A few

- I was looking for a friend in a mansion. Another friend misled me and I eventually wasn't able to find him, while my friend knew exactly where he was and went and hung out with him. I think we were at some house party that got out of control and then we had to leave. I think drinking was involved.

- I was with a good friend on some sort of road trip. His mother was driving, and we were in the first row behind the driver's seat - in a van, so there were two seats with a space in the middle. I remember we were playing and talking about our new BOSE noise cancelling headphones. We also made a stop at a tomb-like museum in the middle of a park somewhere on this roadtrip. My friend had drawn on his face with pen around his eyes and cheeks in a linear pattern of some sort.

- I brought a person I recently met to visit my family. I think he helped my mom find seafood because we were trying to make some Peruvian seafood dish. He also took me to a fraternity "ring ceremony" thing and he didn't get a ring but was essentially on some sort of waiting list where he would get into the frat if some of the people they had invited preferred other offers they had received. The best part of this dream was that there was a path around this frat ceremony location. On the path, there were these lights that looked like spherical orbs of light on the ground. They rocked

a foot race

Don't remember the exact context or reason, but I raced a friend of mine in a basketball gym, from one sideline to another, and beat him (this would not happen in real life). He smiled and was very impressed.

When gorillas attack

A group of friends from the study abroad program in Costa Rica and I were taking a guided nature walk, and we came upon a section of field/forest where many other tour groups were tracking gorillas. This was apparently not very difficult, as many groups were surrounded by gorillas and being way less than careful with them. Some were feeding them, others were teasing them, and it generally felt unsafe. There weren't any regulations and essentially the tourists were doing as they pleased. (note: these animals were gorillas, but they were about the size of a chimp)

Before we had begun the tour, our guide had offered us to scent ourselves with a pheromone mixture that would attract and make the gorillas more likely to come up to us, and most of us had refused this opportunity because it sounded pretty dangerous. Except for one friend, my current apartment mate, who dipped her hand in it.

While we continued to walk, this particular friend got ahead of the group and was walking about 10 feet ahead of everyone else. All of a sudden, a gorilla came charging at her and rammed her to the ground. Another gorilla followed and attacked her from another side. Everyone around us stopped what they were doing, including me, and stood in shock wondering how to respond to the attack. The guide, so called expert, was refusing to do anything saying that if more people got involved more people would get hurt but I immediately dismissed that approach. Watching my friend go through this was incredibly scary and I couldn't just stand there and watch her get hurt. So I jumped and fell by her side, saying "Don't die! Please don't die!" and holding her head. I noticed she had been bitten on her left wrist and bright red blood was coming out. In the middle of this, one of the gorillas who had first attacked was making his way over to charge at me, when out of nowhere an old friend of mine grabbed him and stopped the impact. The gorilla went away and I looked up at him and had one of those "wow, my hero!" moments. Unfortunately, this is an old friend who I despise.

At some other points in the dream, I remember three things: one, a lot of my friends were TV show stars and my mom was asking me how come I wasn't one yet and she encouraged me to find out if I could become one; two, a group of friends from Duke Engage and I went shopping with my mom but one couldn't afford anything more than $10, so we were looking at $7jeans; and three, with the Costa Rica group we were taking a vacation, our families came along and I remember my family stayed in this large Caribbean plantation-style home that was very very nice except for a leaky roof which messed us up when it rained, and anyway this group of friends and I took a jeep out to find a remote beach. We found one with some whales in it that had dolphin-like fins, and one of the girls in the group (who looked like two people I know) decided to jump in and she turned into a dolphin and swam with the whales.

Lucidity and nakedness

1) ACHIEVED LUCIDITY: I'm on an island, it's very sunny. I'm not sure what's going on until I have a moment where I know I'm dreaming. And you bet, I try so hard to make sure that I don't wake up and I don't. What's next? I have to test my boundaries. So, I try to change the scenery, but that fails. Then, I see a road ahead of me and there's a bridge. There is a couple on this bridge and I think what's one of the craziest things I can do? So, I decide to try to seduce this couple into having a threesome. I kiss the guy but as I pull away I realize he's actually really gross. His teeth are missing, he is very ugly, and kind of dirty. Moving along, I drop that idea and run into my mom's friend's daughter. She seems distraught and I'm not sure where she's going but I decide that I need to find a castle. I imagine that if such a castle exists, it's got to be on a road called "Royal Drive" so I ask her if she knows where it is but she has no idea. All of a sudden an Asian girl in a beetle drives up and I direct her to stop. She does, and I ask her if she knows how to get to Royal Drive, and she offers me a ride. While I am in her car she tells me she sells weed but is having some trouble keeping up with the demands of her customers because she keeps getting requests for things like weed tea which she's never made and is very confused about, and then I don't remember my dream after that.

