Today was more focused. I think I'm up to 1.2 consecutive milliseconds of consciousness, which sounds low, but feels like an improvement.
Dream:
I'm a sailor on a semi-modern ship. I am looking for a bathroom where I can move my bowels. I find one, but it is completely unacceptable. There are two toilets, facing each other from opposite corners of the room, as if in a duel, and about fifteen people between them, just shooting the breeze (something people only do in bathrooms in dreams). I barely hesitate a second before taking my privacy-sensitive bowels in search of other accomodations. I finally find a private bathroom with a single toilet, lock myself in, and mount the beast.
Lo and behold, this must be a toilet from an amusement park. Sitting on this thing is like sitting in one of those virtual ride machines at Chucke E. Cheese's, except that I don't have a screen in front of me convincing me that I'm on runaway railcar. I try to relax, but it is impossible, my cheeks are gripping the seat with all the static friction they've been storing away for the last 22 years. It's like trying to relax a bear trap. I struggle for a while, but my needs finally give in to the consistency of my failures, and I decide that I guess I don't really need to go. As I leave the bathroom, the next contestant comes in, Brian Voorhis who I haven't seen since middle school. I give him the thumbs up sign.
After this, I teleport to the dock. The ship is leaving, and I need to get on before I'm left behind. I remember what the captain said about the really stupid things sailors sometimes do, and proceed to do one of such caliber that further speeches in this vein are assured for generations to come. Instead of just jumping onto the ship, I wrap my four appendages around some 4 foot diameter column that holds the ship's roof up. Now I'm hopelessly stuck. If I let go, I fall into the water, but there's no way I can maneuver around this thing without help. I can barely move at all. I stick one leg out as much as I can, which is about one inch, and yell for someone to drag me in by my leg. Unfortunately, the other sailors lack the necessary genie powers required to perform such a feat. I realize that my last chance is to get back onto the deck and then try to jump for it. I try and fail, and almost fall off, and then suddenly I'm on the deck in some kind fluke of teleportation. I don't hesitate for instant to thank the Gods, and execute a beautiful running long jump onto the deck. Crisis averted.
End of Dream
I was studying Chinese today, and ran across this sentence: ge1ge1 he1 ka1fei1 he1 de hen3 shao3. Now don't panic! Of course, at first sight this looks like incomprehensible gibberish, unless you're one of the enlightened few (2 billionish). But in reality, it's pretty simple.
Let me give you some brief background: The above is the romanization of the Chinese sentence 哥哥喝咖啡喝地很少. (Romanization = Chinese for Americans). Romanization tells you how to pronounce the words, unlike the authentic Chinese sentence which just hurts your eyes, not to mention your brain. The numbers in the romanization indicate the tone (what to do with your voice) to use with each vowel sound. Tone 3 is for Chinese Jedi Masters, while tone 1 is Ben Stein's permanent residence - flat tone - where your voice doesn't change pitch during the duration of the vowel.
What's special about this sentence is that the first 6 tones are tone 1. Basically this means that you're likely to say the first 6 syllables on one note. When I say it out loud, it sounds absolutely ridiculous.
This reminded me instantly of Galaxy Quest, where the aliens consistently speak in a perfect monotone, with the added benefit of residing on the precise pitch of their voice breaks. Listen to this (Blogger doesn't allow uploading sound files, I had to convert it to video):
Now back to the Chinese phrase. Expect the worst:
I sound even more retarded, but you get the gist.
Madelyn: ur awesome
Mark: wow
Mark: r u learning to notice the obvious too?
Madelyn: yeah, im not good at it
Madelyn: that's how my compliment came to you
Today was more focused. I think I'm up to 1.2 consecutive milliseconds of consciousness, which sounds low, but feels like an improvement.
Dream:
I'm a sailor on a semi-modern ship. I am looking for a bathroom where I can move my bowels. I find one, but it is completely unacceptable. There are two toilets, facing each other from opposite corners of the room, as if in a duel, and about fifteen people between them, just shooting the breeze (something people only do in bathrooms in dreams). I barely hesitate a second before taking my privacy-sensitive bowels in search of other accomodations. I finally find a private bathroom with a single toilet, lock myself in, and mount the beast.
Lo and behold, this must be a toilet from an amusement park. Sitting on this thing is like sitting in one of those virtual ride machines at Chucke E. Cheese's, except that I don't have a screen in front of me convincing me that I'm on runaway railcar. I try to relax, but it is impossible, my cheeks are gripping the seat with all the static friction they've been storing away for the last 22 years. It's like trying to relax a bear trap. I struggle for a while, but my needs finally give in to the consistency of my failures, and I decide that I guess I don't really need to go. As I leave the bathroom, the next contestant comes in, Brian Voorhis who I haven't seen since middle school. I give him the thumbs up sign.
After this, I teleport to the dock. The ship is leaving, and I need to get on before I'm left behind. I remember what the captain said about the really stupid things sailors sometimes do, and proceed to do one of such caliber that further speeches in this vein are assured for generations to come. Instead of just jumping onto the ship, I wrap my four appendages around some 4 foot diameter column that holds the ship's roof up. Now I'm hopelessly stuck. If I let go, I fall into the water, but there's no way I can maneuver around this thing without help. I can barely move at all. I stick one leg out as much as I can, which is about one inch, and yell for someone to drag me in by my leg. Unfortunately, the other sailors lack the necessary genie powers required to perform such a feat. I realize that my last chance is to get back onto the deck and then try to jump for it. I try and fail, and almost fall off, and then suddenly I'm on the deck in some kind fluke of teleportation. I don't hesitate for instant to thank the Gods, and execute a beautiful running long jump onto the deck. Crisis averted.
End of Dream
I was studying Chinese today, and ran across this sentence: ge1ge1 he1 ka1fei1 he1 de hen3 shao3. Now don't panic! Of course, at first sight this looks like incomprehensible gibberish, unless you're one of the enlightened few (2 billionish). But in reality, it's pretty simple.
Let me give you some brief background: The above is the romanization of the Chinese sentence 哥哥喝咖啡喝地很少. (Romanization = Chinese for Americans). Romanization tells you how to pronounce the words, unlike the authentic Chinese sentence which just hurts your eyes, not to mention your brain. The numbers in the romanization indicate the tone (what to do with your voice) to use with each vowel sound. Tone 3 is for Chinese Jedi Masters, while tone 1 is Ben Stein's permanent residence - flat tone - where your voice doesn't change pitch during the duration of the vowel.
