Dream #518 (February 12, 2014) - The Tricycle

Ha!


I dreamt that my brother Mike, Kevin and I were living at my grandpa's house in Fort Wayne, Indiana.  I had just returned from a shoot in the bitter cold out in Washington state (like in real life), but Fort Wayne was warm and sunny enough for me to wear shorts and a t-shirt.  I hopped out of my car (a blue Honda Civic for some reason; I've never owned that kind of car) and greeted Mike and Kevin.

It was lunch time, so we began preparing a meal together.  In the dream we were all quite talented: Kevin juggled tomatoes before chopping them up, I blew lettuce into the air before slicing it with one knife in each hand, and Mike kicked whole carrots into the air and quickly chopped them up.  Everything we cut up magically landed in a great bowl in the middle of the kitchen and thus a salad was formed.

We then made peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwiches for each other (I made Mike's, Mike made Kevin's, Kevin made mine) and sat down and ate a good meal.  After lunch I hit myself in the head with the palm of my hand as I realized Mike and I were supposed to pick up a rented camera from Indianapolis (over 2 hours south of Fort Wayne).  I began getting ready to leave.  As Mike and I walked to the car, he told me that he didn't want to drive on such a nice day.  Instead, he wanted to ride a bike (yes, just one bike for the two of us) down to Indy.

I laughed at the idea, but he insisted, so I put my things in a plastic bag and walked over behind the house where he kept his bike.  As it turns out, his bike was actually a tricycle with a large basket in the front.  I crawled into the basket and Mike began to pedal.

We went quite a ways, but then it dawned on both of us that it would take us days to bike as far as we were wanting to go at such a slow pace, so we turned back around.

Finally, we got into my car, which had transformed to a Buick LeSabre (the car I actually own) and we started driving.


Then I awoke.

Dream #517 (January 31, 2014)

This was fun.


I dreamt that I was working at the National Youth Worker's Convention in some weird city in Florida.  Emily De Araujo, Seth Bartlette, Andrew DeSelm, and Aaron Satterfield (who all worked at the convention in real life) were there with me.  Though we had a rather small set, we were shooting interviews in an enormous gymnasium that we had all to ourselves.

After a couple interviews Emily told me to run some errands, so I took a 15-passenger van and went into town.  For some reason I stopped at every bus stop and picked up passengers (I was only supposed to go to Lowe's to grab some screws and such).  Finally, I had a van-full.  It was only then that I realized I knew every passenger.  Most were guys from the Oregon-Davis High School basketball team I played with years ago, and one was a barista I barely know.

The dudes were having a jolly old time, singing, shouting, and dancing around (yes, dancing, even inside a van).  Finally Shaun Johnston made me stop so he could drive.  I gave into his request and soon enough we were barreling down the road into a weird subdivision.  Brandon Johnston (Shaun's brother) declared that we should all remove our shirts, which we did (except for the barista; she had somehow disappeared, though she reappears later).  I took it a step further and removed my pants so that I was down to my turtle boxers.  I shouted with excitement, then jumped from the car.  Shaun slammed on the breaks and everyone else got out and followed me as I sprinted about in random directions.

Finally, we all ended up on the doorstep of a house that looked identical to all the other houses around it.  I knocked on the door as I started clothing myself.  As soon as I was fully dressed, an elderly woman opened the door and handed me a box of donuts and a bag of hardware (the stuff I was supposed to pick up from Lowe's).  I thanked her and headed back to the van.  The basketball dudes thanked me for the ride and continued to run around as I started pulling out.

Then I heard a knock on the passenger door, so I stopped.  There was the barista again.  She asked if she could get a ride back to the convention, and I let her in.  We talked about Washington on our return journey.

Upon reentering the gymnasium, I began to tell Emily De about my experiences.


Then I awoke, or so I thought.


I walked out of the Prairie Camp cabin in which I had been sleeping and found that it was the middle of the night still.  I looked about and saw about 100 elementary school kids walking toward me, lead by my brother Mike.  I ran up to Mike and asked what was going on.  He told me we were getting ready to play capture the flag, which excited me.  Then he showed me a huge bag of Tootsie Rolls he was hiding underneath his coat.  He started counting down from 100.  I turned around and talked to some of the students about their camp experience and how much fun they were having.  Finally Mike reached 0 and he turned to the campers and threw all the candy in the air.  The kids went wild for it, and once they had some, they darted off into the woods.

Then more kids came and Mike threw out another bag of candy, this time they were Sprees.


Then I awoke, for real this time.

Dream #516 (January 20, 2014)

Well, then.

I dreamt that I was working in the vast parking lot of a supermarket.  I was pushing carts, picking up trash, wearing a shiny vest, shoveling snow, and feeding sea gulls.  I went though these tasks for quite some time until a black car with tinted windows rolled up beside me.  The back door on the driver's side opened up so, not knowing any other option, I entered the car.

