Thursday, September 15, 2016
TBTT#22 Unconventional Transport
I dreamed I was trying to get back to new orleans from my grandmother's house by harnessing a wild rabbit, encased in a giant glass butter dish, and having it pull my bicycle. But my umbrella wouldn't work. The white rabbit kept trying to run down into the gully. I had better luck with the brown one.
Saturday, September 10, 2016
Ocean Depths to Office Space to Outer Space ~ 9/10/2016
I dreamed I went diving on this special reef where you could collect pet sea animals. I came back up to the surface with a dish full of golden yellow and bright orange brittle stars, one fish shaped like an angel fish, but bright, fiery amber, and a six inch tall rag doll that was really a mermaid under a spell.
I traveled home through a series of quaint British villages, and as I went, I learned the mermaid's story. She had fallen in love with a human, decades ago, and come up onto land to woo him. But she'd been pursued by a dirty old man who tried to rape her. Someone had transformed her into a tiny doll just in time. The man had thrown her into the ocean, and until she could find the person who could change her back, she was stuck.
I got my dish of sea life home, but I noticed the brittle stars were having to crouch tensely to stay under water, and even then their bristles poked up into the air a little. I needed to hurry up and get them a bigger aquarium of salt water as quick as I could. So I hurried to the post office, where at least I could buy sea salt, so I could replace some of the sea water I'd lost. But all I had was a $20 bill, and they refused to take anything larger than a $10, or credit cards. I yelled at them about how ridiculous that was for a bit, then hurried to the beach shop down the street.
The beach shop took credit cards and sold sea salt, which was good. I realized, after poking around a little, that they also sold aquariums and small animal cages. I started looking around, and kept finding tanks that were *almost* what I was looking for, but not quite. I finally asked for help, and was shown several aquariums that were the size I wanted, but not suitable for salt water. It took way too long, but I did eventually buy a suitable aquarium. I got the other chemicals I'd need to treat the water with and some gravel for the bottom, and went home.
I got the tank set up, with a layer of snapped green beans on the bottom, then a layer of gravel, then the salt water. I treated the water with the chemicals, and had to wait a bit. But before I could put the fish in, I noticed the bottom-most green beans had turned black, with a delicate layer of white mold, so I had to empty everything out and start over. By the time I got the fish, the brittle stars, and the rag doll mermaid setup and comfortable in the tank, I was running late for work.
I got myself to New Orleans, and had been working in the office for a couple of weeks, when I was told that the next Friday would be my last day. I was pretty upset, because I'd bought a car and taken an apartment just to come work in New Orleans. I left work early that day, and headed to a pub for a cider. Two women passed me, headed for the same pub. The taller one was a beautiful Indian woman wearing a dress of rich, stiffened, deep teal wool. The dress hugged her figure, all the way down her arms, up her neck, over her hips and down to her calves, before belling out to a two-foot circle around her ankles. Her hair was in a sleek, long, thick braid down her back, and she wore enormous gold hoop earrings.
The other woman was a pale-skinned, dark-haired, Russian woman with jade green eyes. She wore a mauve silk sari with a rosy mantilla of sheer silk around her arms and up to the top of her head. The mantilla was edged with gold, and her hair was piled up on her head, held in place by golden combs. This woman held the pub door open for me, and we all recognized each other. The two of them had been interns the summer before, and were working for Shell again this summer. They insisted I join them at their table for my drink, and we talked over the current business situation, and my layoff.
On my last day in the New Orleans office, I went to the cafeteria for lunch, and spotted a college friend I hadn't seen in years. I called out his old nickname, and he turned around surprised. I wanted to ask him how he'd gone from a free spirit in the peace corps to a starched white shirt and khakis, but I didn't get a chance. He immediately started reminiscing about the a cappella group we'd been in, and insisted we sing our arrangement of Billy Joel's "Lullaby". So we began to sing, and I actually remembered the whole thing.
Suddenly, it seemed like he'd received some sort of signal. He perked up, began to look around, then told me to come with him. We left the cafeteria, and outside the sky was black and the stars were out, and above us hovered a Firefly class spaceship. He'd been its captain for years, and the crew was calling him back. He invited me to go with them, and of course I accepted. We flew up and away from earth, and as we went deeper and deeper into space, the emergency he'd been called to help with became apparent.