What's special about this sentence is that the first 6 tones are tone 1. Basically this means that you're likely to say the first 6 syllables on one note. When I say it out loud, it sounds absolutely ridiculous.
This reminded me instantly of Galaxy Quest, where the aliens consistently speak in a perfect monotone, with the added benefit of residing on the precise pitch of their voice breaks. Listen to this (Blogger doesn't allow uploading sound files, I had to convert it to video):
Now back to the Chinese phrase. Expect the worst:
I sound even more retarded, but you get the gist.
Madelyn: ur awesome
Mark: wow
Mark: r u learning to notice the obvious too?
Madelyn: yeah, im not good at it
Madelyn: that's how my compliment came to you
Monday, January 19, 2009
Breasts, And How To Squeeze Lucid Dreams Out Of Them...Or Was It The Other Way Around?
Morning meditation:
I have the attention span of the Memento guy.
OK, it's time to start more 30-day trials. I came up with two in the 3.7-nanosecond-long conscious section of my meditation.
1. 30 mins or more of studying Chinese per day.
I'm planning on going to China sometime in this or my next life, so it's about time to put some discipline into my studying. Lately I've paid more attention to my love handles than to my Chinese skills (and I pay less attention to my love handles than to my fictional great aunt Propecia. Hmm...I should call her).
2. Start trying to lucid dream again.
Lucid dreaming is a synonym for "stop wasting a third of your life on nonsense, just so you can write it down in the morning for a 30-day writing-down-dreams-in-the-morning trial." It was adopted at the Belgium-based Winslow-Gordon Convention in 1865, when people realized that they have had it up to here(Northern New Jersey, upwards of my head) with saying that long quote twenty times a day.
Normally, you have no control over your dreams. You can lie there right before falling asleep and chant the latest Miss World's name till you're blue in the face, but will she grace your dream with her scantily clad presence? Very doubtful, because she's too busy serving (servicing?) lucid dreamers. Instead, you get assigned the dream where you're filling out your taxes, you're late, all you have left to do is sign, but your pen's stuck up in some tree for some reason and a village of armadillo gophers is willing to lay down their lives making sure you don't get it in time.
Dreaming for the average man (women don't have dreams, it's something to do with their breasts) is like watching an in-flight movie. You have no choice in the content, and chances are the pilot likes The Lizzie McGuire Movie. Or sometimes you don't even get one you haven't seen yet, you get a "recurring" one. What movie did you watch ten times already? Beethoven's 4th? What a coincidence! That's what we're playing today!
Lucid dreamers don't put up with this. They're elite, they're first class passengers, they're "the foot" as the French would say. They take out a couple minutes every day to ensure they don't get trapped in squirrel paradise like the average dreamer. What they do is they do "reality checks." Every ten or fifteen minutes, an aspiring lucid dreamer will examine the world for a second to make sure he's truly awake. For example, look at your hands right now. ...Uhh, I meant look at your hands after the next sentence. If they start swimming in your field of vision/changing shape size or color/vary in their finger content/(insert whatever your particular set doesn't normally do), then you know you're dreaming. In that case, you snap into the reality of the dream, which is much more vivid that ordinary dream-watching, and find yourself in a world where you have almost limitless control over the content. This is what a lucid dream is. You own the dream, you're the master. You can do whatever you want. You can fly around circles, fly around in squares, fly around in triangles...yea, my imagination ends here, but fortunately you're only limited by yours.
Of course, there's a price. In exchange for additional hours of consciousness, during the day you look like an idiot - whipping out your hands every ten minutes, then explaining to the police why you suddenly punched that pregnant woman with both fists. My advice is to take it slowly. Don't rip your pockets off, just calmly withdraw your hands: "calm calm calm...OK, let's see what we have here. Hmm, only one hand, I'm dreaming!...oh, never mind, I lost that one in Nam, nope...not dreaming, OK, see you in ten minutes, hand, done." Do that as often as you can, and you're on your way to lucid dreaming.
In case you're tempted to try it, there are other techniques that can help you achieve a lucid dream, preferably done in combination with "reality checks:"
1. Surpreme confidence - you know you're going to have a lucid dream. "If that idiot blogger can do it, I can do it."
2. Affirmations - unlike Miss World, lucid dreams will materialize if you think about them constantly. Before you go to sleep, turn on a mental mantra - "I will lucid dream tonight, I will lucid dream tonight, I will lucid dream tonight, I will lucid dream tonight," etc.
3. Attach reality checks to everyday things - every time you feel you need to pee, do a reality check. Every time you flip a light switch, do a reality check. Every time you think about breasts, do a reality check. Especially if you do this last one, you're set. Unfortunately, breasts have very little to do with most people's reality.
4. Reading this blog. Twenty to thirty times a day should be enough.
Lastly, performing a "reality check" inside a dream is not the only way to obtain a lucid dream. You can go straight into a lucid dream when you're falling asleep. For that, you need to be a bit of a sniper. You have to lie on your back and wait patiently for that moment when you slip away into dream land. And in that moment, you have a chance to get into the dream, but not lose consciousness. Often, the falling asleep moment will be accompanied by strange bodily sensations, such as heat and full body vibration. These are signs that you're close, but don't get too excited, you'll spook the lucid dream away.
Alright, ready, set, reality checks start...three paragraphs ago! Happy hunting!
I have the attention span of the Memento guy.
OK, it's time to start more 30-day trials. I came up with two in the 3.7-nanosecond-long conscious section of my meditation.
1. 30 mins or more of studying Chinese per day.
I'm planning on going to China sometime in this or my next life, so it's about time to put some discipline into my studying. Lately I've paid more attention to my love handles than to my Chinese skills (and I pay less attention to my love handles than to my fictional great aunt Propecia. Hmm...I should call her).
2. Start trying to lucid dream again.
Lucid dreaming is a synonym for "stop wasting a third of your life on nonsense, just so you can write it down in the morning for a 30-day writing-down-dreams-in-the-morning trial." It was adopted at the Belgium-based Winslow-Gordon Convention in 1865, when people realized that they have had it up to here(Northern New Jersey, upwards of my head) with saying that long quote twenty times a day.
