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Fermius Firefly

A Dream Log, whenever I remember the dreams I've had.

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Name:
Location: San Marcos, United States

Fermius is a pen name drawn from a series of short fiction I wrote when I published the small press magazine Stellanova (on paper.) I play RPG games to escape from my daily grind as a technology wage slave for the state of California. I eat out a lot in order to do my part in supporting our increasingly service level economy. I am butler to 2 feline masters. If you ask them they will tell you I'm not very good at it, late with dinner, don't have enough hands with brushes in them, and sometimes I even lock them out of their office.

Sunday, February 26, 2006

Out of the Camp, Into the Campfire

The whole reason I am awake at this time, having gone to bed early as I have a 16 hour day tomorrow, is that I dreamed I was camping, yes in a jungle again, though not the same jungle as last night, don't ask me how I know. I had a cabin in last night's dream. Tonight, I just had one of those 50's style wood and canvas adventurer's cots, you know the type, the ones that require their own porter.

I managed to roll out of the cot and up against the fire. I don't know why there was still a fire, it was already 90 degrees and 100 percent humidity. That woke me up pretty fast. I was sweating, and my lips are twitching still. Must be something in the vegetable soup my body doesn't like.

Feh! Ad Astra per technica,
FF

Temple and Cruise Ship Puzzles

Two of my four dreams last night contained puzzle solving as a main theme. I was in a Jungle temple. There was a large grey marble slate across from the temple entrance with a huge pile of magnetic hematite tiles. The puzzle was to arrange the magnetic tiles on the somehow magnetic slab of marble (which may have had a big iron plate behind it for all I know.) Walking on the floor of the temple caused ripples in the reflecting bond. I stood on the edge of the pond near the slab, and waited for the water to settle. I could then make out that there was a pattern on the bottom of the reflection pool. I carefully made my way along the curb of the pool, almost no ripples from that action. I stepped back into the entrance and could line the slab's reflection up with the bottom of the pool. I could see the pattern I needed to make and then stepped forward and, in a few more tries, got the right layout. There was a clicking and whirring, and the stone bench in front of the slab opened.



This same temple figured in the following dream, there was some sort of celebration in the works, I never did get to figure out what it was, as every time the priestesses entered the temple dancing in a rhythm that started to make standing waves in the reflection pool, Miranda would come and meow in my ear. This dream restarted no less than 5 times before my brain finally gave up trying to tell the tale in this particular fashion.

The next pair of dreams took place around a cruise ship. I was working on solving another puzzle, this time the image was spread across 12 diet Pepsi cans. What made this puzzle difficult was that you could only see the image after draining the cans and opening them up. I had managed to collect 10 of the twelve images and had puzzled them out as some sort of super submarine. I had lots of spare cans, as we had been getting our two free cans a day for the last week. N, MS, SS and I, so there were 28 cans total plus a few extras we'd picked up just lying around. On a whim, I turned all of the cans over and looked at the back side. Explaining to MS that trading cards used to come with puzzles on the back, sometimes. Sure enough, there was a faint image, it looked like a technical drawing. There were still couple of pieces missing.

Next dream was in the jungle, or above the jungle. I was hang gliding down a long jungle covered slope, only, no hang glider. I was wearing some sort of suit that was holding me in the air. As I drifted down the slope I saw the cruise ship about a mile distant. There was a market at the base of the mountain, just across the docks from the ship. I waved, knowing N was down there somewhere. MS came spinning over, shouting to look in the harbor as he whirled past like a human Frisbee. SS went shooting down past him yelling at him to "cut that out, you'll make yourself sick!"

I looped around, riding an updraft to rise back up to the height of the mountain. I looked back out into the harbor beyond our cruise ship. In the very clear waters of the harbor, I could make out the shape of a large submersible. Twice the length of the cruise ship. It had two conning towers. The aft tower was festooned with antenna. I thought back to the puzzle and realized that I had that piece, I had though it was the same as the forward conning tower, with scratches or flaws. I also noted that there was a third set of dive planes just aft of that conning tower and a few yards in front of the tail planes. I bet I had that piece also, it would have something different on the back. I kicked myself for not turning our extra pieces over and inspecting their backs. MS and SS were zigging back and forth over the treetops, MS having slowed his spinning down.

