ZUDEMA

12007 December 01

The woman and i walked down the long corridor of the old building, heading to the north. The corridor seemed to lead out of a common area in the center of the building, where there had been shops. More people had been crowded in the open hall, but there were few people moving down the corridors around us. The corridor was pale-tan, with deeply inset doors. The corners of the short corridors that led to the doors were rounded, as were the corners of the shorter corridors that led to the east and west from the main corridor. The main corridor ran directly north, but the walls jogged to one side of another at the intersections, making the building seem shorter. I looked around at some of the doors around us. The woman and i were looking for the Hall of Science, but i could not see a door for it. We stopped just past one of the intersections, realizing that we were nearly at the end of the building. We must have missed the Hall of Science. The woman then asked if i wanted to see the rock exhibit. I turned around, noticing that she was referring to the doorway on the southern wall of the short corridor that headed to the west. The carved wood sign above the door said “Burrology”. The name did not sound familiar to me, but i followed the woman into the room. She seemed like $F43. The room inside was small, with a tiny window in the western wall. All around the room were pedestals with small mounted animals on them. There was a squirrel on the one just to the west of the door, and i looked around the room, noticing a beaver, a raccoon, and several other woodland creatures. This was not the room for rocks, and i explained to the woman that “burrology” might refer to burrowing animals. As i said this, i noticed the small silver monkey standing on one of the round pedestals against the southern wall. The woman asked about the monkey, and i said maybe the term referred to really small mammals. We both left the room and headed back to the east, along the northern side of the fairground. There were several long kiosks to the north of us, most of which seemed to be closing. We were heading back to the font gate of the fair, where we had started. I thought that i actually wanted to see the exhibits on the western side of the fair, and wondered why we were heading back to the gate already. Several portable kiosks with canvas awnings stood to the south of us, and there seemed to be a patio area to the east and south of us where small round metal black cafe tables were set up on decorative flagstones. We started walking through the cafe, but i felt that this was not right. We should not be heading back so soon. I told $Z that i was heading to the west. I turned around and drove the car to the north, along the eastern side of the large gray stone building. As i came to the northern side of the building, i could see the paved lot than ran along the northern side of the building, to the north of the drive, just to the south of a short grassy hill. I thought that i could park the car there, but i was worried that i would need a pass to park on campus here. The stone lot to the north of the road was bowed to the north in the center. I turned around and headed to the west, on the road that ran to the south of the building. I came to an area where small stone houses lined the eastern and western side of a street. The path i was on ended at a stone embankment to the west of me, which descended in a series of wide slate steps to the road below. There seemed to be some crude gardens on the steps of the slate. I thought that i could park the car on the residential road and not have to worry about being registered for parking at the university. I stepped carefully down the steps, hoping that i was not intruding or trespassing on someone’s property in my attempt to get to the road. I held the straps to the car in my right hand. The small yellow car seemed heavy, but i could lift it over the edge of the steps as i descended. I jumped down the last step to the road, and the car felt suddenly very heavy. I looked around on the road, wondering where i could park the car. The houses looked quaint, like english country houses.

12007 December 03

I looked around the small bathroom of the house. The room was relatively square, and only had room for a sink and a toilet. The bathroom was in a narrow tower of the house. I moved toward the modern white house. It had square walls and a flat roof. The white tower stood to the south of the house, on what appeared to be the basement level of the building. The top part of the tower was connected to the main part of the house by a covered walkway. The walkway was white, with thin metal railings. I moved into the door on the northern side of the tower, entering into the small tan square room that was the bathroom of the house. There was a modern porcelain sink on a conical stand against the eastern wall, and a small shower stall to the west. A set of black circular stairs rose in the southeast corner of the room, heading up to the second level of the bathroom, where the toilet was. There were pictures on the walls of the room, and everything in the bathroom was very nicely polished and decorated. I looked at the white tower, which stood by itself, not connected to the house. There were long glass windows running down the western side. I remembered that this tower used to be attached to the house by a causeway, but there was no bridge anymore. I remembered that the walkway used to attach the bedroom on the second floor of the house, allowing the master bedroom to use the special bathroom. I remembered being there a while ago. I said something to the other person, who was standing to the north of me. I was then distracted by the people who were coming into the bedroom from the doorway in the southern end of the western wall. I felt that they were the occupants of the house. I sat up on the large white bed, where i had been reclined as i spoke to $Z. We had been staying in the house, but, now that the occupants had returned, i felt uncomfortable here. $Z finished getting dressed on the northern side of the bed, in front of the large glass wall on the northern side of the house. We would have to leave this place. I walked to the north, up the dirt driveway of the rural house. The land around me was bright and green, with tall field grass growing along the sides of the dirt road. The road ran east to west. There seemed to be many trees growing in front of the houses. Others were leaving the house with me, heading up the dirt driveway that was to the east. I did not want to be stopped by these people, so i hoped i would be out of site by the time the owners came back out of the house. I drove the moped to the west on the road, but it would not run smoothly on the rough road. It drove for about fifty metres before it faltered and stopped. There was a large field to the south of me now that did not seem to have been hayed for a few years. I headed to the west, into the large room that was under the roof of the open building. This place seemed like a storage shed on the side of a house. The others were gathered here. I looked around at the items in the area, thinking that i had moved some of them around. I felt that i should not have touched the items, because they were not mine, and i worried that these people would not want me here. I felt uncomfortable and turned back to the east to leave. I wanted to get out of this area before the owners of the house stopped me and questioned me.