When we turned on the exterior lights, we could see that an enormous space parasite had latched onto the ship. It was shaped like a big, flat pill bug, and was an orangey, mustardy yellow with green fronds all around it's edge. Somehow it had been invisible in earth's atmosphere, but had survived landing and take off, and creatures like it were latching themselves onto space ships all through that quadrant of the galaxy. We were trying to figure out what to do about it when I woke up.
I traveled home through a series of quaint British villages, and as I went, I learned the mermaid's story. She had fallen in love with a human, decades ago, and come up onto land to woo him. But she'd been pursued by a dirty old man who tried to rape her. Someone had transformed her into a tiny doll just in time. The man had thrown her into the ocean, and until she could find the person who could change her back, she was stuck.
I got my dish of sea life home, but I noticed the brittle stars were having to crouch tensely to stay under water, and even then their bristles poked up into the air a little. I needed to hurry up and get them a bigger aquarium of salt water as quick as I could. So I hurried to the post office, where at least I could buy sea salt, so I could replace some of the sea water I'd lost. But all I had was a $20 bill, and they refused to take anything larger than a $10, or credit cards. I yelled at them about how ridiculous that was for a bit, then hurried to the beach shop down the street.
The beach shop took credit cards and sold sea salt, which was good. I realized, after poking around a little, that they also sold aquariums and small animal cages. I started looking around, and kept finding tanks that were *almost* what I was looking for, but not quite. I finally asked for help, and was shown several aquariums that were the size I wanted, but not suitable for salt water. It took way too long, but I did eventually buy a suitable aquarium. I got the other chemicals I'd need to treat the water with and some gravel for the bottom, and went home.
I got the tank set up, with a layer of snapped green beans on the bottom, then a layer of gravel, then the salt water. I treated the water with the chemicals, and had to wait a bit. But before I could put the fish in, I noticed the bottom-most green beans had turned black, with a delicate layer of white mold, so I had to empty everything out and start over. By the time I got the fish, the brittle stars, and the rag doll mermaid setup and comfortable in the tank, I was running late for work.
I got myself to New Orleans, and had been working in the office for a couple of weeks, when I was told that the next Friday would be my last day. I was pretty upset, because I'd bought a car and taken an apartment just to come work in New Orleans. I left work early that day, and headed to a pub for a cider. Two women passed me, headed for the same pub. The taller one was a beautiful Indian woman wearing a dress of rich, stiffened, deep teal wool. The dress hugged her figure, all the way down her arms, up her neck, over her hips and down to her calves, before belling out to a two-foot circle around her ankles. Her hair was in a sleek, long, thick braid down her back, and she wore enormous gold hoop earrings.
The other woman was a pale-skinned, dark-haired, Russian woman with jade green eyes. She wore a mauve silk sari with a rosy mantilla of sheer silk around her arms and up to the top of her head. The mantilla was edged with gold, and her hair was piled up on her head, held in place by golden combs. This woman held the pub door open for me, and we all recognized each other. The two of them had been interns the summer before, and were working for Shell again this summer. They insisted I join them at their table for my drink, and we talked over the current business situation, and my layoff.
On my last day in the New Orleans office, I went to the cafeteria for lunch, and spotted a college friend I hadn't seen in years. I called out his old nickname, and he turned around surprised. I wanted to ask him how he'd gone from a free spirit in the peace corps to a starched white shirt and khakis, but I didn't get a chance. He immediately started reminiscing about the a cappella group we'd been in, and insisted we sing our arrangement of Billy Joel's "Lullaby". So we began to sing, and I actually remembered the whole thing.
Suddenly, it seemed like he'd received some sort of signal. He perked up, began to look around, then told me to come with him. We left the cafeteria, and outside the sky was black and the stars were out, and above us hovered a Firefly class spaceship. He'd been its captain for years, and the crew was calling him back. He invited me to go with them, and of course I accepted. We flew up and away from earth, and as we went deeper and deeper into space, the emergency he'd been called to help with became apparent.
When we turned on the exterior lights, we could see that an enormous space parasite had latched onto the ship. It was shaped like a big, flat pill bug, and was an orangey, mustardy yellow with green fronds all around it's edge. Somehow it had been invisible in earth's atmosphere, but had survived landing and take off, and creatures like it were latching themselves onto space ships all through that quadrant of the galaxy. We were trying to figure out what to do about it when I woke up.
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