I arrowed down the hillside, hoping to pick up enough speed to take me out into the harbor before looping back for a landing, I wanted a closer look at the submarine. I discovered that as I got closer the diffraction of light off the waves was more pronounced and I really couldn't make much more out.

Saturday, February 25, 2006

Beach Dream, Shark Attack!

Beach Dream,

Shark attack!
Shark attack!
Out of the water and don't look back.
-Possibly mis-remembered lyrics from the 80's

It was a lovely morning at the beach. The gulls were flapping lazily overhead, riding the morning thermals and circling high above the water, not raucous or annoying. There were about 200 people on the beach, some very attractive swimsuit action, and a couple of dozen folks in the water on body boards and just splashing about.
I was enjoying the sights and the warm sea breeze when the shark alarm sounded. I looked out into the ocean and I saw the classic shark fin angling towards shore, then two more, much larger joined it.
People started to panic as the shapes of the great white were suddenly visible in a large wave. The last few boarders rode that wave in with the sharks. Many folks kept running up the beach, but most stopped at the high water mark. That turned out to be a mistake. The sharks ran ashore along side the surfers.
Ran, up the beach, one on each side of the crowd. They ran on four muscular legs, the front legs each ending in a three toed claw, and the backs in a webbed lizard-like foot. The one nearest me snapped a bather up and bolted the top part of him down. They turned towards one another and began driving the bathers to the water line.
"Don't go in the water!" I shouted, and some of them broke to the left and right of the giant shark things, but others were too panicked and ran out into the surf, where smaller sharks were waiting. A lifeguard drove across the sand in one of their little quads, saw the size of the sharks and dumped the bike trying to turn it around. He ran back up the beach towards the sea wall, as though that would be a help. I ran to the quad, managed to start it and drove directly at the nearest monster. I slammed into its side with the Quad. The shark collapsed in a snapping twist that tangled his back foot. I managed to avoid the tail smash and helped someone get on the back of the quad. I gunned it up the beach, but there was no sign of pursuit. The police were arriving, so I decided not to take a second shot at jousting with the shark. Those teeth looked huge up close.

Friday, February 24, 2006

Naptime Dream Diablo II

I was playing Diablo II, as I sometimes do to whittle away the hours, not so much recently, which may be why I was dreaming it. I was going through an area where there are a couple of unique critters, and therefore lots of cool loot, when I picked up another cube. This one was labeled a "Hyper Cube" rather than a "Horadric Cube" and the tool tip text said "Use the Green Bean to activate the Hyper Cube." The graphic was a lot like the Horadric Cube, but silver with gold designs, it was also socketed. I shouted for N to come see what I'd found. Since I'd never seen a green bean in the game, I tried a perfect emerald. Not working. Then on a whim I tried a flawed Emerald I had just picked up, since they look kind of like a bean. It fit in the socket, and then I was able to open up the cube. Inside, it was larger than the game stash. It also had a row of buttons on the bottom that seemed to reset the color of the gem required to open it. The green emerald was replaced with a perfect emerald that popped off the cube when I closed it.
"Cool," N said. I picked up the gem and went back to town. I didn't have any other flawed gems.
"Too bad, the Hypercube is locked now. I'll have to wait until I find another gemstone to open it up."
When I put the hypercube in my stash, it swirled and added a tab to the stash screen, when I clicked on the tab it opened up the new improved Hypercube enhanced stash area, and the tab was labeled with the act. I quickly jumped back to another town and opened the stash. There was a tab for that town now as well, and it was empty. I clicked the tab for the town I'd just been in. A message, "You must travel to Lut Gholein to access this part of the Hypercube."

Dream Car, Ghost House.

Too much has gone on since dreaming last night to remember many details, but I did have a flying car. It was a deep maroon color, with a tan leather interior. The vehicle controls were pretty basic, with only the addition of tilting steering wheel for controlling the up and down motion.

