wReckless Endangerment

I was driving my scooter home from the pizza parlor, feeling slightly drunk and stuffed to the gills. As I approached the underpass, an on-coming Mitsubishi Montero turned/swerved left immediately in front of me, crossing my lane. It crashed into the bridge-supports on my right just as I puttered past. I looked around to see if anyone else had witnessed the accident, but didn't see a soul.

Crap! I guess it's up to me to see if anyone is injured and call the cops.

I pulled my scooter over on to the sidewalk, and futzed with deploying the kickstand. I still saw no one around, and I sprinted over to the Montero. Going to the driver's side door, I noticed that the wrecked vehicle contained no occupants. Recalling what I'd learned from some First Aid/Safety Red Cross lecture many moons ago, I leaned through the window and turned off the car's ignition. As I pulled my head back out, I noticed some people grouped on the other side of the car and made my way over to them.

Holy crow! That guy looks like Cliff Clavin from Cheers! Fock, it IS him!

John Ratzenberger introduced himself as having also been a witness to the accident, and two of the other forgettable strangers grouped around him professed to be the driver and passenger of the Montero. One was a woman in her early forties, the other her son, who looked to be about fifteen. Are you all right? Yes, they said they were fine. What happened? Explanation was offered in the form of some vagaries about blood sugar and not paying attention and cell phones. Do you need any help? No, no, no, everything is fine.


John Ratzenberger grabbed my arm and pulled me aside. "Hey, buddy. Ahh, look...I was ahh, helping the lady out of the car a minute ago, and ahhh, that kid got out of the car." Yeah that was probably a good idea. Cars that have been in accidents sometimes leak gasoline. "Yeah well ahh, you see what he's wearing right now?" I looked over to see a fifteen-year-old in jean and a t shirt. It looked pretty normal. What's the big deal? "Well ahh, ya see he wasn't wearing THAT outfit when he got out of the car. He changed behind the ahhh, guardrail over there." I strolled over to the guardrail and looked behind it to see a discarded gimp-suit, straight out of Pulp Fiction's pawn shop.

I whipped my head around in time to see the woman and boy diving back into the Montero and putting foot to pedal. Crushed-in fender and all, they went zipping away down the street, only moments before cops and news vans begin pulling up and asking John Ratzenberger where the Malevolent Molesting Teacher had fled to with her latest victim.

I got back on my scooter and left.

♪"Wouldn't you like to get away..."♪

To Dream The Impossible Dream

About a week ago, my mind was trying to jar my body awake. When I'm too cold, or I have to pee, or the phone is ringing, my head makes every effort rouse my body so that I can tend to business. I suppose that experience has taught my collective self that the best way to get things moving is to start threading weird events together until my brain finally has a "what the f*ck?" moment, realizes it is dreaming, and takes corrective measures. However, this particular evening, traditional methods weren't working, so my brain started throwing curve balls.

In the earliest part of the dream that I can recall (which was pretty late), I was walking down a street that looked pretty similar to Bourbon Street. It was packed with people, and we all seemed to be having a great time. Suddenly and without explanation, the street was ankle-deep in crunchy black beetles, and people were far less jubilant. The panicked crowd began to move away and carry me along with them.

As I was borne along with everyone else, I noticed a cloaked, shadowy figure darting from person to person, like something out of The Frightners or one of those Harry Potter And The Epic Of Suck movies. Every time the shadowy freak would close in on someone, he would do an impression of David Lo Pan and shoot red light out of his mouth and into the face of his victim. That person would shudder briefly, then drain of all color, and finally begin attacking the surrounding crowd like a coked-out zombie.

Amid all this chaos of beetles and soulless roid-ragers and a red-light-vampire thing, I just get swept along in the throng. It doesn't really weird me out or cause me any distress. People are getting trampled down into the beetles. Friends are turning against each other. That bizarre black-robed creep keeps zipping about and turning more people into FOX-News viewers. It just doesn't penetrate that I might be dreaming and I need to wake up to check on the toilet-phone-blanket or whatever.

Finally, the thing shooting red light from its mouth gets close enough to me that I can get a good look at his face. He stops just a few people away and throws back his hood. I find myself looking at Armand Assante with red light coming out of his mouth. And THAT is when I finally have my "what the f*ck?" moment, blow a gasket, and realize that I am dreaming. Sure, streets full of beetles are possible. A spooky bastard with a mouth that shoots red light that turns people into a mindless violent army of the undead is feasible. But that red-light mouthed person COULD NOT POSSIBLY have starred opposite of Sylvester Stallone in Judge Dredd. No way. Wake up.