2) I'm not sure what the story is behind this dream but I remember at one point I was going to seduce an older man. But, before I did that, I wanted to check myself out in the mirror to make sure I looked good. I was wearing an ultra-soft, magenta robe and it had some floral decorations on it. It was sort of Japanese style floral decorations on it. Then, I stood in front of a mirror and took off the robe to look at my naked body. I apparently looked different than what I actually look like, because my breasts were much larger and oddly cartoonish.

Met you on the quad

My friend and I were playing around and he gave me a key to a room at Duke, and I don't remember why, but I ended up spending the night there. I woke up, and the people who lived in the room came in. They were surprised to find me there but they didn't mind. Then, either they were helping me move my stuff or I was helping them; either way, we started to move some objects out of the room. I couldn't carry all the stuff I was trying to move, and it was frankly sort of embarassing. Dropping stuff everywhere. I remember distinctly having a lot of trouble with two orange tubes of lip balm.

On one of these back and forth trips we walk past a group of guys - kind of fratty, not my type, no one I actually know in real life - who are talking about a pickup trick: accidentally touch a girl somewhere (shoulder, knee) and apologize, see how she reacts. Anyway, so this one guy tries to pull this on me, and I tell him: oh hey, can you get off, you're accidentally touching me and it's kind of annoying. He laughs, I've bruised his ego a little, but nothing he can't recover from. I'm not sure what he says next, but he gets me to laugh. And after that, we flirt a little, poke fun at each other, and next thing I know he's put his arm around me and he's asking for my name, which I tell him, and he tells me his (no recollection of what it was). So we're taking this stroll along some path on the quad, and then we pause to cross some street. He pulls out a cell phone and he's texted someone about me, and she's calling him. I can hear her say something like "well is she cute or something" and then he replies and hangs up. I ask him if that was a friend or something and he gets this sheepish look on his face. He then proceeds to tell me that him and his ex-girlfriend are still sort of seeing each other, and that he apologizes but isn't in a position where he can really pursue our connection any further. He says he can't even give me his number. Disappointed, but not terribly, I tell him no worries, I get it, I've been there. Why do we get so hung up on these quasi commitments? So I brush it off and tell him to say hi next time we see each other, no hard feelings, and I walk away, feeling pretty hot and confident about the whole event in general.

Next event I remember is that I accidentally end up at some reunion event that a girl I know from school is putting together. Problem is, I'm not part of the reunion. Trapped, however, I find out they are short-staffed so I find a spot behind a table where we're distributing donuts and pastries to guests. At one point, I'm putting a donut on a paper plate and a man who's reaching for one has long blonde hairs shedding from his sweatshirt. I begin to point this out to him. He gets offended, and grabs the donut right from under me, gripping it with excessive force and essentially squashing it.

Remembered the other day I dreamt my hair was gradually falling out. Had a bald spot.

the future?

I don't remember a lot about the dream other than I lived on my own and I had my own place. Then I was planning to have people over in my apartment and I may have posted an ad for friends in the newspaper, or maybe online. Lol

Alien theater

My friend Brendan was directing a play he'd written about an alien invasion, and I was part of the cast. It was a short, funny, audience-gets-involved kind of play, and I played an alien queen who was part of a group of people who surprised the audience by coming out of nowhere and shooting at them with fake lasers. People enjoyed it. I remember at some point, my one line was to say "Oh no, I think we're out of ammo," at which point some selected members of the audience were equipped with fake weapons and shot at us.

Sitting in a cafe

It was a combined setting of Duke and high school, I went from hanging out with some people, getting ready to see a Duke basketball game, to ending up going to a football stadium to see some other game. Taylor King was in the audience, standing by himself. As I was getting ready, I couldn't find a Duke shirt first, and then I accidentally grabbed red instead of Duke blue shorts.