I also dreamed of the dream world house. I had finished some alterations on the back downstairs bathroom, it was now open into the back yard. I had added a sliding glass door, frosted with very intricate honeysuckle pattern scroll work. Opening the sliders I stepped out into a large saffron orange circular canvas tent. The tent was peaked in the center, but without a central pole. There were some sort of S shaped wire poles that created a rounded wall and a concave curved roof. The effect was very warm and bright at the same time. The tent was about 40 foot around and there were about 24 "poles." I could see the shadows of the top of the s curves outside the tent, each had a wire leading back down to the tangent on the sidewall and then to the ground outside. There was another opening down the slope towards the side of the house that bordered the walking trail. (I think I had mentioned that in an earlier dream.) I liked how each of the poles was custom made for the location it was connected to. One of the ghosts came out into the tent with a tray of lemonade.
"Will this be your part of the house when you pass on?"
"I haven't really thought about it."
"We each inhabit our own favorite parts, you know."
"Seems sort of limiting."
"Some liked less than others, Sir."
"Thank you. I like the house, and you, all." I took the lemonade and set the tray on a small table next to a lounge. The ghost vanished and I walked around the perimeter of the tent making sure there was enough space for the smaller animals to make their rounds. I wondered if I could find some shade loving plants that would survive, as almost nothing else had to date. I thought that if I brought them in and left them in large planters, that might work. I think the rocky ground was cursed from some previous owner's experiments.

Wednesday, February 22, 2006

Almost Wet Dream

This Night's Dream pile was mostly about women with cute boobs. Hooray! Something other than exploding space invaders or being chased by Zombies.

In the first installment I was driving under the I15 overpass, rather than going up onto the mess of traffic, I'd just had enough and decided to go get an early dinner and wait the traffic out. As I came out from under the bridge the flag woman for the construction waved excitedly to me and had me pull over. It was a pretty brunette gal in her early twenties. I didn't recognize her, but she recognized me.
I pulled off into the construction parking lot and she finished directing traffic until the cones were removed. We went to dinner together where she was meeting several other former students. I did recognize one of them.
Conversation got turned around to the Redhead's mother's realestate calendar, and how this year it had sold out.
"You're on the cover this year?" I asked.
"At the beach!" she gushed and pushed her breasts up and almost out of her top.
"Whoa! I didn't know your freckles went down that far."
"Yeah, boobies, it's about time I got some." she hugged me and only let go with one arm. I did enjoy having her pressed against me.
I was blushing now. "Nice, very nice. Makes me wish I were twenty years younger."
In short order all three of the women were strutting their stuff around me. Woke up before it got any further than that.

Now that was a fun dream.
The second offering began at the "Laundromat and Lunch" where I was putting my clothing in a big industrial sized washer. A woman entered and threw her clothing in the same machine, then started taking off what she was wearing. When she was nude she climbed up over the counter separating us from the dining room. I got quite the view of her short blond curlies and a nice hint of her pink yummy bits. She wiggled at me. "Lunch?" she asked.
"Oh, yes." I hopped the counter to join her for lunch.
Annoyingly, the dream jumped to the end of the wash cycle, right past lunch. We were loading the industrial wringer/dryer, her load, my load and the dryboard rags from Ms G's third grade class. (She was not naked like the rest of us.) There was a company rep from the dryer manufacturer explaining that there was also a wash cycle, but we had missed that. He started the thing up and it churned away.
Shortly the dryer made some very odd grinding noises and we rushed to get it open. Ms G's rags were gone, completely.
"The dryer gods must not have been happy," said my naked lunch companion.
"Our Sponser's wash cloths!" moaned the dryer rep.
I didn't say anything, just helped get the rest of our clothing out of the dryer and into one of the old fashioned tumbling type dryers.
Dressed in clean clothing we made our way out into the desert. A woman in a silk nightie joined us. She seemed upset with her blonde friend, my lunch companion.
"His boobs are bigger than mine," she complained.
I looked at my chest, then hers, I pulled up my shirt and made the pectoral bounce for her. "Yours are softer I bet." I fondled myself, then reached out and fondled her. "Yep."
"Oh, You!" she sputtered and pulled my hand away, but didn't let it go. Her nipples were suddenly pointy and cute beneath her nightie.
"Please,let go of my hand?" she asked.
I released, but her fingers still stayed intertwined with mine. "It hurts."
"I'm not doing anything, you're holding on." I pulled away.
The dream became much more like my normal dreams. She had a bloody spot on her middle finger, a slash of some sort, there was something small and round sticking out of it. The thing wriggled and unrolled to reveal a giant flatworm. I pulled away and the flatworm, then another wriggled free and dropped to the desert sand. Nightie girl was screaming then.
"I didn't know you had worms," the lunch companion stepped away from her friend.
"Stand back." I crunched the worms into the pebble like dirt.
"We need to get you to a hospital. We can fix this."
"She's not riding in my car!" the lunch companion grabbed her basket of laundry and ran off.
"Bring me a big glass of rubbing alcohol." I had her get in my car and hold on to the glass. "If any more break out, put them in here." I started heading for what I hoped was the nearest hospital.