Normally, you have no control over your dreams. You can lie there right before falling asleep and chant the latest Miss World's name till you're blue in the face, but will she grace your dream with her scantily clad presence? Very doubtful, because she's too busy serving (servicing?) lucid dreamers. Instead, you get assigned the dream where you're filling out your taxes, you're late, all you have left to do is sign, but your pen's stuck up in some tree for some reason and a village of armadillo gophers is willing to lay down their lives making sure you don't get it in time.
Dreaming for the average man (women don't have dreams, it's something to do with their breasts) is like watching an in-flight movie. You have no choice in the content, and chances are the pilot likes The Lizzie McGuire Movie. Or sometimes you don't even get one you haven't seen yet, you get a "recurring" one. What movie did you watch ten times already? Beethoven's 4th? What a coincidence! That's what we're playing today!
Lucid dreamers don't put up with this. They're elite, they're first class passengers, they're "the foot" as the French would say. They take out a couple minutes every day to ensure they don't get trapped in squirrel paradise like the average dreamer. What they do is they do "reality checks." Every ten or fifteen minutes, an aspiring lucid dreamer will examine the world for a second to make sure he's truly awake. For example, look at your hands right now. ...Uhh, I meant look at your hands after the next sentence. If they start swimming in your field of vision/changing shape size or color/vary in their finger content/(insert whatever your particular set doesn't normally do), then you know you're dreaming. In that case, you snap into the reality of the dream, which is much more vivid that ordinary dream-watching, and find yourself in a world where you have almost limitless control over the content. This is what a lucid dream is. You own the dream, you're the master. You can do whatever you want. You can fly around circles, fly around in squares, fly around in triangles...yea, my imagination ends here, but fortunately you're only limited by yours.
Of course, there's a price. In exchange for additional hours of consciousness, during the day you look like an idiot - whipping out your hands every ten minutes, then explaining to the police why you suddenly punched that pregnant woman with both fists. My advice is to take it slowly. Don't rip your pockets off, just calmly withdraw your hands: "calm calm calm...OK, let's see what we have here. Hmm, only one hand, I'm dreaming!...oh, never mind, I lost that one in Nam, nope...not dreaming, OK, see you in ten minutes, hand, done." Do that as often as you can, and you're on your way to lucid dreaming.
In case you're tempted to try it, there are other techniques that can help you achieve a lucid dream, preferably done in combination with "reality checks:"
1. Surpreme confidence - you know you're going to have a lucid dream. "If that idiot blogger can do it, I can do it."
2. Affirmations - unlike Miss World, lucid dreams will materialize if you think about them constantly. Before you go to sleep, turn on a mental mantra - "I will lucid dream tonight, I will lucid dream tonight, I will lucid dream tonight, I will lucid dream tonight," etc.
3. Attach reality checks to everyday things - every time you feel you need to pee, do a reality check. Every time you flip a light switch, do a reality check. Every time you think about breasts, do a reality check. Especially if you do this last one, you're set. Unfortunately, breasts have very little to do with most people's reality.
4. Reading this blog. Twenty to thirty times a day should be enough.
Lastly, performing a "reality check" inside a dream is not the only way to obtain a lucid dream. You can go straight into a lucid dream when you're falling asleep. For that, you need to be a bit of a sniper. You have to lie on your back and wait patiently for that moment when you slip away into dream land. And in that moment, you have a chance to get into the dream, but not lose consciousness. Often, the falling asleep moment will be accompanied by strange bodily sensations, such as heat and full body vibration. These are signs that you're close, but don't get too excited, you'll spook the lucid dream away.
Alright, ready, set, reality checks start...three paragraphs ago! Happy hunting!
Friday, January 16, 2009
Where are my pants?
For writing hour today, I was too lazy to come up with my own ideas, so I went online and looked around for possible first sentences. I found "Where are my pants?" and decided to go with it. How can one pass up such an opportunity? Here's what I have so far. I'd say it's about a 1/4 of a story, and I haven't really gotten to the main idea (which is not grounded in reality of course), so you can think of your own plots for now:
Where are my pants? I know I put them on this morning. I know for sure because I remember suspending them between two chairs and then trying to jump into them, and ending up putting them on the old-fashioned way. I've been trying to learn that trick for the last five days, but I've allotted a month so it's OK. My only fear is that we'll run out of chairs; I've already broken two, and nearly killed myself both times. But that's not important right now. What's important is that I'm sitting on the bus, and I don't have my pants on. This better be a dream. Maybe I should slap myself.
OK, this doesn't seem to be a dream. I now have two very rosy handprints on my cheeks and still no pants on and I'm starting to panic. At least no one's sitting next to me; maybe if I figure things out before we get to school, no one will have to know this ever happened. I duck and look under the seat. Nothing. I duck even lower, with my face practically touching the floor, and look down the row of seats, first towards the front, then towards the back. Still nothing. "Where could they have gone!? Where could they have gone!?" I yell frantically inside my head with poor enunciation.
Lily Thorns leans over from the seat behind me. I quickly get up on my knees on the seat, shove my backpack in front of me and meet her halfway. I'm praying that everything's hidden.
That's when I notice I'm wearing tighty-whities. I blush immediately. I haven't worn tighty-whities since elementary school. It's just a hazard. You might as well send out invitations to all the school bullies. "Hi, I could really use a good thrashing today. Should I wear tighty-whities, or will you cut me some slack and beat me up even if wear boxers?"
"Something wrong?" Lily Thorns asks. She's a pretty girl, nice too, and she doesn't really deserve quite that caliber of a name. "Thorns." Last names like that should be reserved for hot "Ms. Popularity of Jordan High" contestants. Maybe someone with a unisex first name. Like Jessie. Or Addison. Someone hot and cold, if you know what I mean.
"Uhh...no," I stammer unconvincingly. How long have I kept her waiting?
"I heard you shuffling around, I thought you might have lost something."
"Oh! Ha! No...," I say in my best impression of a million awkward movie scenes.
"I mean, I did, but now I got it."
"What was it?" Lily wonders innocently.
"Mmmmy...My homework. For English. I thought I forgot it at home, but nope. Got it. Here it is." I pat my backpack.
Lily smiles and sits back down. I notice that I've been existing on one breath for a while now and draw in another, walking a thin line between choking and sounding like an asthmatic swallowing a cat. I don't want to draw more attention.
