Dinosaur Roundup

        I dreamed, again, of dinosaurs. This time there was music, "la la Boston, Jack! la la " I couldn't get the tune out of my head this morning, but the drive in to work has erased it now. Still, I had a big stripped dinosaur mount or partner, riding herd on a bunch of frilled four-footers with stubby nose horns. "Them ain't milkin' cattle partner they're 4 tons of earth movin’ muscle."

        It was meant to be a long trip. I had a huge set of saddle bags with full tent and provisions. Half dozen smaller but also striped raptors were wearing panniers as well. They didn't have riders, though. Apparently this part was a solo drive for me. I, my mount, and six raptors were driving about 400 frills to market. (Not a meat market, but a labor market.) The raptors were pretty intelligent; there was a sort of abbreviated language I used to communicate with them. (They were all wearing GPS and radio harnesses that had an earphone and a microphone so they could call back to me and my mount, I had a tablet monitor on the saddle with a map showing my raptors and the herd.

        My mount was not the same species as the herding raptors, and it was much more like a partner than a mount. I was definitely better educated, and in many ways smarter, but we could communicate in both English and dinosaur, and he could smell birds flying by and see the text on a page a couple of hundred yards away. (Not something you wanted to have hunting you down. I had an in dream memory of working on an escaped prisoner posse with him.)

        We joined a larger group of frillies and their watchers. One of them was a woman who'd recognized me long before I'd recognized her. "She smells ready for you, partner," my T-Rex sized partner informed me, long before we made it to the campsite.

        "Thanks, buddy. It's always good to know what we're getting into."

        I woke up looking forward to riding with the large herd, then realized that the only T-Rex around was the cat.

Ad astra per technica,

FF