The One at Taco Bell

I stopped at the Taco Bell in Westfield, and it was generally in the same location as the real one, although the stores and parking lot layout around it was different.

It was a larger-than-normal building for Taco Bell, and divided in half cross-wise. If you were looking at the front door from the outside, the left was where you ordered and there was one of those people corrals, and the right was where the seating was and there was a second entrance on the side.

Also, it was one of those Taco Bells that had another restaurant in the same location. I can't remember what the other restaurant was, though.

I had to park pretty far away from the entrance because there were so many handicapped spots. I ended up parking near a gas station where the attendants looked really grubby and shady. I was wary about the safety of my car (which I think was the same as my real-life one) but since it was near the gas station, I figured it was all right.

I started ordering at the counter and the cashier asked for my drink order first. Then John came in and she took his drink order before I had ordered the rest of my meal. Then another woman from work, Sara, came in and she took her drink order too. I knew it was weird and was kind of annoyed, but since I knew everyone I was OK at this point.

When Sara was asked about her drink, she asked when the last time they had Lysol'd - she said, "Is your Lysol fresh?" The cashier said, "Yes..." And Sara asked, "Well, what's the date on the Lysol?" and the woman said 8/21/2009. Sara said, "Oh, 2009. Great! But I'm not going to get anything to drink."

We were all confused, and Sara said that on that date the weather was good.

Next, a guy I didn't know came in and put in his drink order, and at this point I was getting annoyed because I was really hungry and still hadn't put my food order in.

And still, Andrea came in and put her drink order in. I knew it was Andrea ******** in the dream, but when I had to sign her receipt, I had to sign her last name that was only four letters, although I don't remember the name.

We put in our food orders, and I had coupons in my black bag. I had one for a drink coupon, which I asked about and woman didn't know I had given it to her (there was something else to this, but I can't understand what I said on the dictation machine!).

Andrea had gone out to her car for some reason and it was time to start signing the credit card receipts. I thought at first that the woman put everything on my credit card, but someone she had rung them up all separately.

I was starving and Andrea was outside, so I was going to sign it for her, and I wrote out "Andrea" and was about to write that four-letter last name and the man asked if she knew I was doing that when Andrea came back in. She saw what I was doing and said, "No, you can't do that, how dare you!"

She took the pen and was going to finish when I woke up.

The One with the Video Store Shooting

I was in a video store with a friend of mine (don’t remember who) and a guy that was older than us and served as some sort of role model normally - like a teacher, older relative, etc. While we were looking at videos - I remember there being a Disney section with no Little Mermaid, and a Bette Midler special section with a boxed set of all her stuff, he got some gloves and had a gun in his pocket.

When we were at the checkout, he took out the gloves, put them on the wrong hands and held the gun in his left hand (he was right handed) and pointed it at a guy in line’s head. But then another guy doing the same sort of thing did the same and shot the guy.

Well all ran outside the store and the guy that actually did the shooting ran to a bag on the ground in the parking lot, with another guy lying in the lot, and put on a wig and the two men pretended that they were sun bathing in the parking lot, but they were dressed like women.

The police came and ignored them... it seems the plan was that both men would do the same thing but they didn’t know who had the actual live round in their gun or something. Then my dream transitioned into another one somehow....

"What Did I Dress For Halloween"

Somehow this dream had a title: “What Did I Dress For Halloween”. I’m not sure how that happened, but I knew it when I woke up. This dream was a bit different because although I didn’t open my eyes, I’m pretty sure it happened in the middle of the night instead of the morning close to waking. I went to sleep very early last night, so I guess that it happened around midnight or so.

At the beginning of the dream, there were two boats - canoe-ish boats that are pushed along by oars (not rowing), not unlike the water taxis in Venice although not as nice.

A fight of sorts was imminent, so we had to descend (with the boats) underwater to a two-room shack. On my side of the fight was Mohinder (or someone that looked like him) from the TV show Heroes, an older man and perhaps two other people. There was a young boy, perhaps 6 or 7 years old but I’m still unclear which side he was on.

While underwater, we could either hold our breath indefinitely, or we could breathe underwater. I’m not sure which. I don’t remember feeling the sensation of breathing during the dream, nor the sensation of holding my breath.

On the other side of the fight was at least one old American Indian man. I believe there was a young boy on his side, too, but I can’t remember if there were two boys or not.

We sent Mohinder down in a boat on his own as bait to distract the other side while we set the shack up as a base or sanctuary. I remember there being a light in the boat with him, glowing green I believe, and knowing that it was a sacrificial move.

The young boy drowned somehow, and the old man from the other side someone got into the first room of our shack. I fought with him by forcefully slapping his forehead with both of my hands, each time causing his head to crack open (like the movie Kung Fu Hustle when the old woman breaks the top off the funeral bell). Each time it cracked, pumpkin seeds came out of his head, kind of oozing out of the crack. I don't recall him really doing anything to fight back physically.

When his head was cracked about halfway, he said that he wanted to stop but I told him that it was too late, because he was already dead.

At that point, it became apparent that for some reason, when people were dying they were hanging around. I wasn’t sure if it was because we were underwater, because it was dark (it was nighttime) or for some other reason. But I knew that it wasn’t permanent - if something changed, they would “move on”. I speculated in my head that perhaps once they were exposed to sunlight they would die for real. Mohinder died and moved on because he was going to die anyway and it was his time.

Toward the end of the dream I realized that other famous people had spent time in that underwater shack. I “saw” a poster of faces but I don’t think it was a real poster - I just visualized it. It was of famous people that either had disappeared or died or were hounded by paparazzi. I remember Princess Diana and I think it included Amelia Earhart.