Sunday, February 19, 2006

Stone Poppas Arrive

Stone Poppas Arrive

I this dream I was monitoring the photos from several deep space aiming cameras. I was using SV's method of overlaying images to increase the contrast and resolution. I discovered a needle-like object which the parallax indicated was inside the orbit of Jupiter. When I made some rough calculations of its orbit, it indicated that it would be sweeping in to the align its aphelion with our perihelion. This would mean it would be in close proximity to the Earth for some time. Perhaps even long enough for us to get a good look at it. I contacted SV who contacted some amateur astronomers, and soon we had some images from some of the better telescopes.
The object was a three mile diameter stone needle about 150 miles long. Several of the photographs showed some smaller stone needles near it, those were sometimes there and sometimes not, so there was no corroboration. Eventually, the news was so insistent, that the Hubble took several dozen shots. There were obvious sequences where the smaller stone needles were docking with and leaving the larger asteroid. The smaller stone needles looked a bit phallic, and because of their coloration, slightly darker at the tip, they picked up some interesting nicknames.
Radar telemetry indicated that the vessel was indeed on a course to intercept the earth.
After the extended radar telemetry we began to receive radar signals regularly from the object. Our government with China quickly mounted a probe mission. Secretly, one or the other had included a little nuclear device as a "backup" plan. The probe sent back great photos of the ship and its launches working. In one series there was a flyby by a stone poppa of our probe craft. The images stopped coming for a time and several amateur astronomers reported that there had been a bright explosion. The governments of the US and China denied any involvement in the explosion for a couple of weeks, until we began to receive video and audio transmissions from the crafts cameras, and other devices using the same protocols. What had been a recon mission was now a demand to stand down. China launched about 50 large booster rockets into orbit over the course of the next 3 weeks. Not to be outdone, we managed to get about 30 nuclear missiles into orbit. It was for nothing. The stone poppas sent in small ships and destroyed them all, then the radar stations, then the Hubble re-entered in flames, then soon we were blind in space, even the international space station was broken up and sent tumbling. The crew were returned to an Island off the coast of Peru by a Stone Poppa. We tried to intercept his shuttle, but he managed to evade the missiles. Four days later, a hundred stone needles swept through the sky, ripping our air fleet to shreds over the course of about 36 hours of continuous operations. They did not attack anything but aircraft of the type that attacked them. Soon the US had almost no fighter craft. The only surviving aircraft are the ones that were safely hidden in hangers. The Stone Poppas suffered only a few casualties, though I think even those numbers were greatly inflated by our government. I personally watched a dogfight over Miramar in which two Stone Poppas shot down every plane sent to intercept them, and I could tell from the smoke, they had destroyed many planes on the ground. They landed, and when ground troops attacked, they returned the favor, destroying everything that was of a nature to have attacked them. Including men. A troop of several thousand marched across the planet. Killing anyone who resisted their movement, but leaving alone anyone who just let them pass. One group of about 100 was destroyed in a nuclear fireball, and then from that point on, the Stone Poppas needle ships swept across the planet, destroying anything with a radioactive signature, power plants, weapons, uranium mines. They systematically destroyed our capacity to hurt them by destroying any technology or peoples who had shown a capability to harm them. When it was all said and done, we managed to convince them that not all humans, despite having similar DNA to the ones who had shot at them, would in fact harm them. The damage was severe. Major cities like New York and Las Angeles were reduced in population by well over half. In many cities, there were no men or boys left alive, the Stone Poppas having determined, early on, that beings with a Y chromosome were dangerous, they had just started wiping them out, down even to the babies. This had gone on for a couple of months before they had figured out a finer method of winnowing out the dangerous ones (adults and teens) and then finally with the population so low, only attacking men and boys and now women, as many had taken up arms to avenge their fallen male comrades and children, who actually showed anger or hostility towards them. They had some sort of detector that allowed them to tell from quite a distance, it was as though they could read our minds. Eventually our population was reduced to the level where we posed no threat, and they did something really strange. They started to rebuild. They broadcast a single apology to the nations of this world, as near as we could interpret it, and began to put the trains back on the rails and to rebuild apartments and businesses. At this time they stopped killing people other than in self defense.