And so I did. After turning off the ringer on the toilet, I wondered briefly what had become of Armand Assante's career. Was he still making movies? Was he still alive? Was he chasing hapless victims through the beetle-infested streets of New Orleans?

As I lapsed back into sleep I quietly hoped that I would never learn the truth.

The Day I Met an Identity Thief

How is it possible to be surprised in a dream? How can unexpected things occur? This is one of the things that I find really amazing about dreams. If they are entirely of my own mind's making, how can the scenarios it (supposedly) creates be unpredictable? How can the characters it (allegedly) invents do and say things that it doesn't see coming?

And who are the characters in my dreams? If they are my mind's creation, how is it that I can say things to them they don't expect to hear?

The dream I had this morning is an example of this happening.

I was back in college. It was my first day back and I had just walked out of the student union into a central courtyard area with lots of picnic tables lined up on the lawn. Each picnic table had several pay phones on it, only they weren't really pay phones, they were just the university's phone system that you needed a special code or card to access.

I was carrying two big bags of laundry and all the paperwork I needed to complete to get my tuition and financial aid squared away. I sat down at one of the picnic tables and looked at the phone in front of me. To finish the paperwork, I needed to use the phone and enter the correct code. I remember trying to write the access code on a small glossy card and struggling to get the ink to stay on the card. The number was 475 030 0060 (or 1160, I can't remember now).

I picked up the phone and started dialing the numbers, but because the numbers wouldn't stick to the glossy card I had written them on, I was also unable to dial the numbers into the phone's touch pad. I just could not get the sequence right. I kept mis-dialing and then I would have to start over.

Although there were students and other people at lots of the tables around me, there was no one else but me at the table where I was sitting. There were dozens of other phones available, both at my table and at the numerous other tables in the courtyard. So I wasn't in any kind of rush. No one was waiting on me and there was no pressure to complete my task. I had all the time in the world. But it was frustrating. Every time I tried to dial my access code, I would get part-way through it and then screw it up.

Holding the handset to my ear, I just kept trying, screwing up, and starting over. Then, through the receiver I heard a voice, "Come on... get it... get it!" It was very faint and kind of crackly, like it wasn't a direct connection. I was completely taken aback. I shouldn't be connected to anyone yet, because I had not successfully entered my access code. There was a second or two of silence before I realized that someone was tapping into the phone lines - lines that were supposed to be secure.

Then I spoke back to him. "Get what?" I said.

There was another pause and then all he said was, "Uhh..."

I had caught him by surprise. I realized that I was not supposed to be able to hear him, but something about the connection was faulty. So when he had spoken, he had not expected me to hear his words. When I heard them, I was surprised. And when I answered them, he was totally caught off guard.

"What are you doing?" I asked him. "You're trying to get access to my information, aren't you?"

He wasn't completely forthcoming, though he did respond to me. I could tell I had made him nervous and, although he hadn't disconnected yet, I don't think he knew quite what to do.

I was curious and continued to ask questions. "Are you only connected to me? Or are you tapping into lots of lines? Where are you? Are you even in this country? East or West Coast?" He wouldn't even give me a vague answer.

A group of students at the table next to mine noticed me talking and began to laugh. I told them what was going on - that there was a guy tapping into the system to steal our information and that I had caught him. I thought they would be interested. They weren't.

I turned back to my own table. Realizing that my interview with the identity thief wasn't going to get me anywhere, I decided I should report this breach to the authorities. Staying on the line with the guy, I picked up a handset from another phone at my table. Below the keypad was a list of access numbers, one of which was labeled "POLICE: 1-2-1."

I dialed the numbers and connected to the dispatcher. She asked what I was calling about and I began to repeat the entire story to her. As I began to tell the story, something was announced over the loudspeaker and immediately all of the other students got up and began to exit the courtyard. The courtyard emptied quickly and then crews began removing the picnic tables. At the same time, the grounds crew drove onto the lawn with an enormous tractor that looked like the maintainers that used to drive up the dirt roads in Nebraska to redistribute the gravel.