I sit back down and look out the window. The bus is waiting at the entrance to the school; it's a left turn. Prayer isn't getting me anywhere today, but I make a quick one for heavy incoming traffic. Nope. The bus pulls in. There are about thirty seconds left before I have to get out. Not having too many options, I spend all thirty worrying.
Everyone gets up from their seats and starts piling out. It's eighth grade, so it's in that transitional period between the elementary school stampede and the lazy off-beat herd of high school students. Lily Thorns is now standing next to me. I'm holding my backpack across my lap, but my two spaghetti legs are still showing from mid-thigh down.
"Coming?" Lily asks. She still seems oblivious to my situation. I don't really have a choice.
"Yea." I get up. The stink of fear is in my nostrils, but only there; I'm a big fan of deodorant. I start wondering where the smell could possibly have come from. I cruelly hope for a second that it's Lily. That would take away some of the attention I'm about to receive. No, Lily smells strongly of that peach perfume that middle school girls abuse so tastelessly these days. Sickly artificial peach, probably with lots of Blue 9 and Red 11.
Something's wrong. I've been up for five seconds now, and there haven't been any tears of joy, not one elated scream from in front or behind. I look around and spy exactly zero pointing fingers and laughing double-chinned Jakes or Billies. Bullies are always named Jake or Billy. Or Brian. And sometimes Tom. Why doesn't anyone notice?
The bus is slowly decongesting. Lily pulls away, and I follow her, still holding my backpack in front of me like an oversized groin protector. I can't help but look everyone in the eye, when it's physically possible. I get weird like that when I'm embarrassed. I'm gauging their reactions, but so far, no one has noticed a thing. I nod and thank the bus driver as I too go down the steps and off, and receive the same lazy "Have a nice day" that I'm used to. Not a hint of surprise or disbelief. Strange...
I'm slowly getting a little braver with all of this consistent failure to cause a ruckus. I'm walking towards the front entrance, and now I'm really in good position for being spotted, but still nothing.
"Hey! Jack!"
My heart goes from 60 to 120 in about half a second, putting the fastest vehicles of our modern age to shame. I look over to where the sound originated from. It's my friend Vinny, he's walking towards me.
"Sup," he says, pulling up to walk next to me.
"Sup," I say, incredulous.
"You alright? You look dazed."
"Dazed?" I echo. "Nothing else stands out?"
Vinny takes a step back like a cameraman to take in my entire frame.
"Uhh...did you get a haircut or something?"
"Yep," I say, even though I hadn't.
"Weird. Looks exactly the same."
"Huh. I must have forgotten to tell the barber to make it look different."
Where are my pants? I know I put them on this morning. I know for sure because I remember suspending them between two chairs and then trying to jump into them, and ending up putting them on the old-fashioned way. I've been trying to learn that trick for the last five days, but I've allotted a month so it's OK. My only fear is that we'll run out of chairs; I've already broken two, and nearly killed myself both times. But that's not important right now. What's important is that I'm sitting on the bus, and I don't have my pants on. This better be a dream. Maybe I should slap myself.
OK, this doesn't seem to be a dream. I now have two very rosy handprints on my cheeks and still no pants on and I'm starting to panic. At least no one's sitting next to me; maybe if I figure things out before we get to school, no one will have to know this ever happened. I duck and look under the seat. Nothing. I duck even lower, with my face practically touching the floor, and look down the row of seats, first towards the front, then towards the back. Still nothing. "Where could they have gone!? Where could they have gone!?" I yell frantically inside my head with poor enunciation.
Lily Thorns leans over from the seat behind me. I quickly get up on my knees on the seat, shove my backpack in front of me and meet her halfway. I'm praying that everything's hidden.
That's when I notice I'm wearing tighty-whities. I blush immediately. I haven't worn tighty-whities since elementary school. It's just a hazard. You might as well send out invitations to all the school bullies. "Hi, I could really use a good thrashing today. Should I wear tighty-whities, or will you cut me some slack and beat me up even if wear boxers?"
"Something wrong?" Lily Thorns asks. She's a pretty girl, nice too, and she doesn't really deserve quite that caliber of a name. "Thorns." Last names like that should be reserved for hot "Ms. Popularity of Jordan High" contestants. Maybe someone with a unisex first name. Like Jessie. Or Addison. Someone hot and cold, if you know what I mean.
"Uhh...no," I stammer unconvincingly. How long have I kept her waiting?
"I heard you shuffling around, I thought you might have lost something."
"Oh! Ha! No...," I say in my best impression of a million awkward movie scenes.
"I mean, I did, but now I got it."
"What was it?" Lily wonders innocently.
"Mmmmy...My homework. For English. I thought I forgot it at home, but nope. Got it. Here it is." I pat my backpack.
Lily smiles and sits back down. I notice that I've been existing on one breath for a while now and draw in another, walking a thin line between choking and sounding like an asthmatic swallowing a cat. I don't want to draw more attention.
I sit back down and look out the window. The bus is waiting at the entrance to the school; it's a left turn. Prayer isn't getting me anywhere today, but I make a quick one for heavy incoming traffic. Nope. The bus pulls in. There are about thirty seconds left before I have to get out. Not having too many options, I spend all thirty worrying.
Everyone gets up from their seats and starts piling out. It's eighth grade, so it's in that transitional period between the elementary school stampede and the lazy off-beat herd of high school students. Lily Thorns is now standing next to me. I'm holding my backpack across my lap, but my two spaghetti legs are still showing from mid-thigh down.
"Coming?" Lily asks. She still seems oblivious to my situation. I don't really have a choice.
"Yea." I get up. The stink of fear is in my nostrils, but only there; I'm a big fan of deodorant. I start wondering where the smell could possibly have come from. I cruelly hope for a second that it's Lily. That would take away some of the attention I'm about to receive. No, Lily smells strongly of that peach perfume that middle school girls abuse so tastelessly these days. Sickly artificial peach, probably with lots of Blue 9 and Red 11.
Something's wrong. I've been up for five seconds now, and there haven't been any tears of joy, not one elated scream from in front or behind. I look around and spy exactly zero pointing fingers and laughing double-chinned Jakes or Billies. Bullies are always named Jake or Billy. Or Brian. And sometimes Tom. Why doesn't anyone notice?