By this time the population of the cities was so small that the Stone Poppas moved in with some of the survivors and began teaching them their language, and protecting them from the roving street gangs, who now that they knew there was no armed police force, had begun to prey on their fellows.
The Stone Poppas had no trial by jury, somehow they apprehended, questioned, played back the crimes as though they could look back in time, then executed anyone who was found to have used lethal force, or even the threat of lethal force. Folks who just grabbed stuff and ran, they made them return the stuff, or if it was not possible, they made them make replacements. Meaning, they really worked in the auto factory, then the stereo factory, etc. The offenders slept in a 10 by 10 cube, with a Stone Poppa guard until they made reparations, or their victims indicated they were satisfied. Many of those so incarcerated initially tried to escape, but found themselves back in their 10 x 10 cube, this time with no exit and only a 3 x 9 inch hole to communicate and pass goods and services through. It could take a long time for someone to make up for a stolen and damaged car by selling leather wallets and keychains. If the criminal had used violence (non lethal) they would be incarcerated for life, the Stone Poppas sealing the cube's exit permanently. The cubes were left on street corners everywhere in public, some places they were stacked two and three deep. Crime seemed to take a rapid downturn in those areas. Any one could visit, any time. Trying to pass a criminal a hacksaw or a digging tool was a sure way to become a resident of a cube yourself, but anything else was allowed. Attempting to free a criminal made you an accessory. Soon gang members found themselves working on making restitution for the original crime, so sometimes a half dozen people would suddenly be working and the sentence would be seriously reduced. Many times, the gangs kept on working, as they then got to keep what they earned. It was a twisted system, but it seemed to work.
On the positive side, there didn't seem to be many cases of mistaken identity or errors, as they seemed to be able to play back memories, both witnesses and perpetrators. They were disappointed to learn that memories were fallible the longer the time from the incident, or the more interference from interrogators. The Stone Poppas found our minds to be, well, untidy.
I had managed to make my way into a rural area, and was working on keeping the technology infrastructure of our farming community intact. Still, we wanted desperately to be free of the Stone Poppas, but were having a difficult time of coming up with a violence free method of getting rid of them. The only thing we could see was that we had to get the wheels back on the bus, and begin to govern ourselves without resorting to guns to make people behave.

Friday, February 17, 2006

College Baseball, UFO Attack

Dreamed I was walking by the baseball fields at the local College, when a ball rolled out onto the street in front of me. The fielder chasing it held out his glove, but there was an infielder who was goofing off with his glove out. Instead of throwing it to the out fielder I tossed it in to the shortstop.
The fielder complemented me on my arm. This led to a discussion of baseball and athleticism and why a 50 year old couldn't be on a college baseball team.
They let me take a turn at bat, I was trying to show them that while I was a good hitter when I was younger, there was no way I could hit the sorts of pitches they threw now. I was wrong. I knocked about half a dozen balls into the gaps in the outfield. The fielders only managed to get to half of them. Not bad for an old man. I tried to explain that it really wasn't a good test of their theory as I wasn't really 50. The coach asked if I'd thought of being on a sports team. Let me think. Full time job, full time student (Nights and Online classes) and practices and games and travel. I declined, but offered to come out an work out with the team when I could. So I was made a batting coach.
 