However, instead of a scoop this machine had an enormous rotor blade for cutting the grass. It was basically the biggest lawn mower I had ever seen - and one of the loudest. By this time I had no idea if the guy was still on the other line, and I assumed he had hung up. But I was keeping the phone off the hook anyway, just in case it would help them trace the source of his connection. I was still telling my story to the woman at the police department, but I couldn't hear a thing over the roar of the lawn mower. And any minute now, the grounds crew would be at my table telling me to leave and trying to move the table. I couldn't tell if the dispatcher was listening to me and I had doubts that I was even speaking to the right people. I knew that I was only talking to the campus police. I probably needed the FBI for this. Would the dispatcher even care enough to put me through?

Was she even listening? I could barely hear, but I thought I detected an affirmative "Uh-huh..." from her at one point. "So do you think you'll be able to locate the source?" I asked while also trying to stall the grounds crew who were clearing the courtyard and eyeballing my pile of laundry and papers.

Just then, something beeped in the real world - the phone, an alarm clock, something - and woke me up, which was a relief. By this time, the dream seemed to be only getting more and more chaotic - and it was really noisy!

So, I don't really find the storyline of this dream to be very remarkable and I don't think I would even have bothered to write it down were it not for a couple of things I found interesting. Aside from the surprises I (and the guy on the phone) experienced, I also noticed a couple of what appear to be recurring themes from other dreams I have had.

In 15 Minutes to Apocalypse I was similarly flummoxed when I needed to dial runes into a telephone's keypad. And in The Delirium of Illness I had a similarly frustrating phone call with my doctor's receptionist, who I was unable to hear over the yelling of my Romanian grandmother.

Wonder what that means.

Oddities

I dreamed a montage of odd things last evening. Not that this is unusual. I only remember one though. I remembered the other odd stuff this morning when I got up, but now I can't think of them. Isn't that weird how that happens?

Anyway the one I remember was that I had to ride one of those scooters generally reserved for elderly folk because my back was so bad and I couldn't ride in a car without being in agony. For some reason my mom was walking with me in a neighborhood and we were trying to get somewhere, but it was proving difficult because the scooter wasn't as fast as a car. I was impatient. She was impatient. Then the scooter quit working. And we threw up our hands and gave up and walked home.

Attacked!

I had a dream last week that I was being attacked by a man. He was just a big black shadowy blur, but he was mean. I was fighting and kicking and screaming and thrashing. He went to put his hand over my mouth to silence me and I bit down on his hand between his thumb and forefinger. I bit down hard. It was so vivid becasue I felt my teeth ripping away at his hand and he was screaming.

I woke up at that point and was a bit panicky. Rightly so. I laid there for a few minutes and then had to get up and check all the locks.

It was freaky.
Me no like.

Montage

I had a weird dream last night. Not that this is any surprise, but nonetheless I wanted to share it.

It starts out at Niagara Falls. I have never been to Niagara Falls. I didn't see or read anything about Niagara Falls, so I have no idea where this came from

Anyway I am with a group at Niagara Falls and we are walking down some wooden steps. A person in my group asks, "See the tour guide? See how close he is to the falls?" I said, "The guy with the skeleton face paint?" (Because for some reason the tour guide had skeleton face paint on) The person said, "Yeah." I respond, "I guess he is close to the falls! DANG! He could reach out and touch them!" I remember having a sense of dread and panic because it was a long fall down the falls and I don't particularly like heights.

Then somehow I am in my old house in Omaha. Gram and I are resting on the bed talking. One entire wall at the head of the bed is open to the back yard. As we are chatting away we hear a peacock squawk. We stop and look up and see a white peacock looking at us inquisitively. I turned to my grandma and asked, "What do you think it wants?" She said, "Well, it looks cold. Let's see if it wants under the covers." We lift the covers up and the bird dashes in and turns around, snuggles in and looks at us adoringly. Then it lay down and went to sleep.

We got up and left it to rest and decided that Jasmine (my mom's dog) needed a bath. But I was late for work, so I couldn't do it. My grandma said she would and I went into my room to shower. I was showering in my room with one of those handheld shower heads and I remember thinking, "How can I be showering in my room? There is no place for the water to go. The carpet is going to be soaked." I looked out the window and down to the driveway and saw my grandma lathering up Jasmine. I looked out at the street and suddenly saw a bunch of people lining the streets. I jumped back because I was in the buff and didn't want them to see. I grabbed a towel and went back over to the window to see why all these people were on the street. Just then the house started to shake. I opened the window and shouted down to my grandma, "What is that?!?" She said, "Heck if I know."

