Playing tag with the tots

We were in a sort of controlled figure-8 pathway with lots of hiding places and stuff. Mr. Nibs and Imogen were racing around. There were other people there, and cats. I was hiding by lying down on the grass. Neither tot could see me, but I was hardly hiding. Finally, I got up and went to find them. I slipped slowly into conciousness. It was 7:11am.

Book as dream

We watched the films, now I am reading the books.
Millennium. The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo.
I read this 850 page book in under a week.
I would wake up in the middle of the night and burn through a hundred pages, lying on the couch.
You just fall through this thing, I tell you.
Not a deep book. Not a complex book, finally.
But a helluva ride. A dream of a book.
I wonder how autobiographical this book is?
I wonder if it will spur a new kind of journalism.

Shooting strangers in the Square Mile

Hmm. Strange dream last night.

Must have been all that Grand Theft Auto over the holidays, coupled with the acupuncture I had yesterday.

Discovering a horrific plane crash

I was with some people from work, going somewhere vaguely work-related when we saw smoke, emergency vehicles and lots of people up on an overpass. As we got closer, we saw that a massive passenger jet had crashed onto an elevated highway.

We walked up onto the overpass, among the police and ambulances, looking at what happened and vaguely wondering if we could help. There were bodies scattered on the rocks that surrounded the broken body of the plane.

Near the front of the plane many of the seats were intact. We walked up to the front row, where three well-dressed people in their 60s were still buckled into their seats. At first, I felt this horror feeling and thought they were dead. Then they started to move and fumble with their seat belts.

They were in shock, but could speak to us and move about. They were very gentle, with the nicest manners, thanking us for helping them, etc. At first, I attributed their gentleness to their state of shock. But as we led them away from the plane into some kind of room or building, it became clear that they were simply very genteel, refined people.

In the dream, I realized that I never wanted to fly again, after seeing first hand what a plane crash looks like.

I woke up still believing I was in the dream, thinking about how the passengers we helped were travelling first class, since they were sitting at the front of the plane.

Three Dee Tank Dream...

I dreamt last night that I was playing that 3-d first person shooter video game from 1980, Battlezone. But it was updated and full scale, so I was walking around inside a virtual reality of tanks and pyramids. Rocky was with me.

Hangover dream & the "POW" tattoo

Golly, there was a lot going on in my brain in the early hours.

I dreamed that I was getting a tattoo.

I remember explaining pop art to the tattoo artist, talking about Lichtenstein and how wanted a cartoonish "POW" on my arm.

Funny that my pre-dawn hangover intruded... in my dream, I was taking Tylenol to try and feel better. Despite reminding myself that I had popped an Advil mere hours earlier.

Wine, wine, wine, what you mean, but never say...

A tribute. A tribute. Tri-bute. Brandy: no, wine. Wine. Yes. Wine and Dreams.
I had a dream last night.
I was at City Hall.
We were invited.
Invited to present the housing plan to the committee.
City Council was meeting in the big room.
During the meeting, the committee broke out.
Four or five members of council met in a side room to discuss housing matters.
The GRTs were presenting: old familiar.
Three of us were to present: new, dynamic, focussed, different.
Our turn came.
Attention on our team of three.
Not sure who was going to present.
My colleague started: "I want to begin with a comment. Many people right now are looking for a place to rent. An affordable place....blah blah blah."
I thought: NOT the time for this speech. Not the time.
Suddenly, the committee was called back to Council.
I felt we had lost our opportunity to make the case.
I regretted not speaking out first, taking the lead.
I felt I knew better how to present our case:
Mega-hospital. Community. Bridge. Mutual benefit. Etc.
I woke up to Mr. Nibs hammering gently on his door.
It was 643.am.

lots of wine

Guests have been pouring in for days now and with them, loverly glass bottles green and labeled and corked. Too many to recall, really. A Kim Basinger (or was that a Kim Klein?...or a Cindy Crawford?) Anyway, a fine white wine, which improved remarkably with a little sejourn in the icebox. A hefty red fellow, for sure in a green bottle, that's all I remember. From Argentina, I think. I wish those recycling trucks didn't come so often. We drank Kim while watching Citizen Kane last night, oh that pasty faced genius. Our guests were also on Atavan, having been travelling, so the grey tones cast a strange light against our pale, numbed faces, gawking at the scenes before us.

Weeds

I had been helping Kirsten weed her community garden, a distasteful task for me. I think we should use some late 20th century herbicide free techniques to keep the weeds down: black plastic garbage bags, carefully layered over the soil, but with holes to let the good guys out, a technique taught to me by Chris Wrobel, my farmer friend. But K likes to weed.

