I began as a fighter pilot but upon returning from a mission, I changed clothes and started writing computer programs as part of a small startup. In my early thirties (from appearance), I was initially writing programs as a database manager while serving as a mid-level manager overseeing several functions, including data collection and entry. The company was involved with a new medical process and was going through clinical trials and marketing trials. Several RL people from my RL employment with medical device companies appeared in the dream. I knew the details of the trial in the dream, but it was all glossed over and they’re lost now. What the company was doing wasn’t working but I realized that another benefit was possible. That’s what I began writing a program. It was to work with a scanner to be a sort of medical tricorder (as used in Star Trek). I developed a form for the scan to fill out. Each iteration helped me refine and expand what the tricorder could do. I became immensely excited because they could be manufactured and sold cheaply, enabling people to scan themselves non-invasively at home without a need for blood and urine panels, x-rays, or MRIs. It would be a proactive tool to get ahead of your body’s trends before they became a problem. You could easily baseline your norms and then keep testing yourself to see what changes had taken place. The dream ended with me scanning myself as a test subject.
The Port Dream
This was a dream about port, the fortified wine drink. A very expensive bottle of port had turned up missing from its crate. The owners were the U.S. government. CIA, I think. I didn’t know who took it but I quickly realized where it was. The bottle had been sent to offer samples to people at a function. I met with the agent, a blond, white male, clean shaved, tousled hair, average height, casual clothes, and relayed what I’d learned. He told me it was critical to recover that bottle. I told him that I would get it back.
A strange car journey in a Ford Thunderbird convertible (a 1965, I think, which was what my father owned) followed, a circuitous route that embraced old steel girder bridges over ravines and rivers, a bumpy, dusty lane, a winding country highway, and a modern American Interstate. I always knew where I was going but detours kept coming up. Fair weather and certainty kept me calm, though.
I arrived at the function, where a gathering of women was about to open the bottle to sample it. I intervened, telling them they’d been sent the wrong bottle and producing another bottle for their benefit. The agent arrived to take the bottle from me. We then agreed we would go to the river. A few others joined us enroute, including a female acquaintance of mine, a young white woman with a round face and a short, black bob. The agent told me to open the bottle. That confused the woman. She protested that it was supposed to be a protected bottle, according to her understanding. I replied, that was a different time. Circumstances had shifted and we were approved to open the bottle to sample it.
I turned to the agent for confirmation. After talking about it with me and thinking more, he agreed with me. We opened the bottle and poured small portions into fine, small glasses. Toasting, we drank.
Dream end.
Monday’s Theme Music
“Life is the essence. The essence is rock and roll. Rock and roll is life.” – Dead Smokers’ Society
Ahoy. How are my fellow travelers this day? For further reference, this day shall be defined as Monday, November 8, 2021. Not many days are left to this hallow year. The countdown has commenced; the end is nigh. Fake Christmas trees are being advertised as on sale on television, discounted up to 50%. What a bargain.
Sunrise was a pleasant diffusion to night at 6:52 AM, rolling in louder and bolder through a sky unwrinkled by clouds and their threats. Sunset cometh at 4:59 PM. With that short period and the tilt, we expect highs in the low fifties F and lows in the thirties. It’s 39 F at the moment. BTW, a strong wind advisory has been issued for this afternoon and evening. Batten down the light stuff and bring the domestic beasts in.
Two of our housecats have taken to the change in time without issue. They just seem to accept the time change. The problems anticipated from them didn’t materialize. The old man, however, arose at his usual hour, visited my face, then went down to the bedroom entrance and grumbled his annoyance. “It’s breakfast time. Where is my food? What’s the matter with you? Why aren’t you getting my food for me? What have I done to you that you treat me in this callous manner?”
Yes is dominating the morning mental music stream with a 1983 song, “Changes”. Specific lyrics inspired its rise:
Change changing places
Changes
Root yourself to the ground
Word to the wise – Well you get what’s coming
One word – One word can bring you round
Changes
h/t to AZLyrics.com
Remember, let’s stay positive out there. Test negative. Wear a mask as needed. Get the vax and booster when you can. Here’s the music. Carpe diem. I’m gonna go seize a cuppa coffee. Cheers
Thursday’s Theme Music
Hey, all you sons and daughter, mothers and fathers out in cyberland, how is your world?
Today is Thursday, October 14, 2021. It’s the third Thursday of the month, out of five. Likewise, we have five Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays in October. Must make Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday feel lame, to have less than the others.
Sunrise is at 7:22 AM. It’s a good one, exuding a strong sun presence – you know, light and heat. Really brings out the reds, gods, greens, yellows, and oranges in our valley, a large change from yesterday morning, which looked like a set for Wuthering Heights. Our temperature ranges from 39 to 56F today with a stop at 44, where we now sit. Sunset will come at 6:30 PM.
I have a PC computer, and use Microsoft Windows. Which means it was time for another security update yesterday. Which makes things different. It’s humorous and odd. On WordPress, for example, I have a different default font this morning. I made no changes; the computer powers did this for me. The spacing and size are different, too. I’ll just go with the flow on this because it’s workable. Nonetheless, it’s a shade annoying when these things are changed for me.