Then we saw a long brigade of military vehicles coming down the street. Trucks, tanks and the like. Then we saw a platform with a brand new, shiny helicopter on it that was painted black and red and orange. An announcer came on a loud speaker and said, "And now the new copter." And then everyone cheered. The brigade stopped and all the tank topper made a full circle and once back in position all the guys riding on the truck and tanks said at once, "HOO RAH!" I must have thought that was cool because I looked right at one of the gentleman sitting on the side of a tank with one of those fisherman-type military hats on and mouthed "Hoo Rah!" out my window. He saw me and gave me the gangster peace sign as the brigade got moving again.

Soon the trucks were gone and I suddenly had the urge for pasta. I started talking to my grandma about all different kinds of pasta. Fettuccini with alfredo sauce, lasagna with marinara sauce, mushroom stuffed ravioli with cheese sauce and on and on and on I went. We decided to go eat Italian, but on the way I made her take me to Walgreen's because they were having a buy one lipstick get the second lipstick free sale and I had to buy some. Once I got into Walgreen's I saw that every single make-up line had the lipstick sale. I panicked because how the heck was I going to choose which line to buy from. Then how was I going to choose the colors. My grandma was outside honking the horn and I was getting panicky.

I don't know if that was the end or not, but that is all I can remember.

Conclusion: my brain is weird.

No more crashes

I was being given a ride in a new vehicle developed by these guys. It used teleporter technology to make crashing into objects impossible. They demonstrated it by driving down the street very fast through crowds of people who were out celebrating. As we approached the crowds, we just passed through them without hitting them - though we scared the shit out of them.

This was expected to revolutionize space travel as well as make travelling on Earth much safer.

The guys showing me their new invention were really funny - total geeks in sort of Hawaiian shirts. They were explaining to me certain aspects of the vehicle, and apparently time would speed up or slow down depending upon where you stood in the car.

"Where you're standing," the guy said, "It's 1.0. But where he's standing, it's 2.0."

"Why?" I asked.

"Because that's the good wing," he said. "Go ahead, stand there."

I did, and didn't notice any change at first. But when I spoke, the words came out slower and my voice was lower than theirs.

They were showing off their new invention while not really giving any specifics. They were pretty excited, but reserved - reminding me of 2 Brian Denneheys in Hawaiian shirts.

"This is all very new to us, too," they said.

And I said, "Well, I understand. I mean, I remember when you used to drive into things and it would actually smash them."

Fear of Heights and Out of Gas

I had a dream that freaked me out last night:

My car in reality is currently almost out of gas and I hate going to the pump these days because prices are so high. I was pondering last evening whether or not I had enough gas to get to work this morning and I decided I did so I didn't go to the pump.

Then last night I had this dream...

I was in my little blue Sunfire and I was on a road trip [imagine that]. I was in a place where I was unfamiliar of my surroundings and how to get around. I was kind of unsure about which way I needed to go and knew I needed gas for my car since I was almost on E and thought I would find the freeway and then once on it stop at the first exit with a station. So, I started driving. I saw the exit to 450 (I have no idea if a 450 exits or where its at if it does) and it split into North and South. I took North and soon regretted it.

If you have ever been to larger cities like Dallas you will know that these new freeway bridges they are building are really high up or at least they feel like that to me because I am so afraid of heights. In my dream, this on ramp to the 450 North freeway was almost as steep as the initial incline on a roller coaster. I was freaking out because I was almost on E and I knew my engine was going to have to kick in to high gear to get me up this hill and I was petrified out of my mind because this hill was so high. I was gripping the steering wheel as if my life depended on it just waiting for the engine to rev. Finally it did and I almost lost control and plumeted over the edge. I screamed and regained control just as we peaked the top of the hill. Then the road levelled off and I saw an exit right away. I got off to fill up and compose myself as my heart was beating a mile a minute, my palms were sweating and I was shaking.

That was the end of the dream because I woke up and thought to myself -- HOLY CRAP THAT WAS SCARY -- and then I went back to sleep. The first thing I thought of this morning though was that freeway hill -- shudders.

What does it mean?
You got me.
Any ideas?

UPDATE:
Then I find this picture almost immediately after composing this post. Freaked me out.