And last night, I had a dream that this weed came back. A stinging weed that she thought was strawberries: it had grown ginormous and I was tasked to get it out, which is how I learned it was a stinging weed. So I used a pitchfork. So here is this weed in my dream, and I pinned it against a metal grate with my heel and cut the roots off it with a machete. Very satisfying.

Metal grate: could this have been a visual import from Terminator Two, that took us four days to watch this past week? Remember the liquid metal man who could squeeze through grates? Can't wait to see Terminator Four. But I digress.

It was a great dream. Not exciting, but very satisfying.

Visiting an English enclave in Amsterdam

J and I were in Amsterdam. I was wandering the city, alone, at night and came upon a kind of village near the water. A bunch of smart and interesting artist/squatter types were living in some industrial buildings. When I arrived, they were having a neighbourhood party. A bonfire raged in the middle of the street. The overall feeling was of Christiania, circa 1996.

Oddly, the people in the village spoke English. They told me they were part of an English enclave in Amsterdam.

I went back to where we were staying. The next morning, I wanted to show J the village but got lost on my way to find it. We ended up at an elementary school. I thought I would take a shortcut by going through the school.

Inside, I watched a really cool teacher work with a group of kids. They were doing incredible things. A man saw us watching and invited us to have lunch with him. It turned out that he was the principal of the school. The teacher we were watching was his wife. We knew we wanted to send our kids to this school.

J and I had a wonderful lunch with him in his office next to the gym where the kids were playing. Then we went on our way. It was the school for the village I had visited the night before. J and I knew this was where we belonged.

Meeting with the Queen, my ex and an elephant

One of my exes got a job at Canada Steamship Lines. I found out because I was walking past their offices (which are near where I work) and saw him and some other people looking out the window. Then, later, a friend confirmed that he was working there.

Then I was in a meeting room at Canada Steamship Lines. It was a kind of salon -- very Victorian, like a room at the British Museum where world explorers met.

I was... scantily dressed, lounging around in this room reading anthropology coffee table books. People began to gather in the room. The queen arrived. Not Queen Elizabeth, but maybe Queen Victoria. She was leading a geriatric pet elephant. Apparently, the elephant went everywhere with her. She was a little bit dotty, but was still an essential presence at the meetings.

Then my ex arrived in the meeting, along with some other people. I tried to blend in and not be noticed. But it was difficult.

Me and my platypus buddy

I dreamed that I had a pet duck-billed platypus that I carried around in my arms.

Blind men

A long and detailed dream last night.
It started with a visit to my friend's house in Geneva. He lived in a big rambling apartment. We talked. Somehow, we were on a worksite and there were some city workers taking measurements. But they seemed hesitant. We poked around at a doorway and found some very sophisticated wires. We figured they were looking for wiretaps. Alex realized he had information that could be useful. Suddenly we were in a spy movie. False information was transmitted by phone. The people who got the information died. Alex supplied the information to the right people. Suddenly we were all much older. I was an established photographer and, it seems, good with the ladies. Alex had been admitted into an old age home, but the nurses hated him so much they hid him in a back room and ignored him. Coming up to the front staircase of the old age home, the stairs were littered with women hoping to see some famous old man who was living out his last days there. I managed to get in by showing my camera. I learned that someone had given the old man a gift, but he was blind and wouldn't be able to see it. Everyone was sad about this. I remembered that Alex had the gift of being able to see with his hands. Maybe he could help out....I went to look for him... and woke up.

Happy dream: My favourite imaginary band of all time

I was in Calgary, and was scheduled to go back to Montreal. En route to somewhere... I stumble on this band playing an impromptu show in one of those characterless corporate alcoves next to an office tower.

I jump out of my bus, or taxi or whatever and join the small audience. The band is amazing -- these carnivaesque rock and roll people, playing music I can't remember clearly. They were a lot like one of my absolute favourite bands: Friendly Rich and the Lollipop People

Two lead singers stood on soapboxes, with their faces painted in grey and white, with scary, accentuated old man wrinkles. Behind them stood horn and accordian and guitair players, dressed in pinnochio marching band kitch.

When the song was over, a greyhound bus pulled up and the whole audience got onto it. They were taking us somewhere.... no one knew, no one cared. We were all having such a damn good time.

I remember thinking that I was supposed to be going somewhere. But I was too intrigued not to lose this trajectory.

The bus headed to the suburbs and ejected us all on a big green open space. The band danced and ahead of us, playing something spontaneous and ridiculous... from the circus. We all ran after them, waving our arms and encouraging them to keep playing. It was awesome...