There Gary Oldman, who in my dream was playing an FBI officer, told me some long story about a drug cartel and people smuggling cocaine inside of school buses.  I asked what it had to do with me and Gary told me that he wanted me to offer my vehicle washing services to the bus drivers, who were supposedly going to park in the supermarket parking lot for a bit of a break.  I was then supposed to find a way to snag some evidence while washing the vehicles so that the FBI could proceed with their raid of the buses.

I accepted to do the bus washing, and I left the black car and began getting the power washer prepared.  Sure enough, the buses rolled in just a few minutes later.  I walked up to the lead bus and talked to a rather large gentleman, who told me he would very much like my assistance because the buses were extra filthy (indeed they were, for there were layers of dirt caked onto all sides of every bus).

I proceeded to blast soapy water on to the first bus.  I was surprised at the great joy I had cleaning the buses.  It was so great that I forgot that I had another more important task to do.  Well, I didn't forget; I just didn't care anymore because cleaning was so much fun.

The head bus driver, after I'd made my way to the third of five buses, talked to me and told me how impressed he was with my washing ability.  He began asking me why I wanted to wash the buses and I told him that the FBI instructed me to do so.  He laughed and patted me on the back as I continued to cleanse the filth.  Then he offered me a very well paying job with the mafia out of gratitude for my honesty, but I really didn't care.  I just wanted to clean the buses.

Then Gary Oldman, dressed as a shopper, snuck his way over to me and asked me what I was doing and that he'd pay me a large sum of money to follow through with the evidence snatching.  I told him that I just wanted to clean!  Frustrated, he left.  The mafia guy again came up to me and commended me on how I'd turned away Gary and offered me even more money to join the mafia, but again I refused.

I just wanted to clean buses.

Then I awoke.

Dream #515 (January 15, 2014)

I seem to be getting more and more sporadic with these dream blogs.  Oh, well.


I was in an old Japanese temple, searching for a sacred scroll.  The place was made up mostly of gray and pale blue linens, ad the windows were arranged to allow natural light to create several diffused gradients of light to shadow areas.  I was wearing my hair in a bun, and I had a light blue robe wrapped about me.  I thought I was the only person there, but I found a priest inside one of the rooms.  When he saw me enter, he pulled out a beautiful, yet simple blade and presented it to me.  I accepted.

Then he opened up a barely saturated red chest and lifted from it the sacred scroll.  I bowed, then knelt before him as he handed the scroll over to me.

I left the temple and found myself in a thick woods bright green trees with red trunks.  I wandered about for quite some time until I finally came upon an American city.  I took a deep breath and descended down a great hill in order to enter it.  The streets were full of filthy people who all paid no attention to me.


I eventually awoke.

Dream #513 (October 31, 2013) Sufjan and Santa

This one almost makes sense, right?

Sufjan Stevens was holding a Midnight Christmas Extravaganza in the middle of a lightly snow-covered gravel church parking lot in Indiana.  I was working the event; I helped set up the large red, white, and green stage, the speakers, the various decorations, and microphones.  After a lot of hard work (too boring to write down here), the show was ready.

About two hundred people showed up on the cold night and sat down with their hot chocolates and watched the show, while I watched from side and backstage.  Sufjan put on an excellent show, performing in several costumes including the following: teddy bear, Christmas frog, elf, tree, snowshoe.

During the finale, a bunch of people with paper-mache reindeer heads (8 in all) jumped on stage and dance alongside jolly old Sufjan.  At that moment, I noticed that Santa had not made an appearance during the entire show and, for some reason, that upset me very much.  I dashed to the trunk of my car, pulled out my Santa suit, and hopped onstage and joined in the fun.  I did some amazing acrobatic dance moves, and even climbed to the top of the trussing, swing across the stage, and slid down the heavily decorated Christmas tree.  It was awesome, and the audience let me know it.

After the show, the crew set up a long dining table and a large Christmas turkey, as well as all kinds of other tasty foods, were brought out for Sufjan and his gang.  I was getting ready to leave, but Sufjan grabbed me and placed me in the seat of honor right next to his.  I dined with him and had a merry time indeed.

At the end of the meal, he asked me if I would join his troupe and become his full-time Santa.  Immediately I answered, "Certainly, Sufjan!"  He told me to take the next hour to pack up all of my belongings and to meet him back at his larger-than-life tour bus.

Then I awoke.

Dream #514 (November 18, 2013) Cocaine and the First Lady

Well, well, well


I was walking down a long dirt road surrounded by fields and pine trees.  I wore a sweatsuit and a backpack and was trying to interpret the large map I was carrying.  I walked several mile blocks, unable to find where I was going (though I was never sure where I was actually trying to go).

After a long while, a tractor pulling a hay wagon rode past me.  I didn't think to hop on, but luckily Gia Franke (a former college classmate of mine with whom I haven't spoken for years) stopped the driver, hopped down, and, with enthusiasm, convinced me to join her and a dozen others on a ride to some convention center where the president (not the current president, but a president I created in my head) was supposed to speak later that day.

We rode along the road for a while, and I found myself telling life stories to all the other passengers.