The bus is slowly decongesting. Lily pulls away, and I follow her, still holding my backpack in front of me like an oversized groin protector. I can't help but look everyone in the eye, when it's physically possible. I get weird like that when I'm embarrassed. I'm gauging their reactions, but so far, no one has noticed a thing. I nod and thank the bus driver as I too go down the steps and off, and receive the same lazy "Have a nice day" that I'm used to. Not a hint of surprise or disbelief. Strange...
I'm slowly getting a little braver with all of this consistent failure to cause a ruckus. I'm walking towards the front entrance, and now I'm really in good position for being spotted, but still nothing.
"Hey! Jack!"
My heart goes from 60 to 120 in about half a second, putting the fastest vehicles of our modern age to shame. I look over to where the sound originated from. It's my friend Vinny, he's walking towards me.
"Sup," he says, pulling up to walk next to me.
"Sup," I say, incredulous.
"You alright? You look dazed."
"Dazed?" I echo. "Nothing else stands out?"
Vinny takes a step back like a cameraman to take in my entire frame.
"Uhh...did you get a haircut or something?"
"Yep," I say, even though I hadn't.
"Weird. Looks exactly the same."
"Huh. I must have forgotten to tell the barber to make it look different."
Wednesday, December 3, 2008
I Believe Shaved Is The Expression
Dreamed of a cool invention, but unfortunately not of how it works. It was a laptop, and the speakers worked in such a way that you could turn them on full blast and yet not hear anything. So far, very useful. Then, when you put your head at the right distance from the screen, you hear everything normally. You move your head out of the magic spot and again you hear nothing. There's also a dial you can use to adjust the location of the sweet spot.
Yesterday Gene shaved his head. I thought about it, flexed my Photoshop muscles, and shaved mine as well:
There are lots of reasons to shave one's head. Like most reasons, they split up into good reasons and bad reasons.
Some good reasons:
Your friends hate you, and you need another chance for a first impression. Chances are they won't recognize you with you new 'no do' do.
Your girlfriend did it, and she looks horrible. Trust me, this will get you laid. Or married. Hmm...maybe not such a good reason after all.
You just realized you already shaved half of your head.
You're butt-ugly, or in PC terms - aesthetically offensive. Your 57 makeovers didn't help. This is your last resort before you go under the knife.
The Apocalypse has come and gone. You're hungry and you're out of food. Hair has protein.
Some bad reasons:
You're an aspiring neo-Nazi, and they won't let you hate Jews with your Jew-fro.
You think you're black.
You just found your first grey hair.
Your head won't fit into that jar of honey, and you really really want those last few drops.
Unfortunately, even the good reasons rely heavily on situation. If you're only going by them, you might never shave your head. Luckily, there's a great third category, called the 'no good reason' category - one I subscribe to daily.
Some no good reasons to shave your head:
You want to know when it's raining as early as possible.
You want to test whether your head is hot enough to cook an egg.
You flipped a coin. Heads = shave your head, tails = ____ your _____. (Imagine you're Chinese, and use your imagination to fill in the blanks). You got lucky - the coin landed heads.
You're a heroin addict and all of your other exposed veins are infected. No...wait...that belongs in good reasons.
Anyway, making this decision is a headache. Good thing there's Photoshop. You can shave your head in there, and no one will ever interrogate you about it. And then when you're done, you can grow half of it back, if you want.
Or you can just shave it for real.
Yesterday Gene shaved his head. I thought about it, flexed my Photoshop muscles, and shaved mine as well:
There are lots of reasons to shave one's head. Like most reasons, they split up into good reasons and bad reasons.
Some good reasons:
Your friends hate you, and you need another chance for a first impression. Chances are they won't recognize you with you new 'no do' do.
Your girlfriend did it, and she looks horrible. Trust me, this will get you laid. Or married. Hmm...maybe not such a good reason after all.
You just realized you already shaved half of your head.
You're butt-ugly, or in PC terms - aesthetically offensive. Your 57 makeovers didn't help. This is your last resort before you go under the knife.
The Apocalypse has come and gone. You're hungry and you're out of food. Hair has protein.
Some bad reasons:
You're an aspiring neo-Nazi, and they won't let you hate Jews with your Jew-fro.
You think you're black.
You just found your first grey hair.
Your head won't fit into that jar of honey, and you really really want those last few drops.
Unfortunately, even the good reasons rely heavily on situation. If you're only going by them, you might never shave your head. Luckily, there's a great third category, called the 'no good reason' category - one I subscribe to daily.
Some no good reasons to shave your head:
You want to know when it's raining as early as possible.
You want to test whether your head is hot enough to cook an egg.
You flipped a coin. Heads = shave your head, tails = ____ your _____. (Imagine you're Chinese, and use your imagination to fill in the blanks). You got lucky - the coin landed heads.
You're a heroin addict and all of your other exposed veins are infected. No...wait...that belongs in good reasons.
Anyway, making this decision is a headache. Good thing there's Photoshop. You can shave your head in there, and no one will ever interrogate you about it. And then when you're done, you can grow half of it back, if you want.
Or you can just shave it for real.
Tuesday, December 2, 2008
Dream #64,875
This blog is turning into a dream journal. Maybe I'm just compensating for lack of social commentary.
Note: all of the following is one dream, but different scenes.
Note 2: The people I actually know in this dream are, in order of appearance, (or preference, you doubting 'Insert Name I Can't Remember'...ah! Thomas!): Min, Daniel, Diana, Natasha, Rachel. Or if it's easier to remember, they're the ones with plain boring names. The names of the transient dream-people are much cooler.
Scene one: We're playing MarioKart - Min, Shenegra, with e's pronounced like the e's in Hell's Bells or Montenegro, Daniel and me. I sit out for a round, figuring out the controller, then I completely dominate everyone. Daniel is impressed. So far, just gritty realism.
Next scene: We're in the bathroom - Fat Orthodox Jew (someone I don't know, but who fits the description), Keanu Reeves from The Day the Earth Stood Still, and me. Keanu Reeves is giving Fat Orthodox Jew his screenname in the Universe - foldinlife. I catch myself thinking it's a cool screenname. Then Keanu Reeves leaves.