When I mentioned my dream to J, he said it sounded a lot like the magical mystery tour. Perhaps.... but I was also watching Burning Man videos yesterday....

No more wine...

Kirsten announced at our annual post New Year's spa day, where we soak for a few hours with friends and then congregate around a few plates of hot and spicy food, while reviewing our new years resolutions from years past and making new ones for 2009, Kirsten announced grandly, and without prior consultation with her soul mate, the man with whom she shares a blog called wine and dreams, indeed this blog, this blog...Kirsten rolled up her tongue and said: I will stop drinking wine in 2009. I choked on a piece of spicy meat. What? So, of course, in solidarity, I have quit also. So we won't have many postings on the wine side of wine and dreams, this year, unless we break under the pressure. So far, so good. That was January 24th or so. No bottles have been cracked since. But we will certainly be breaking our vow in June, when we plan to get married again. That's right, we are going to tie the knot again on June 21st. Why not? is there anything in the rulebook that says you can't? It's kind of like getting a second mortgage with the same lender.

So many dreams, where to start?

Rather than tell you my dreams, and I have had many of them in the last little while, I will tell you Imogen's dream. A few days before, she had an accident with some (not very hot) macaroni and cheese. So this scenario played out in her dream. She woke up very agitated and said: "I had a dream. GHL-dlkaold macanoni elaosl face, my shirt aodldlldle hair...dhlslsod mummy ...in the shower dohhdood cold. Very cold."

Doing stunts in my very own fast car

My parents had bought me a new car to commemorate some kind of acheivement. Now you have to realize that a) I've never owned a car, b) my parents, simply, don't buy me thinks like that, and c) I don't drive.

So: I had this shiny, black Porsche convertible of my very own. While J and some of our friends enjoyed brunch in this European-type terrace space, I burned around alone in my new car. I got air on stairs. I drove really fast. I had a really super crazy good time.

Then I parked the car and joined everyone at the table. I was looking at photographs of myself driving the fast, black car. Imogen was in the passenger seat. We were flying through the air, our blonde hair waving in the wind.

Suddenly, J said: "I just heard someone drive away in your car. I think your car was stolen."

I used a cell phone to call the (get this) in-car phone. This car thief picked up. He thought I was someone else and explained how he had just stolen this amazing Porsche.

I said: "that's my Porsche and I'm going to call the police. No. I'm going to call my friends who are in a motorcycle gang and they'll do horrible things to you and get my car back."

Doing time for short skirts and hijinks on the bus

My old friend Popi and I were on the bus, wearing short skirts and being really obnoxious. There were some old ladies nearby who were getting particularly crabby.

Later, it was clear that we had been very naughty on the bus and were going to get into trouble. I ended up at a trial where the old ladies described our transgressions.

I knew that what we did was not a big deal, and was hoping for a chance to defend myself. But when I started to speak, the judge said that we both had to go to jail.

I was astounded that girlish misbehaviour could have such a harsh punishment. I began to wonder just what it was like to be in jail and how I would handle it. In the next scene, I was in a jail cell, bored and confounded that my life had come to this...

Visiting the heart of the festival

I was at some kind of giant festival, with lots of crazy things going on, when I got a glimpse into the inner circle. I climbed a fence and looked down on a vast, grassy farm.

High above the grass, young people in twos and threes were swinging on giant, wooden swings. There were little gardens, high in the trees. Each garden was rough hewn, but lovingly cultivated on little tree balconies.

I knew that I was witnessing something very special and I wanted to be a part of it. I also understood that these people earned all these pleasures: the garden, the swings... They worked hard.

I so badly wanted to know more that I scaled the fence and jumped down into the grass on the other side. The festival behind me seemed empty compared to what I was about to experience.

I followed a path to the farmhouse and went inside. There were animals and gardens inside the house. It was a kind of commune, with nice, wholesome kids tending animals and preparing vegetables.

An old woman greeted me, and I understood that this was the true heart of whatever good things the festival had to offer. And I knew that these kids worked hard, year round, to build their paradise.

And I knew that I didn't belong, but was welcome to earn my place there if I worked hard, not to be part of the festival but because I was part of something bigger.

Breaking cats legs...?

A couple of nights ago, I dreamed a strange dream. Swirling chaos dream. Nancy Neamtam was in it. I was involved in some kind of competition. I had to cross rivers and fight wild animals that wanted to kill me. I found myself fighting very savage very large house cats, that wouldn't stop trying to scratch me savagely and I had to break their legs and paws to keep them from ripping into my flesh. Walking in water. Struggling. Was this the Amazon, or Northern Quebec?