The last dream before waking was a thorny flaming jumble of running through underbrush while large rotating disks roared overhead spraying the ground with jets of white hot plasma. Nothing we could fire back at them seemed to have any effect. (A typical theme in my dreams.) I reached a stream bed filled with small rounded river stones. I picked a couple of them up and used the straps from a shredded backpack to make a sling. The first stone flew right into the upper intake of one of the saucers. There was a loud banging and an explosion, the disk dipped towards the ground and tipped over when it snagged on a tree. The other saucers veered off. A soldier came out of the brush on fire and rolled through the stream. "How'd you do that?"
"A rock." I showed him my sling.
He swore.
"Use the grenade launcher on that thing. It looks like you can drop things into the intake vents."

--
ad astra per technica,
FF
``Clearly something is going on. And it is fascinating. But the question we need to ask, is it going on in outer space (or the outer world) or is it going on in inner space (or the inner world)?''  -Carl Sagan

Sunday, February 12, 2006

Homeless Tree Dwellers

Homeless people living in the boughs of trees off the main paths. If you've made a shelter and a bed, are you really still considered homeless? Nonetheless, there was a troupe of gargoyles, or dragons or some similarly undefined entity coming to reclaim the branches of these distant trees, so myself and a Roc sized bird took it upon ourselves to evacuate everyone. We were waking them, and gathering their meager belongings and moving them out into a nearby hilly area, one with plenty of protected space and good cover from the weather. As the deadline approached I made my way back towards the trunk of a tall tree where a group of about 16 folks had set up apartments, and didn't want to leave. I spoke to them again, and did something with a spiral of air and the knot of a broken branch to create a video display of what was happening in a tree just about half a mile away. The creatures who'd called in their eviction notice were alighting, and tearing apart every indication of human habitation that had been left behind. They seemed particularly frustrated that there were no humans left to tear apart. Quickly they made their way through the whole tree, sometimes lopping off entire branches as they were, too "contaminated by human stink." Even though these were the first to arrive, several begged their leaders to be allowed to hunt the other trees for vermin. Their leaders calmed them down and convinced them to wait to offer their services to the other clans when they arrived, but not to get their hopes up.
The remaining dozen or more were suddenly eager to be leaving. We could see the cloud of flying creatures in the distance. Many rolled up their bedding and clothing and raced out to where the roc was waiting. She could only take four at a time. Two astride her neck and one on each claw. I got an idea and while my roc friend took the first load of children to safety. I contacted some folks on the hill and they began to lay out a grid of holes filled with water from a nearby stream. I started laying out a great winged structure, using blankets and clothing to fill in the framework. The roc returned, two light women mounted her neck, She grabbed the framework, from which dangled the remaining eight people and their belongings. I summoned a ferocious wind that helped the roc lift the framework into the air, and blew into the faces of our pursuers, slowing them. They all dropped out of sight for a moment, until the roc had enough airspeed to climb out. I continued singing an odd whispery tone that I could feel supporting the giant bird and her winged burden. After they were on a sure glide path I stepped into the air and ran across pools of hardened sky after them. Each step swirling into firmness then dissipating in a micro tornado as I left it.
The flying scouts of the gargoyle/draconia soon drew next to me, keeping a safe distance from my turbulence. They hissed in an airy tongue at me. I responded in kind. They did not like my answers, finally noticing the roc and her cargo far ahead. Unable to get to me, they beat harder and pulled away, after the roc. I sang ahead, a sonic laser. On the ground, pools of water burst to life, reaching up to the glider and snatching a rider from below. They were dragged down to the pools, I regretted not having told them what to expect. The roc released the glider, which, bereft of its weight, began to flutter and turn on the uplift I had maintained. I let it rise a while before letting go. It fluttered randomly into the draconia scouts, knocking one aside such that it had to be rescued by its fellows, leaving only one hunter. I ran even faster, since I no longer had to worry about the glider and the roc. No Draconia gargoyle was going to catch a roc, especially one capable of flying at speed with a full grown elephant.
Water covered the heads of the former tree dwellers, my companions would see them safe, and I thought that they could use the baths anyway. The remaining gargoyle dove at the retreating columns of water but was repulsed. Angry, he turned back to the lone figure running in the sky, and beat his wings against the wind to climb above me. The injured Draconia gargoyle shouted out at him to break off. The young gargoyle (I could see his youth) dove on me. I pulled an umbrella from my sash and snapped it open with a twirl, the twirl became a roar, and wind blasted from the edges of the umbrella in a visible sheet of condensation that grasped the diving gargoyle and swirled him off course and towards the ground. I heard the shriek of the injured gargoyle below me. With a twist of the wrist I pulled the young gargoyle out of its uncontrolled dive, and dropped it gently, well almost, into some thorn bushes. The injured draconia had regained its wings and was flying towards me.
"Stroke for stoke," I whispered into the wind in his direction, "I will not yield, but will return. That which would move, is moved. Sky touches water, touches earth, sky fuels flame, fuels life. Sky touches all. I touch all. Be warned, there is no lasting harm in my flight save what you place there.
"Piss in the wind!" The gargoyle cursed, and turned back to aid its companion, who was struggling to pull himself out of the brush. More embarrassed than injured.
I ran on, allowing the turbulence of my steps to linger as further deterrent to pursuit. I hastened to help pull the evacuees out of their watery landing pits.