Next scene: Me and Fat Orthodox Jew are in some undetermined hallway. Fat Orthodox Jew has his shirt off, exposing his Fat American Gut. He starts putting on some blue cellophane table cloth. I realize it's part of his orthodox attire and ask him what it's called. He says it's called a "shenekra," with e's like in Hell's Bells or Montenegro. Teleport to the middle of a supermarket. Some girl and some guy I know, but don't actually know, are sitting on the floor. I say to them: "Wow, did you know your name came from an Orthodox Jewish blue cellophane tablecloth called a 'shenekra?'" (but in slightly different words). Apparently I'm confusing the girl for Shenegra, even though I now know that the previous scene's Shenegra was actually named Thai. The guy and the girl look at me, justly confused, and say: "Who are you talking to?" I suddenly realize neither of them is named Shenegra. In fact, as of the latest revisionism, there never was a single person in this dream named Shenegra. I feel slightly bad because apparently this girl who isn't Shenegra and I are pretty good friends, but forgo apologizing in favor of some wisecrack now forever lost to dreamland. Rest assured it was equal measures brilliant and crass. Anyway, getting to the point, the girl starts crying because I can't remember her name. I sure hope this is a prophetic dream.
Next scene: I'm walking with Diana and trying to tell her my hilarious story - yes, in the dream I've already recognized it for what it is - making a girl cry is worth an hour of SNL's Best Of. Diana isn't listening to me very well. She's looking for Natasha, because we're supposed to meet somewhere, and Natasha is late. Then there's an announcement over the intercom: "Natasha, you're overdue on the copy." This idiotic statement makes perfect sense to me, and Diana smiles with relief - apparently she asked them to say that. We head over to where we're supposed to meet. Rachel's there, she's still crying. "Oh yea!" I scream, and burst out giggling like the Pillsbury doughboy after a good poke in his zeppelin-like belly. "Her name's Rachel, now I remember!" Strange though, Rachel looks nothing like the girl I mislabeled minutes ago. Made perfect sense in the dream though. Oh, and at some point, that guy knew but didn't actually know turned into Bobby Gant from elementary school, someone that should have vacated his place in my memory long ago. Sorry Bobby...deleted.
Note: all of the following is one dream, but different scenes.
Note 2: The people I actually know in this dream are, in order of appearance, (or preference, you doubting 'Insert Name I Can't Remember'...ah! Thomas!): Min, Daniel, Diana, Natasha, Rachel. Or if it's easier to remember, they're the ones with plain boring names. The names of the transient dream-people are much cooler.
Scene one: We're playing MarioKart - Min, Shenegra, with e's pronounced like the e's in Hell's Bells or Montenegro, Daniel and me. I sit out for a round, figuring out the controller, then I completely dominate everyone. Daniel is impressed. So far, just gritty realism.
Next scene: We're in the bathroom - Fat Orthodox Jew (someone I don't know, but who fits the description), Keanu Reeves from The Day the Earth Stood Still, and me. Keanu Reeves is giving Fat Orthodox Jew his screenname in the Universe - foldinlife. I catch myself thinking it's a cool screenname. Then Keanu Reeves leaves.
Next scene: Me and Fat Orthodox Jew are in some undetermined hallway. Fat Orthodox Jew has his shirt off, exposing his Fat American Gut. He starts putting on some blue cellophane table cloth. I realize it's part of his orthodox attire and ask him what it's called. He says it's called a "shenekra," with e's like in Hell's Bells or Montenegro. Teleport to the middle of a supermarket. Some girl and some guy I know, but don't actually know, are sitting on the floor. I say to them: "Wow, did you know your name came from an Orthodox Jewish blue cellophane tablecloth called a 'shenekra?'" (but in slightly different words). Apparently I'm confusing the girl for Shenegra, even though I now know that the previous scene's Shenegra was actually named Thai. The guy and the girl look at me, justly confused, and say: "Who are you talking to?" I suddenly realize neither of them is named Shenegra. In fact, as of the latest revisionism, there never was a single person in this dream named Shenegra. I feel slightly bad because apparently this girl who isn't Shenegra and I are pretty good friends, but forgo apologizing in favor of some wisecrack now forever lost to dreamland. Rest assured it was equal measures brilliant and crass. Anyway, getting to the point, the girl starts crying because I can't remember her name. I sure hope this is a prophetic dream.
Next scene: I'm walking with Diana and trying to tell her my hilarious story - yes, in the dream I've already recognized it for what it is - making a girl cry is worth an hour of SNL's Best Of. Diana isn't listening to me very well. She's looking for Natasha, because we're supposed to meet somewhere, and Natasha is late. Then there's an announcement over the intercom: "Natasha, you're overdue on the copy." This idiotic statement makes perfect sense to me, and Diana smiles with relief - apparently she asked them to say that. We head over to where we're supposed to meet. Rachel's there, she's still crying. "Oh yea!" I scream, and burst out giggling like the Pillsbury doughboy after a good poke in his zeppelin-like belly. "Her name's Rachel, now I remember!" Strange though, Rachel looks nothing like the girl I mislabeled minutes ago. Made perfect sense in the dream though. Oh, and at some point, that guy knew but didn't actually know turned into Bobby Gant from elementary school, someone that should have vacated his place in my memory long ago. Sorry Bobby...deleted.
Tuesday, November 18, 2008
Adultery
I had a weird dream today. Well, two, but only one's PG-13 enough to tell, and even so, it's borderline.
I was living in some trailer in a trailer park (perhaps this is a prophetic dream), and I was friends with a couple of other families living in the next-door trailers. One of those families was a couple, and the wife and I seemed to have a history. I don't know what the history was, but I have the feeling it was mostly the horizontal kind. Anyway, we had a nearly adulterous incident in her trailer, but her husband came back and ruined it with the usual suspicious-husband's lack of tact. He didn't notice anything, we hadn't really gotten anywhere, but we couldn't very well continue in his presence. Somehow we stole a second and agreed that she was going to come over later that night, as soon as suspicious-husband slipped away into dreamland.
So later on, I was back in my trailer, it was getting dark, and I was considering my predicament. Unfortunately, I don't get much practice with these types of situations in my dreams, or in reality, so I found myself struggling with the moral issues. I finally managed to quiet my conscience. I told myself that it's not good to think so much, and that I could debate the morality at leisure after the deed was done. This is true to the philosophy of Emo Phillips, as summarized by this quote I often put into practice:
"When I was a kid I used to pray every night for a new bicycle. Then I realized that the Lord doesn't work that way so I stole one and asked Him to forgive me."