At last we arrived at an enormous warehouse.  Once inside I saw that a sizable crowd had gathered to hear the president's speech.  I wandered off by myself because I was far more interested in exploring the warehouse than in hearing a canned message that I'd probably heard before.  I ended up in a back room where the president was being prepped for his talk.  I saw a woman run up to him and exclaim that his wife had fallen ill suddenly and was lying down in a nearby room.

I continued to explore the warehouse.  I noticed that my left nostril had become irritatingly stuffed up, and I tried, as I walked, to expel the gunk from my nose, but I had no luck.

I finally found a large room in the warehouse in which dozens of brute men were, in an assembly line, unpacking large boxes of cocaine and repackaging the powder into a more manageable size.  For some reason, they left the large garage doors of the room open to the outside.  It was extremely windy, so cocaine clouds filled the room.  I was quickly covered in the stuff.  I, for some reason, was hopeful that it would clear my nasal cavity, but even cocaine couldn't help.

I knew that I should probably leave the room before I got in trouble with the brutes or before they all got caught by the plethora of security guards present in the building due to the presidents presence.  However, before I left, a particularly muscular man forced me to put on a puffy hooded Miami Hurricanes coat (I had one when I was in lower elementary school) and grab a large black trash bag filled with something I would never see in the dream.

I left in a hurry (well, in as much of a hurry as a heavily coated guy carrying a large trash bag can be), and accidentally ended up in the room in which the First Lady was resting (unconscious).  A bunch of the cocaine fell onto her (I had a thick layer on me, and I was constantly creating a cloud wherever I went), and I tried to brush it off, but it only made it worse.

The only thing left for me to do was run.  I didn't leave the bag, for several reasons that made sense to me at the time (I didn't know what was in it, I didn't want to further harm the First Lady, I didn't want to leave my fingerprints behind on something that could've been filled with an illegal substance.

I must have been high, because I had no idea of knowing where I was going, or how to guide myself in certain directions.  I just sprinted.  I, unfortunately, literally ran into the president right as he was walking out to give his speech, knocking him to the floor and covering him in cocaine.  Oops.


Then I awoke.

Dream #512 (October 27, 2013) Battle for President

This was strange.


I dreamt that I was at an enormous assembly somewhere in the United States.  There were thousands upon thousands of people there for a conference held by the Missionary Church (a rather small denomination, primarily located in the Midwest).  In the dream the president of the Missionary Church (very loosely based on the real president, Steve Jones, though in the dream he was tall and buff) was a very corrupt man (not the case in real life) and had used his special spirit to control the spirits and the minds of the Missionary Church congregants.  All those subject to Steve's conjuration had black spots in their eyes.

I was at the conference just by chance.  I was in town and thought I would talk to a couple friend I knew were there.  When I showed up, several middle aged people gathered about me and talked about me as if I were not there.  They formed a circle about me and began to sing about me.  I finally escaped the circle of praise and asked a hoodie-wearing young man what it was all about, and they told me I was to be the next president of the Missionary Church.  I was to be the one to free them of Steve's corruption.

Initially I mocked those who praised me so, claiming that I knew very little of what a president should know.  However, they persisted, and eventually pity lead me to accept the calling.

The great session was about to begin, so the large stadium full of people grew quiet as the lights dimmed.  I stood in the back as Steve took the stage and shouted his lies from the pulpit.  Those who were brain/spiritwashed cheered and applauded at each of Steve's proclamations.  Finally, the rebels lifted me up and carried me to the stage.

I stood there, face-to-face with Steve.  He laughed at me as some of his servants (they all wore black and had long, black hair) placed a dark red, mechanical armor on his body.  They handed him an enormous sword, and he took an offensive stance.  A rebel from the crowd tossed up a large medieval axe and I grabbed it and took a swing at Steve.

A battle ensued.  I, to my surprise, was very quick and accurate with the axe, and I delivered several strong blows to Steve, though his armor seemed to absorb all the impact.  I, armor-less, managed to dodge each of his swings and stabs.  I was quite impressive.  Finally, I struck Steve on the face, but to my horror, he suffered no wounds.

The battle continued for quite some time, and with each minute I realized more and more that Steve possessed invincibility.  As I was about to give up and flee, Steve's right-hand man (a scary-lookin' fella wearing a long black robe and possessing a long, narrow nose) managed to whisper to me from across the room, stating that Steve had a magical orb in a black pouch attached to his belt.  I quickly managed to find this orb and cut it loose from Steve's waist.

A beautiful black and white sphere rolled across the ground.  I grabbed it just as Steve cut his sword across my stomach.  I suffered not a scratch!  It was only a matter of seconds before I had slain Steve and he was on the floor, lifeless.

The crowd was immediately freed from the spell, and they cheered and a celebration ensued.

As my first act as president, I gathered up a team of people, including my brother Mike, and prepared them to go to South America to help a few people in need there.

I thought that I had also scheduled a trip to South America just a couple days after my brother's flight, but I discovered that I accidentally committed to serving for three weeks on a submarine.  I thought that sounded miserable.


Then I awoke.