Saturday, February 11, 2006

Hot Water, Hypno Sword, Missing Wallet

Dreamed the tub had filled almost to overflowing with hot water.

Dreamed I was at Mom and Dad's when the sky turned dark and a maniac with a hypnotic sword tried to brainwash a bunch of my friends. I jumped in and planted the suggestion that they wouldn't be susceptible to brainwashing/hypnotism, except to listen to me. When the sword guy got close I pretended to be hypnotized with my friends. I waited until he was in the center of our group then shouted "get him." He wasn't expecting that at all. I managed to shatter the sword on the first blow. At which point his following wandered off, confused about why they'd walked all the way down the mountain with that scruffy looking guy. My friends and I offered to give everyone rides home, and Mom made coffee cake for the ones who would have to wait for the second trip (Too many to take all at once.) Dad held the Hypnotist for the sheriff's Department. I got a thank-you kiss from a cute red-haired woman.

There was a third dream this morning, mundane preparing to go to someplace, getting there, and finding that I had left my wallet at home in another pair of pants. I offered to stay while my date took the car back to my place and brought back my wallet. The manager didn't like that, so called the police. They arrived. When I told them what I wanted to do they drove me back to the house, I pulled my wallet out of my other pants, we went back and paid him.
"You're not going to arrest them?"
"Someone from their party stayed here until the bill was paid. Isn't that usually how restaurants work?" asked one of the police.
The owner fumed. Especially since I paid him with a hundred, and he had to make change. Which he counted out incorrectly the first time. (To his credit, of course.)
While all this was going on the waiting room emptied and several new patrons actually got up and walked out before ordering.
"Don't ever come back here!"
"What, in your treatment of us this evening, would entice me to return here, or recommend you to my readers?"
The owner actually cringed when my date handed me a notebook she'd been writing in.
Not that we were really reviewers, but what a great exit. Who ever I was dating was definitely a keeper, what a great adlib.

Tuesday, February 07, 2006

Idylic Dream

 In my dream this morning I was 11 again and riding my bicycle through a town that was almost devoid of traffic. I may have been passed by a car a couple of times a minute at the most. I eventually turned down a dirt road at the end of town and made my way down along a stream where I found myself dangling my feet into the water from a small bridge, or what was left of a bridge.

The water was smooth and dark. I could see fish swimming below, and every so often a large catfish would rise to the surface and nibble at my toes. I pulled my feet up out of the water and put them down on either side of the fish. The catfish would dive down out of sight, then return a few seconds later from under the bridge. I played like that with the catfish, finally feeding him some of my sandwich. It began to get dark, and I knew I had to go. I needed to be back on the streets and pulling into my driveway at home before all the streetlights were on.