However, my conscience yielding to this excellent idea didn't put an end to my ruminating. I also considered the possibility of being shot in the head by a jealousy-possessed man upon successful completion of fornication, but failure to uphold secrecy. I was wise to remember the Russian saying that concerns secrets:
"When only one knows, only one knows. When two know, twenty-two know."
In my situation, the only way I could keep the secret to myself after the dirty deed was done, was with a brick upside the pretty head of my co-conspirator/mistress. And this my conscience would never let me do. My Mom has taught me that girls are at worst to be spanked, never to be beaten with weapons.
Anyway, all the excellent philosophy and common wisdom I am schooled in never amounted to anything. As it often happens in dreams, my conversation-with-self took about 10 seconds, but the outside world had meanwhile reached morning. Perhaps I was zooming around the inside of my trailer at an appreciable fraction of light-speed for those 10 seconds. In any case, she had never come.
I came out of my trailer only to find myself surrounded by grieving, slobbering people. "What happened?" I demanded of some blurry dream face. He told me. It turns out that the couple had fallen asleep and the husband had his arm around the wife's neck in a "we're lying on our backs and he has his arm under and around her neck" kind of way. Then, it seems like the husband dreamt that we had already perpetrated our heinous crime, because when he woke up in that very position, he found he had strangled her.
I woke up shortly after, but there was one last strange moment. This was everyone's unconditional acceptance of the fact that it was not the husband's fault. There wasn't even going to be a trial. This completely undermined my belief in dream-justice.
Anyway, how bout some real tragedy?
Mario has hit a new low. Yesterday he was sitting on the couch, reading something on his laptop, while flipping through the channels on TV. He might as well have been pressing the channel button with the TV turned off for all he saw or heard. When I commented on it, he gave a typically brain-mangling retort: "if there was something worth seeing, I would have looked."
I was living in some trailer in a trailer park (perhaps this is a prophetic dream), and I was friends with a couple of other families living in the next-door trailers. One of those families was a couple, and the wife and I seemed to have a history. I don't know what the history was, but I have the feeling it was mostly the horizontal kind. Anyway, we had a nearly adulterous incident in her trailer, but her husband came back and ruined it with the usual suspicious-husband's lack of tact. He didn't notice anything, we hadn't really gotten anywhere, but we couldn't very well continue in his presence. Somehow we stole a second and agreed that she was going to come over later that night, as soon as suspicious-husband slipped away into dreamland.
So later on, I was back in my trailer, it was getting dark, and I was considering my predicament. Unfortunately, I don't get much practice with these types of situations in my dreams, or in reality, so I found myself struggling with the moral issues. I finally managed to quiet my conscience. I told myself that it's not good to think so much, and that I could debate the morality at leisure after the deed was done. This is true to the philosophy of Emo Phillips, as summarized by this quote I often put into practice:
"When I was a kid I used to pray every night for a new bicycle. Then I realized that the Lord doesn't work that way so I stole one and asked Him to forgive me."
However, my conscience yielding to this excellent idea didn't put an end to my ruminating. I also considered the possibility of being shot in the head by a jealousy-possessed man upon successful completion of fornication, but failure to uphold secrecy. I was wise to remember the Russian saying that concerns secrets:
"When only one knows, only one knows. When two know, twenty-two know."
In my situation, the only way I could keep the secret to myself after the dirty deed was done, was with a brick upside the pretty head of my co-conspirator/mistress. And this my conscience would never let me do. My Mom has taught me that girls are at worst to be spanked, never to be beaten with weapons.
Anyway, all the excellent philosophy and common wisdom I am schooled in never amounted to anything. As it often happens in dreams, my conversation-with-self took about 10 seconds, but the outside world had meanwhile reached morning. Perhaps I was zooming around the inside of my trailer at an appreciable fraction of light-speed for those 10 seconds. In any case, she had never come.
I came out of my trailer only to find myself surrounded by grieving, slobbering people. "What happened?" I demanded of some blurry dream face. He told me. It turns out that the couple had fallen asleep and the husband had his arm around the wife's neck in a "we're lying on our backs and he has his arm under and around her neck" kind of way. Then, it seems like the husband dreamt that we had already perpetrated our heinous crime, because when he woke up in that very position, he found he had strangled her.
I woke up shortly after, but there was one last strange moment. This was everyone's unconditional acceptance of the fact that it was not the husband's fault. There wasn't even going to be a trial. This completely undermined my belief in dream-justice.
Anyway, how bout some real tragedy?
Mario has hit a new low. Yesterday he was sitting on the couch, reading something on his laptop, while flipping through the channels on TV. He might as well have been pressing the channel button with the TV turned off for all he saw or heard. When I commented on it, he gave a typically brain-mangling retort: "if there was something worth seeing, I would have looked."
Tuesday, November 11, 2008
(mis)adventures
I received a complaint yesterday. Apparently my most recent entry was more depressing than a bag of drowned kittens. I didn't think so, but my subconscious must have taken it personally. It rebounded today with an optimistic dream, knowing full well I'd tell it here. You get to hear it first, before it is shamelessly converted into word-mass for my novel.
I'm somewhere off in nondescript-setting land. The dream isn't really visual in any way. I'm listening to a Queen song I haven't heard before. It's important to note hrtr that I pretty much worship Queen. So I'm listening to the song for a while. It changes pace several times in that sexy Bohemian Rhapsody kind of way. Very enjoyable. And then, all of a sudden I'm hearing something very familiar. It takes me a moment, and then I realize I'm hearing one of my own songs, but sung by Freddie Mercury. And here I'm faced with a choice. I could get depressed, because there's nothing more depressing than taking a good song out of the bank. I definitely consider mourning the loss for a second, but then another idea occurs to me. "Hey!" I think. "This means my song kicks ass!" And on that happy note, the dream ended, at least I don't remember anything else. And no, I have no idea which one of my songs it was. It being kickass doesn't really narrow the search down.
Yesterday, Mario and I went to Starbucks. We looked up all the Starbucks in our area and found one that was open till eleven, because it was already ten when Mario got back from work. I even called a couple (so you can appreciate the effort). Having found it, we left the apartment in a hurry.
So we're in the car, we've driven out of the apartment complex, and we need to make our first decision - right or left. That's when we realize we forgot to do one insignficant little thing. We never wrote down the coordinates or phone number. In fact, neither of us remembers a single piece of information that would aid in the search.
Being optimists, we decide to drive around for a while. We roll down our windows. We think maybe we can pick up the scent of overpriced-ness. Our optimism lasts about ten minutes.