Afterwards, I found myself heading to a cafe by myself, talking on my cell phone. I was randomly talking to an old high school teacher, one of my favorites, about life in general. I went into the cafe and ordered a variety of small cookies and a coffee, and sat by myself. Somehow, being on the phone wasn't rude in this place. Next to me, there was a lady, her mother, and possibly an aunt, waiting for another guest. They were eating breakfast food, one lady had two eggs and black beans. We made eye contact a few times, they smiled. Then the 4th guest showed up - the youngest's fiance, and he had brought everyone jewelry. He pulls a little jewelry bag out of nowhere and just turns it over on the table, letting it fall out, with this grin on his face. He gave his fiance a necklace I saw in Austin, the aunt some sun medallion, and the future mother in law, some other thing I can't remember. I remember the women looked at me funny, possibly embarassed by the way he just pulled the jewelry out like that.

My teacher asked me about my boyfriend, and I acted like my reception was bad because I didn't want to discuss the long story and details. The waiter tried to take my food away before I was done, and I had to tell him twice that I still wanted to eat the chocolate cookie still on my napkin.

State fair

In this odd dream, I am flipping between present and past (both imagined). I remember going to the state fair with my boyfriend and taking home a piglet. It was adorable at first, and clung to me like a puppy. Not long after, however, it becomes a nuisance in my home. It is super annoying and won't stop annoying me. It's obsessed with me and won't even let me go down the stairs without giving it attention. So I try to lock it in a contraption under the breakfast table, but it fails. Then on another occassion I go back to the state fair, and consider returning it. While I'm there, once more with my boyfriend, a little girl runs up to him and offers to trade him a t-shirt for his hat, which is a cap from my father's company. She is thrilled, and tells us her town doesn't have any big company plants in it, so she will be really cool now that she has a hat.

We also run into an old friend from high school, who I never really liked and haven't heard from in ages. She is working as a waitress for a restaurant portion of the fair. Each time we pass her, she tries to ignores us, or gives us an insincere smile.

While at the fair, I am texting an old friend. He's at the fair while we are, but never in the same place, so I don't see him. He texts me about what he's seeing at the fair, stuff he is finding and buying.

Apparently, the only reason the pig couldn't follow me to the fair on this trip is because we rode a carriage there and carriages scare the pigs because they are hazardous to them.

confusing reality

Set my alarm for 8 am.Woke up at 7:15, went back to sleep. In my sleep, shut off the 8 am alarm and unfortunately remained asleep.

I dreamt that I woke up and my friend picked me up from my house to go on the trip (which is exactly what was supposed to happen in real life, but I was actually dreaming...but believing it was reality). We even got to our destination and he was helping me take stuff out of his car. How crazy is that??

Dreaming of greater dreams

working on my lucid dreaming skills with LaBerge's methods.

Managed to have ~ 5 short dreams last night. I remembered them upon waking, but I was too lazy to write them down.

I only remember one where I went to the store and bought custom-packaged steaks. Friendly butcher.

Jurassic Park

No kidding, last night I dreamt that I was in a Jurassic Park 2-like situation...there was an enormous dinosaur or two going around the country killing people, and it was unstoppable. I don't remember how or if the army had tried to stop it, but clearly it was not an easy task.

I remember that because the monster's path was so unpredictable, there wasn't any point in evacuating because you had the same chance of getting eaten...so people went about their normal lives but in constant fear, planning where they would run and hide if they encountered the dinosaur or if it suddenly broke through the building or something.

The problem was, the dinosaur could smell you...so it wasn't enough to just be out of it's sight.

I remember I was outdoors when the dinosaur came running through and attacking people...I climbed into a tree, but the dinosaur smelled me. Before it could attack me, however, I think I got shot or something else happened. It's all still blurry to me.

All I can remember is that my mother was in this dream and she was disappointed about something I did.

Daydreams

This is where I'm going to keep my writing:

http://catherinejotsdown.blogspot.com/

Just remembered a dream from a while ago

It was LDOC, and we were doing what kids do on LDOC. Walking around in sundresses on lawns, SOLO cups in hand. In this version of Duke University, we had a Baskin Robbins where they featured a new flavor every week or month, and on LDOC, two of my friend's had submitted a flavor and had won. In fact, their flavor was so fresh and new that it was put at the top of the list and released without spending any time on the wait list.
So, on this LDOC, my boyfriend decided he was having the munchies and really really needed to go get some ice cream. I had already gone to get some myself and so I did not go with him. I remember being irritated for being left alone so I stormed off through the Keohane lawn and as I did that, I ran into a girl I know who has rollerblading, and I fell backwards. Somehow, my head hit one of her rollerblades, and within my dream, I passed out.
I woke up, within my dream, and found myself in my bed in my dorm room. The girl I'd hit was there and she told me I'd hit my head on her roller blade and I'd passed out. I asked her why no one had called the EMT and she said they didn't want to overreact. Furious, I asked where my boyfriend was. She told me he felt like getting more ice cream and so he'd be back later.