The bicycle had a flat tire. I made it into town and stopped at the bar at the end of the main street to call home and let them know I had a flat tire. One of the patrons had a repair kit, so we went and fixed the flat. I walked the bike over to the gas station and the owner opened up the coin box on the air compressor and pulled out a token and fed it in for me. I filled up the tire and made it home. Although all the streetlights were on, there was still some light in the sky, so I was allowed to stay outside until dinner was ready.

My brother and his friends were playing football in the back yard. My sister was inside reading in the front room window. I turned on an old radio on the front porch and listened to a radio drama while I was washing the grease and dirt off my bike.

At dinner I told my story about the big catfish, but not where, exactly, I'd seen him. I didn't want Dad to bring him home for dinner some day. I didn't think I could eat a fish after I'd become friends with it.

 

Apparently my brain really thinks I need a break.   

 

Ad astra per technica,

Fermius Firefly

 

Ad astra per technica,

Fermius Firefly

 

Wednesday, February 01, 2006

Nightmare, Disturbing Content Warning Safer stuff below.

Nightmare, Disturbing Content Warning, Skip the first one if you're squeamish. I know I won't be reading it. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
The white dog was back, someone had shot it and its backside was full of red welts from shotgun pellets. It's muzzle had been broken and when she dug her face under the door of the garage it broke and tore off.
The cats were in a panic. I asked Nan if everyone was OK.
In a horrified voice she told me "She killed Science."
I looked over to see her shaking and sobbing, covering her eyes. I looked to where the kittens had been sleeping. The brown tortie kitten was completely eviscerated, but the eyes were open and the mouth was going like the kitten was in pain. I didn't know what more I could do. I told Nan it was just reflex action and it soon stopped.
I had collared the dog, but even with nearly crippled hind quarters and a broken snout, she lurched after the kittens again. I asked Nan to gather up the other kittens and take them inside out of sight. I knew it would be unlikely for the feral mom to return for them after that, but we could hope. I couldn't believe the dog was still going so strong with all of the injuries it had taken.
This was a wake up in a sweat and not go back to sleep for hours dream.
 
 
 
 
 
OK, safer material starts here:

Better dreams later, one in which I was working on some sort of bridge, I had to span a couple of hundred feet, there was about 22 tons of bricks and mortar on each side, but I only had 100 tons of steel. I could have the steel rolled or formed into any shape I wanted, but any connecting pieces had to be made from it as well. I ended up designing a truss style bridge with lots of thin triangular supports, very fractal like with a arched span. I could use any local materials for the bridge surface, so ended up using some lumber recycled from a run down factory near by. It was an interesting project in that we had to build our tools as well as the bridge. Then assembling it was a challenge as well. The initial cables were towed over on boats (That we had to build. And then we ferried supplies over to the other side of the river. At one point we had to recycle the steel cables to make bolts/pins to put the bridge sections together.

The other dream found myself and a couple of women on a world, colony, that had developed an unusual social structure. Adult relationships were only authorized in trios, and those trios were further subdivided into three classes of participants. In the majority of households there was one person who was always the lead and the other two positions might be exchanged. In a few households all three positions might change, and in the family that was hosting us, the positions never changed. The lead for our host family was a woman, the second was a man and the servant level was a younger woman. Only trios had the right to vote and attend meetings in this colony. Each trio had one vote. The reasoning seemed to be that the trio prevented families from having a vote cancelling effect on one another as yes/no propositions would always have an outcome. In theory everyone in the triad had a say, but in practice I doubted it very much. Our little group qualified as a trio. I ended up being the lead because I was the senior party member. We got to go to a public meeting, discussing our contact, and it turns out that if we hadn't been a trio they wouldn't have even listened to us. And everything that I said or proposed to the counsel would trigger a question of my com padres seeking agreement. I found out afterwards that I could have asked for the same polling of the representatives. Singles or Duos were not able to fully participate in the political landscape, but apparently there was no bar to forming or breaking up a triad, so there were many political triads that had no actual family aspect. Interesting. 
 
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ad astra per technica,
FF