Then Mario has the brilliant idea of using On-Star. On-Star is a ghetto version of the GPS monitor+screen that's so generously contributing to the further mental retardation of America. You press a button, the car places a phone call, you tell the operator where you want to go, and they send directions to your car. Anyway, we use On-Star, and it takes us pretty much back to our apartment. Apparently there's a Starbucks in the next-door Kroger. Feeling most triumphant, we march into Kroger's only to find that we're about three hours too late. This wasn't the lucky Starbucks after all. After that we gave up and went home.
This reminded both of us of another of our many failures, one that took place sophomore year of college. We had decided to go to Costco. We were really excited about it for some reason. I think we were under the illusion, or rather delusion, that Costco is a magical place where pennies are still worth something - specifically vast amounts of food. We got ready, we took our biggest suitcases, and walked bravely out of Next House (our dormitory), dragging them behind us. We only went about thirty meters. We realized neither of us had a Costco card at twenty meters, the other ten were by inertia. Then we stopped and turned around without another word. We were each still willing to go, provided that the other would buy a card, and the resounding "No Way!" was palpable without us having to prompt each other.
I'm somewhere off in nondescript-setting land. The dream isn't really visual in any way. I'm listening to a Queen song I haven't heard before. It's important to note hrtr that I pretty much worship Queen. So I'm listening to the song for a while. It changes pace several times in that sexy Bohemian Rhapsody kind of way. Very enjoyable. And then, all of a sudden I'm hearing something very familiar. It takes me a moment, and then I realize I'm hearing one of my own songs, but sung by Freddie Mercury. And here I'm faced with a choice. I could get depressed, because there's nothing more depressing than taking a good song out of the bank. I definitely consider mourning the loss for a second, but then another idea occurs to me. "Hey!" I think. "This means my song kicks ass!" And on that happy note, the dream ended, at least I don't remember anything else. And no, I have no idea which one of my songs it was. It being kickass doesn't really narrow the search down.
Yesterday, Mario and I went to Starbucks. We looked up all the Starbucks in our area and found one that was open till eleven, because it was already ten when Mario got back from work. I even called a couple (so you can appreciate the effort). Having found it, we left the apartment in a hurry.
So we're in the car, we've driven out of the apartment complex, and we need to make our first decision - right or left. That's when we realize we forgot to do one insignficant little thing. We never wrote down the coordinates or phone number. In fact, neither of us remembers a single piece of information that would aid in the search.
Being optimists, we decide to drive around for a while. We roll down our windows. We think maybe we can pick up the scent of overpriced-ness. Our optimism lasts about ten minutes.
Then Mario has the brilliant idea of using On-Star. On-Star is a ghetto version of the GPS monitor+screen that's so generously contributing to the further mental retardation of America. You press a button, the car places a phone call, you tell the operator where you want to go, and they send directions to your car. Anyway, we use On-Star, and it takes us pretty much back to our apartment. Apparently there's a Starbucks in the next-door Kroger. Feeling most triumphant, we march into Kroger's only to find that we're about three hours too late. This wasn't the lucky Starbucks after all. After that we gave up and went home.
This reminded both of us of another of our many failures, one that took place sophomore year of college. We had decided to go to Costco. We were really excited about it for some reason. I think we were under the illusion, or rather delusion, that Costco is a magical place where pennies are still worth something - specifically vast amounts of food. We got ready, we took our biggest suitcases, and walked bravely out of Next House (our dormitory), dragging them behind us. We only went about thirty meters. We realized neither of us had a Costco card at twenty meters, the other ten were by inertia. Then we stopped and turned around without another word. We were each still willing to go, provided that the other would buy a card, and the resounding "No Way!" was palpable without us having to prompt each other.
Wednesday, June 18, 2008
Wednesday
I've been losing consciousness a lot lately. I find myself waking up at any given time of the day in front of the open door of the refrigerator with high expectations of finding something.
I had a dream today where yet another girl fell for my charms. If girls are anywhere close to as easy in real life as in my dreams, then I've missed out on college life more than I thought. Unfortunately my conscience is also much less dormant in the dream world, and wouldn't let me do a damn thing before talking it over with Chun.
Another unreported case of stomach abuse happened today, and sadly, no one will ever know. I had a dinner appointment with grandma, and those are not broken without consequences (Grandma has a collection of brass knuckles). However, I hadn't told Mom of my plans, and just as I was about to go, she called me to the dinner table. I stuttered something or other in my defense, but she grabbed my by the figurative nape of the neck and fed me till she deemed me full. Meanwhile, grandma called me on my cell, and demanded to know why I wasn't there when the food was hot and already on the table. I told her I'd be there as soon as I could but she demanded to know why I couldn't leave the house immediately. I bleated something about being there soon and hung up hoping everything would just blow over. It did eventually, but I had to suppress many a gag reflex, and Mario had to eat about half of the food on my plate while she wasn't looking.
On another note, "nasal septum" has vacated its spot on Google Trends as #37 most popular search. #37 is now occupied by "thong injury" - a rather radical jump in interest content. I am eagerly anticipating tomorrow's winner.
I had a dream today where yet another girl fell for my charms. If girls are anywhere close to as easy in real life as in my dreams, then I've missed out on college life more than I thought. Unfortunately my conscience is also much less dormant in the dream world, and wouldn't let me do a damn thing before talking it over with Chun.
Another unreported case of stomach abuse happened today, and sadly, no one will ever know. I had a dinner appointment with grandma, and those are not broken without consequences (Grandma has a collection of brass knuckles). However, I hadn't told Mom of my plans, and just as I was about to go, she called me to the dinner table. I stuttered something or other in my defense, but she grabbed my by the figurative nape of the neck and fed me till she deemed me full. Meanwhile, grandma called me on my cell, and demanded to know why I wasn't there when the food was hot and already on the table. I told her I'd be there as soon as I could but she demanded to know why I couldn't leave the house immediately. I bleated something about being there soon and hung up hoping everything would just blow over. It did eventually, but I had to suppress many a gag reflex, and Mario had to eat about half of the food on my plate while she wasn't looking.
On another note, "nasal septum" has vacated its spot on Google Trends as #37 most popular search. #37 is now occupied by "thong injury" - a rather radical jump in interest content. I am eagerly anticipating tomorrow's winner.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