The One with the Award Party

I had a dream that I was going to a party with Julie P. It started out as being a regular party, but it turned out to be an awards party and I was due to get an award for being a director of photography on a film. I spent the vast majority of the dream going through all my pants and shirts, trying to figure out what to wear.

There was a woman trying to help me - like I was shopping for clothes in a store but I was trying on all my clothes. I ended up getting mad at her and I think I was mean to her, and then a guy got mad at me for getting mad at the woman and he was threatening to kick my ass or something.

I ended up changing my mind and asked the woman for help, but she wanted me to try on dresses. She wanted me to wear two - one for "before the Emperor" and one for "after the Emperor" - like before and after I won the award. I didn't want to wear dresses, so she mentioned something about leather, and I remembered my leather pants. I think I was going to wear those after I won, and before I was going to wear black pants and a red shirt with a black sweater over the shirt.

I woke up sweaty and feeling anxious.

The One with the Underwear Show

A guy I work with (who shall remain nameless) was sitting on a toilet (going, uh, number two). I was in the bathroom also, which seemed to be in a private residence. He calmed watched and commented as I tried on different pairs of underwear, apparently preparing for some kind of outing. I was even taking them off and putting on new ones right in front of him - something I would not be inclined to do during waking hours.

The One with the Big Mob Shooting

I first remember being in a building in the center of the Westfield State College campus with Angelo - perhaps in the dining commons. Angelo worked at the college or was going to school there now and we were talking about it. He was saying that the campus was so big that he didn't know where anything was. I was saying that no, the campus is very small. He mentioned the student center (I think he had yet to see it) and I responded, "It's right there! I can see it from here!"

I decided to take him and some other student (I didn't recognize him) around, and said that it would be nice to see Stanley Park. Even though Angelo said he had been there before, we decided to head in that direction anyway. I think at one point we were in a car, but at another point the three of us were flying above Western avenue. There were a bunch of cops in the street like there would be for a big event, but then we noticed there were a whole bunch of guys dressed like old-style mobsters with small machine guns in the street, just kind of in a neat line going down the length of the street.

The other student and I were wondering what they were doing and were concerned, but Angelo was acting like a kid, making gestures and kind of yelling at the mobsters like it was all a game or a joke. We were flying down the length of the street for a bit when I heard something like, "Ok guys get ready." I yelled, "Let's get the hell out of here!" and somehow directed Angelo down a side street.

We started flying down the side street and kind of crashing into branches and stuff and ended up having to run. I remember pushing off tree branches with my legs to fly faster. At one point, I heard someone yelling, "OK, pull the rope!! Pull the rope!!" Although we couldn't see or hear directly, we knew that they had starting shooting and something else was going on, too. I never actually saw anyone in the dream get shot, though.

We ended up going into a big house (like a three family house) where two Asian boys lived (Tony and Jaycen?) and told them something was going on and we all ran up to the attic to hide. Someone from our group said to be quiet, but it seemed like the shooters were coming into houses, like they were just trying to kill everyone.

At this point, I think I woke up briefly and my heart was pounding. I fell back to sleep and all of a sudden the shooting was over but I was in the same dream, but someone I was now disguised as a small black cat. I remember running around the town trying to figure out a place go to. I ended up in some small apartment at the top floor of another multiple family house, turning on the TV briefly, but then leaving again for some reason. I remember seeing car lights (at this point it was dark) and crouching down and seeing cars drive by but then when I looked closer, they were like mechanically driven with statues in the car, almost so it would seem like the town was still populated. Some of the "people" in the cars, buses and such looked like the guys from the Blue Man Group.

A bunch of young people walked buy, and one girl made those kissing sounds when she saw me because she wanted to pet me. When she approached, I just ran away.

Now at this point in the dream, I started to find out more about what happened. I remember being in a hotel-like building and hearing the "Pull the rope!" line again. It seems l thought it was going to be like Ghost Ship and people would be somehow cut in half by the rope, but instead the rope was catching people in multiple, big nets. I don't know what was going to happen to the people in the nets. But they were shooting, too, and some people were trying to stop the nets. At one point, my friend Lissa ran by pulling a rope, and she was being heroic trying to save people.

The One When Lighting Struck Thrice

I was in a classroom, sitting in maybe the second row in the middle of the room. The teacher (although in the dream I though of him as a professor, so it must've been college) was in the front of the room teaching, like normal. Justin came in and was either going to be a guest teacher/speaker, replace the existing teacher or join the teacher on a permanent basis - I'm not sure.

The outer wall of the classroom had large windows, and some of them opened like doors. Justin went outside with the professor while the rest of us watched from inside the classroom. They were going to do some sort of demonstration.

The sky had dark clouds and Justin ended up getting struck by lightning - but it wasn't like a bolt came down and hit him, it was more like a cloud of electricity came down, surrounded him and shocked him for a few seconds and then dispersed. He remained standing at that point but became understandably nervous about staying outdoors.

The professor then got shocked in a similar manner while he was continuing to set up the demonstration. Justin became increasingly agitated and for good reason because he got hit a second time. I remember bolts of lightning kind of hovering around the clouds, pointing at the two of them, almost like they were being targeted. At this point in the dream, both Justin and the professor were lying on the ground unconscious.

The entire class was frozen and one other person and I were like "Call 911!!" So the other guy called while I ran into the hallway. I remember thinking of the stats that X percentage of people freeze in emergencies, Y% panic and scream and like 10% can actually function.

In the hallway (a college/school hallway), there was what looked like a medical triage unit set up in a large stairwell landing. I remember seeing a very large defibrillator unit. Lynn was the head nurse. I yelled for her to come into the classroom, but she shook her head like she was too busy with other things. I yelled that two people had just gotten hit by lightning, so she followed me into the classroom.

At that point, I woke up.