What did you dream last night?

good job, chumly!

i was teaching some teenagers history. in arabic...which i don't speak a word of when awake, but seem to be surprisingly fluent in in my sleep.

I know what you mean, sometimes it almost seems like I can understand a foreign language, say for example in a small restaurant with close seating.

Don't know Francis, I seem to have more dreams when I get more than seven hours of sleep and I seem to remember more of those dreams because I actually make a mental note to do so.

I think dreams are fascinating things. I wonder sometimes if we dream differently now than people did in the eighteenth or seventeenth century. Our brains receive so much more stimulus from television, ipod music, store and cafe music, movies and, of course, this bright computer screen that is in front of both of us right now.

I'm not sure if the brain can tell the difference between an actual experience and a movie.

Joe(Of course, if that's so, my brain thinks I've been through seven wars, numerous car wrecks, many many murder scenes and even more naked trysts and a shark attack.)Nation

i even had one dream about Joe Nation. I think i posted that here before though.

I asked because the stimulus of life don't seem to get through to me, as I sleep like a log, of a seemingly dreamless sleep...

SAL-9000: Will I dream?
Dr. Chandra: Of course you will. All intelligent beings dream. Nobody knows why.

HAL-9000: Dr. Chandra, will I dream?
Dr. Chandra: I don't know.

Last night I dreamed I was teaching a fourth grade class from last year. They were a horrible class, and they were no better in my dream. I dreamed that one of them left the class and refused to come back. the others tried to cover for him saying he wasn't still in school. I kept seeing him walk by the room but nobody in the class or in the hall would help me get him to come back into class.

I usually have these dreams before school starts for the year not near the end!

The dreams happen, Francis, you just aren't conscious of them.

The fun part, for me, is that no one knows why exactly sleep brings on these odd exchanges of data from one section of the brain to another, fictional and otherwise. Science knows they happen, people report their dreams and we can see the brain activity in scans, but we don't know the reason for the activity.

We aren't even sure why sleep in necessary, but we know that it is. (A human deprived of sleep for as little as forty hours will begin to show symptoms of paranoia and other psychoses.)

How many hours of sleep do you get a night? Less than six impairs the dreaming function, get about seven on average for a week or so and the dreams will begin spinning.

Joe(It's like getting free movie tickets)Nation

Bad dream. But very colorful.

I was pushing a child in a stoller in this park like setting. There was no one in the park but us. The sun was shining but there were bolts of lightening all around like it was going to storm. So I was trying to find shelter but there was nothing at all. Next thing I know, I was crossing a street. Not in the park anymore. This man in a real old beat up car was coming down the road and he stopped and poked his head out the window and said what a pretty baby I had. And away he went. I didn't even have a chance to ask if he could help us. Then it was dark and I had the baby in my arms. Not sure what happened to the stroller. From that point I was running from something. I have no idea what or who. I just knew this "thing" was after my baby. Kept running and running.

Then I woke up. And was soooo glad! Geeez Louise!

And I dreamed I saw the bombers riding shotgun in the sky
Turning into butterflies above Joe Nation

What would that be? Synchronicity ?

That just before sleep last night
I was singing that same verse.

I was trying to explain the difference between Ms. Mitchell's original and the CSN&Y version after wondering aloud if anyone under forty could still sing the melody of "Somewhere over the Rainbow."

Joe(Songwriters have a right to have their songs sung somewhat in the fashion that they wrote them. Somewhat.)Nation

I am the eye in the sky
Looking at you
I can read your mind


Alan Parsons Project - Eye In The Sky

I dreamed there was a man with a terra cotta mask in his hands and an old piece of pottery (black, big at the bottom, narrow and tall to the top, rather south American looking.) The mask was broken and I was trying to see if I could help him repair it since it appeared to be of value.



Hmmm. Wondering if the value was monetary or otherwise, but I percieved it to be something he was heartbroken over.

Mrs. Nation and I were in a yoga class and there was a lot of talk about how "Don" the previous teacher had once thrown "Anne" out his class for being "too religious". The joke was on him, it seemed, although it was never made very clear to me what the joke was, other than she was now the teacher.

Joe(there were a couple of other which flew by -- keys needed, something about -- I forget- nevermind.)Nation

It was the Christmas holidays and I'd come into town to visit relatives. I went to the mall on Christmas Day after realizing that i didn't have a gift for my favorite cousin. At the mall I had no purse, no id on me, no cash, I was just wandering around before meeting one of Jesus' disciples and discovering that I, myself, was earmarked as a disciple. And then I was introduced to Jesus and we shook hands. He looked like one of my cousins in Memphis. On my fathers' side.
I left the mall and was turned around, trying to find my way back to my aunts' house and usually when i have these lost dreams (and I have them often), I'm just lost and left to wander but in this dream, I stopped, turned around to go in the opposite direction and began recognizing landmarks. I relaxed, knowing I would find my way back.
Other things happened, I was hiding in a field, a group of guys were looking for me but I wasn't frightened at all. I eluded them and carried on, heading for my aunts' house. I woke up before getting there.
What troubled me throughout the dream was not being able to buy a gift for my cousin.

This is pretty wild: I had read in Rolling Stone about Van Morrison's new album and wanted to get it. I was in NJ visiting my parents and drove by my old Record Setter haunt on route l8 and I was telling my daughter - 'That's where I used to ride my bike every week to spend $5.25 of my $38.00 paycheck (which is what I made after taxes working 18 hours a week at my part-time job during highschool) to get whatever album I was gonna treat myself with that week.
So I said -'I can't believe it's still here and open.' I wanted to show it to her and get the Van Morrison album - so we stopped.

On the door a sign said, 'Closed for spring vacation - opens again April 15'. So I didn't get the album....
This is not the dream - this is the real set up for the dream.

So last night - April l5- I dreamed I was listening to Van Morrison's new album (which I haven't heard yet). In the dream I said, 'His voice sounds just the SAME' and I was so excited to hear it. That was the dream.

I'm gonna go get his album today.

I was walking along an unpaved dirt road. When I came to a cross road. The northeast corner was "obviously" the 140 corner. The standing cornstalks had been cleared away for a collection of scarecrow costumes, all in unbleached muslin (with the seams on the outside) and all with sunbonnets.

I knew that I had to make a choice--that while I was expected to stop, I could walk past and escape.

I walked past.

Last night I dreamed that I interviewed for a job in Denver, Colorado. It was some sort of financial services company. I was one of three candidates, and I didn't think I would get the job. Somehow I discovered the interviewer's notes and found that I received the highest marks of all the candidates. The man who interviewed us asked me to step back into his office (obviously about to offer me the job); I started worrying about how I would relocate to Denver. But before he could offer me the job, an alarm went off. He said, "That's the earthquake alarm. We're about to have an earthquake. Take your station!" No earthquake came, but the overhead sprinklers all came on. The office was closed and I never learned if I got the job after all.

I don't recall all of it, but part of my dream involved using an extremely low tech computer. It was rectangular and gun mental grey. You flipped up the top and there were buttons underneath but no screen. I can't recall what I was using it for.

Those were four wonderous dreams.

Joe(great minds have great dreams)nation