Which brings me to the music. “Heartless” by Heart — ironic? — is playing in the morning mental music stream. The clue for why is in the lyrics. “Never never out of control.” Because I’m not in control. Not of my ‘puter. You see? The mind just played with those ideas and up bubbled the 1978 song by Heart. Well, it’s a good throwback sound, a little hard rock with some pop nuance.
Stay positive, test negative, wear thy mask as need be, get thee the vax when and if you can. I know it’s not all simple on the vax front. Underlying conditions and meds can be game changers in the vax world. My sympathies if you can’t get it for those reasons. The world must be a terrifying place, to have COVID-19 out there raging, a vax available, and you not able to get it because of your health.
Here’s the music. Listen while I go for coffee. I think there is also one last pumpkin spice muffin in there. I call dibs!
Cheers
Another Dream About Pennies
I dreamed about pennies again. They seem to be a recurring dream theme for me. In this particular one, I was knee deep in shiny new pennies. They were moving like the ocean. Swells of pennies rose and fell. Penny waves lapped against me and broke on my thighs.
I had a pushbroom. I was expected to push the pennies to one side. I laughed at this, saying, “This is crazy. These pennies are like water. How am I supposed to sweep them?” I kept muttering to myself about that and didn’t make much effort at sweeping them. Thinking about how new they appeared and also wanting to feel them — because they moved like water — I scooped up a handful of pennies. I looked at the date on one and saw, 2022. I began looking at as many as I could, searching for other dates. All I found was 2022.
Holding the pushbroom out to one side, I looked across the sea of pennies under a clear, dark blue sky. Far away to one side was a stretch of rising land. The sun just about them, drifting toward setting. I laughed and thought, “This is so cool.”
Sunday’s Theme Music
The daily can of sunshine was opened up on Ashland, Oregon at 5:49 AM on this Sunday, May 16, 2021. Said can will close at 8:26 PM. That sun comes with a mildly hot flavor. We expect temperatures in the mid to upper eighties in our part of the valley. All the clouds have departed to other areas, leaving us with blue sky as far as vision takes us.
Today’s theme music is “Changes” by Yes (1983). And why not? After a year plus of wearing masks, changes are suddenly being distributed.
Change, changing places
Root yourself to the ground
Capitalize on this good fortune
One word can bring you round
Changes
h/t to Genius.com
Stay pos, test neg, keep up to date on the changes, and get the vax. Enjoy the music, and your day. Cheers
A Crush of Dreams
What a crush of dreams the night held. First came stupidity.
I was in a broad, lightly-used parking light. A woman with two girls (daughters, I assumed), were on blankets and towels on the parking lot, sunning themselves. All were fair skinned. The youngest was to her mother’s right, with her arms thrust out to either side.
Along comes a red car. It backs up and turns. Although there are scant other cars on this lot, they do this right in front of the threesome. As I do, I realize that they’re going to run over the young girl’s arm.
It’s a little red SUV. I run toward the SUV as it backs, shouting at them to stop. The woman and her daughters look over at me. The SUV’s windows are down. Its occupants all turn and look at me but the driver keeps back, going right over the girl’s arm, rear wheels, front. The girls screams. The SUV keeps going, then turns and pulls forward, away from the girl and me. They’re still oblivious about what has happened. The mother is attending the daughter. I run to the SUV, shouting at them, “What’s wrong with you? You ran over that girl’s arm.” The driver, a middle-aged white woman seems confused.
Without further resolution, I’m in a parking lot. A young woman in bright green shorts is laying on the asphalt. A car comes up and runs over her legs.
I watch with shock. Then, I think, again?
Dream shift. I’m in bed, naked and aroused. A petite brunette woman comes in a blue shirt and jeans. We seem to know each other. We start joking and goofing around, then she begins making up the bed with me in it. I fondle her breasts and ask if she wants to scream. Laughing, she replies, “Oh, why not?” She jumps into bed with me.
Now I’m at home. It’s a weird, disjointed place. I don’t recognize it and I’m struggling to recognize changes. Other people are there, my wife’s friends, apparently. I ignore them as I walk around, looking for my wife, trying to understand the changes that have been put in place. I’ve been working all night; now I want to rest. But she’s decided to have a party. This infuriates me; didn’t she realize that I need my rest and the party noise will keep me awake? Glaring at her, I find a bench to sleep on, pulling covers up over my head.
Unable to sleep, I keep changing locations but the noises keep me up. I went to find my wife to register my complaints but she blew me off.
Next, we’re out somewhere with other couples. A guy asks her to dance. I’m pissed at her because she decided to sit at the other end of the table. I thought, WTF? After dancing with the guy, she gestures at me from across the room, ‘want to dance?’. I ignore her. She goes off to dance with the other guy again. Disgusted, angry, I leave the area and find myself in a cold, dark, wet place.
That’s where it ended.
Michael Seidel, writer 