Haunted Grounds

Last night, four of my friends and I decided to go camping at the Devil's Tramping Grounds in Siler City, NC (Chatham County).

The story goes something like this...there's a barren circle in the woods with "no scientific explanation" as to why nothing grows on it. There's a fire pit in the middle where people like to build fires, and the folklore explains the blank circle by claiming that the devil and evil spirits walk around in circles on that spot plotting evil.

So, naturally, we were not spooked at all until we had a few spooky experiences. First of all, a local man and his son randomly pulled up and came to talk to us, at first refusing to tell us the "real story" about the site (it used to be a tribal ceremonial site) and then telling us to watch out for copperheads...and any tricks that the place might play on us. Later, some people pulled up nearby who sounded like they were drinking, and then later we heard some voices in the forest. Regardless, we weren't freaked out enough to leave, but we stayed and split into two separate tents.

I can't deny that I was spooked anyway, since after all, I am open to the possibility of paranormal and/or spiritual happenings. So I had a freaky dream.

It was one of those dreams where you feel like it's real, because you "wake up" in your dream to find yourself in the exact same place where you are sleeping and it feels like you've actually woken up. But when I "woke up", I felt like I had sleep paralysis, and couldn't move. My eyes were open, however, and I was staring at the sky and the stars, which we could see from our tent because we had screens at the top.Then I began to hear sounds, as if there were a lot of what sounded like teenagers walking and rustling about in the forest. Then I heard whispers, like they were talking about their plan of action. All of a sudden, the most vivid part of my dream occurred. I heard them begin to circle around our tents and none of my friends were making any noise. I assumed that like me, they were trying to stay as quiet as possible, but in my case I wouldn't have even been able to make noise if I wanted to. Which was probably a good thing because the next thing I felt was the presence of a person feeling their hand around the outside of the tent, as if looking for bodies inside. I felt their fingers as they felt my back through the thin layer of tent, and at that moment I essentially "passed out" from the fear of the moment.

The next thing that happened is that I woke up - and this time, it was for real, and the night was still. The stars looked brighter, and I tried to calm myself to sleep.

Walking Art

I dreamt I had gotten off some sort of Duke bus and I was walking on a trail going into a wooded path. I wore a colorful purple and aqua and black dress and matching hightops. I remember walking daintily while dramatically holding last year's Duke yearbook. I feel that I ran into my mother, aunt, and grandmother along the path and they asked me how I was doing and making me feel good about myself. I think they were liking my outfit.

Vegan Cupcakes

I dreamt that I had been relocated and for a reason unknown to me, I
had to live with a family that had a bunch of high school kids. So I
was being forced to attend high school classes when it dawned on me: I
have a high school diploma, I'm probably not even eligible to take
these classes! So I went to the counselor and told her what I'd
figured out and she clapped and excitedly confirmed that I in fact did
not have to attend those classes.

Instead, I found myself at culinary school with a fellow Duke student
who will be working closely with me this year. She really, really
wanted to become an expert chef and I was just in for the fun. It
turns out I was on her cooking team for the final examination, and we
had to make vegan cupcakes and a fish dish. I was helping her out at
the really, really, intense final moments and she had to step out of
the room for a few seconds, right when the fish was done cooking. In a
moment of brilliance/carelessness/reckless impulsion, I couldn't find
the plate or any sign of a side dish for the fish. I had no idea where
to put it. So, I put it on top of one of the frosted cupcakes.

Right at that moment, the girl came back in, furious and in shock over
what I'd done. She began to freak out and I immediately apologized,
not having a clue what to do to fix it. I assured her I would take all
the blame and explain exactly what had happened to the director of the
program. Then time was up and all we could do was wait for the
judgment. Then the director came out and told us that while that weird
thing had happened with the fish, she was able to put the mistake
aside because it just tasted soooo good.

My friend got her degree and I completed the program without one, just
a certificate of achievement, and that's all I remember about the
dream.

A dream is a wish your heart makes

when you're fast asleep.

Or so the song says...

I haven't recorded my dreams in a while. I'm upset about it. I'm going to try to dream tonight.