The dog did it

I woke up laughing this morning. I believe that's because I was laughing in a dream.

I have no idea where we were in this dream, but my buddy Nick and I were out and about somewhere. Probably curling in a weekend bonspiel, as we needed a room for the night. So we find a hotel.

As we begin to fall asleep in this double bed, I look over my shoulder to see Nick lying on his side facing away from me, but so close to the edge of the bed that I though he would fall out. Then I turn away from him, and here's my son's dog Gaspode, a black and white Australian Shepherd. So I start petting him.

All of a sudden Gaspode leaps over me and, taking one big hop on the middle of the bed, he comes down with all four paws against Nick's back, knocking him onto the floor with a loud thud. Then 'Spode just sits in the center of the bed, studying his conquest.

I raise up and start laughing out loud. Then I was petting Gaspode and saying, "Who's a good boy? He's a good boy!" and laughing like all get out. All the while Nick is laying on the hotel room floor stunned.

Then I woke up laughing and, honestly, looking for Gaspode, wondering where he was. I laughed for about ten minutes before I settled down.

You can't make this up. But I sure hope Nick's all right.

Eerie Hessel

Earlier this month they repaved Cedar Street in front of our house in Hessel, Michigan in the glorious Upper Peninsula. I took a picture a couple hours before dawn the day after the work. This is it:

It's kind of eerie, don't you think? The interesting thing for me is that it reminds me of a recurring dream I had as child. Really. I remember a lone street lamp in the near distance against a black backdrop, with a vehicle parked underneath, not at all unlike the picture. In the dream, there were voices beyond the darkness, and maybe barking dogs, which I could never quite make out. I can almost hear them again looking at this image.

I like the picture, though what inspired me to go outside at around 4 AM to take it I don't know. And I must admit it's weirding me out a little.

Gourmet Dog Food

Old Chief was a good dog, and I don't mean that as the lead in to a joke. He was a good dog, a beagle we had as the kids were growing up. His ear flaps were so large that when he stood still in a high wind they'd flap. I mean it. They were huge.

I had a dream about Chief last night. I was fixing him his 'favorite' (remember I was dreaming) meal, pork and beans. Pork and beans mixed with sour cream. He was super excited.

Me, now that I'm awake? I about half want to try it.

Dream Car

Dream home, dream vacation, dream car, dreams. They all have a certain air of unreality. Sometimes they are indeed very unreal.

I dreamt the other night that a salesman was offering me a new car. I remember nothing about it except it was metallic blue and kind of small, for $35. He insisted it had only six actual miles. 

Six actual miles? Even dreaming Marty knew that was absurd. Any vehicle would get more than six miles on it driving it off the assembly line and being loaded onto a car hauler. 

Still, such low mileage merited serious consideration. I made a counter offer of thirty-two bucks, and not merely because that's all I had on me. You simply never pay list on a new car, right?

The salesman made a counter counter offer of $33.50, presumably to meet me half way. Yet I woke up before the next step of the negotiations. I never even got a test drive.

True Story, Sort Of

We all, or at least I think we all, have bizarre dreams sometimes. Generally, they go unremembered. Yet sometimes they stick with you.

Last night I dreamed that I was in my front hall with a Tyrannosaurus Rex. Only it was a miniature one, about four and a half feet tall. I was still scared. But then a voice yelled to me, I don't know whose voice or wherefrom it came, "Put a chokehold around its snout before it breathes fire!" I didn't know T-Rexes could breathe fire but, dreams, right?

I got the mini-monster in a chokehold. "Now throw it out the door!" I looked over and the door was open, so I tossed it out the door bodily. The animal landed nose down in the hostas next to our sidewalk.

The T-Rex didn't like that. It fought its snout free and leaped back towards the house. I slammed the door shut, but the dinosaur busted through the stained glass window which made up the top half of it. By then it was mad but couldn't move, stuck among the shards of colored glass.

"I have an air cannon!" shouted another voice. And right at my feet was an air cannon. Whatever that is, anyway, for I don't know that such a thing exists. "It only fires air, but that will blow the thing back out into the yard," I was assured.

As we aimed the device, I realized the T-Rex was then stuck in the bottom of the door, which was impressive because that part of the door is oak. Hardwood like that I don't think even a miniature T-Rex could burst through. The stained glass was fine. How, I don't know. Dreams, right? 

It took four shots, but the fourth one blew the T-Rex back into the yard. Then it jumped up and began running down the street, yelping like a dog. It sounded pretty much like a beagle. The guy with the air cannon started after it with a crossbow. Every time he fired an arrow it would hit the T-Tex, which would leap up and yelp exactly like Yogi Bear would when he'd get hit in the butt with an arrow in the old cartoons. The animal would try to reach around to the wounds with its arm, but T-Rexes arms are short, right, so he couldn't get to the arrows.

They were quickly out of sight. Then I thought, I'd better fix the door. But it was fixed. How? I don't know. Dreams, right?

There you have it. A genuine dream. Let's see Sigmund figure that one out.

Perchance to Dream

I am not one to engage in new or unusual cuisine. Odd or interesting gastronomical delights do not delight me. So why was I dreaming of bizarre foods last night?

I don't remember much of what was on the menu. We do tend to forget dreams, and that's generally just as well. But one bizarre food I distinctly recall was given me by, of all people, me brother Patrick, a man of limited and quite sharply defined tastes. It was a sandwich of vanilla wafers, mayonnaise, melted cheese, peanut butter (a super thick layer), and a chicken nugget. Or perhaps it was a fish nugget, I'm not sure. You know how dreams have that unreal quality, right?

Still, it was one of those dreams which was so real I could almost taste the food. I am just as glad I could not. Still, if I find Patrick eating such a sandwich today, I will begin doing all I can to wake myself up.