12007 December 05

I quickly walked to the north, across the parking lot. Others were moving about in all directions across the paved surface. I heard the animal sound from the west, and thought that there was something large coming. I tried to ignore it as i reached my small red car. I went to unlock the door, but could not get the keys into the lock. As i tried again, i managed to drop the keys on the ground. I felt silly, thinking that this seemed too much like a cheap horror movie where the tension was built by someone unable to do a simply task. I could hear the animal approaching, but i did not seem to be frightened, and i thought that i should just stay calm and get in the car. I opened the door and got into the driver’s seat. As i closed the doors, i looked across the parking lot. I could see people running from the west as a large furry brown dog stalked across the parking lot. It was the monster. The dog came around the side of the car, but i knew that it could not get in because the doors were closed. I then brushed something with my left arm and i could hear the back door of the car opening. I looked back and tried to close it, but it was too late. The monster dog jumped into the back seat of the car. I felt annoyed and worried.

I came out of the house and started walking to the west, down the northern face of the tan farmhouse. I was a little hesitant about walking past the alligator, which had its head poking out of the tall tan field grass that was just to the north of the cement path i was on. The alligator held its head up into the air, but did not move as i passed. I walked into a fenced-in area on the western side of the house. $Z stood in the center of the U-shaped house, looking out over the field to the north. As i reached the western side of the house, i noticed that there was a group of people moving into the large open field north of the house. They came from the east, and stopped in the center of the plowed field. I realized that they were the work detail that was going to be farming the field today. They seemed to be part of some organization, like a school football team or boys club. There was an older man in a brown windbreaker in the center of the group, and he seemed to be the coordinator. The rest of the group seemed to be young athletic men, and i realized that they were working in the field without shirts. I felt excited about this, thinking that many of them were very attractive, and i wanted to go back into my house to get my camera. I excitedly hurried back down the cement path to the east, looking for the alligator, but not noticing it in the grass anymore. I wanted to get my camera so that i could take pictures of the men, but then i started to feel that it was too inconsiderate to take pictures of the men. I felt that i might be overindulging in simple desires. I looked up the wooden stairs, which ran up the western side of the eastern wing of the house to the second floor. I could see the alligator at the top of the first flight of stairs. It had been heading back into the house, but it stopped to rest on the long wooden walkway that bridged the space between the two wings of the house. I decided that i could not climb back up the stairs with the alligator there, so i turned to the west and headed up the wooden stairs on the western side of the building. The stairs started going up to the west, but turned to the south as they reached the outside of the house. I thought that i could simply watch the men as they worked, even though i knew that seemed lecherous. I looked to the north as i was partway up the stairs, but there was a tall wooden wall blocking my view of the field. I wondered if the men would notice that i had a camera when i tried to take pictures of them. I turned back to the south and continued up the stairs to the next level of the platform. The platform ran along the northern side of a wall, which seemed to be a tall chain-link fence. The other person was sitting on the top of the stairs to the east of me. He was watching the men move across the field to the north of us. I watched myself walk to the eastern end of the catwalk and start climbing down the green fence. I jumped from the lower half of the fence, landing on the grass in the center of the yard. I looked for the other man, to see what was happening with the men in the field. I then looked to the south, noticing that the work detail had started walking across the plowed field, toward the house. The young men were wearing red sweat pants and white T-shirts. Several of them did not have shirts on, and i could see that they were nicely built. They were members of the local high-school football team. I knew that they were nice people, and i felt very friendly toward them. I asked them if they needed anything from the house, and they asked if they could get some water. I grabbed the large plastic cooler from the ground and started carrying it back to the house, to the north. After only a few paces, i realized that i should have asked one of the young men for help with the cooler. It would have been a way to get to chat with one of the team members. I said something to $Z as we walked back across the dry dirt of the plowed field and to the small white farm house to the north of us.

12007 December 08

I headed to the east, down the street of the open area on the outside of the city. The main part of the city seemed to be to the north of us, down a steep hill. The houses just to the north of the street were built onto the hill so that their upper floors ran along the street that i was on. I headed to the south, into the theater. There was a crowd of people waiting at the door, and i felt that i wanted to hurry in so that i could get a good seat. This was a showing of Rocky Horror Show. It had been a long time since i had seen this show, and i wanted to be near the front. $F45 was with me, but he did not enter the theatre with me. I had come in early, heading right for the front row of red seats in the large plain tan theater. The rest of the crowd came in just after me. As i stood in the second row center seat, i thought that i would tell $F45 that we did not need to be this close to watch the movie, but it would be nice to be this close for the floor show. I turned to the south, noticing that there were people dancing on the stage. The show had started. About a dozen people were arranged in three lines on the stage, moving together. They were wearing plain street clothing, and i decided that this was the warm-up to the main show. There was some kind of railing across the front of the rounded stage. It seemed to be made of brass vertical bars that held up a single wooden horizontal pole. The house lights still seemed to be on. I looked to the west. $F45 was sitting several seats down from me in the front row. I hoped that he was enjoying the show. I seemed to be in the theater for a long time, watching the people move on the stage. I wondered when the movie part of the show would be starting. The actors were still not in their costumes for the show. I watched the people on the screen, but the movie stopped abruptly. The house lights were on and i turned to the south, looking up the slope of the audience. Someone on the eastern side of the audience called out that this was intermission, and people started to get up and walk about. It seemed strange that there would be a break in the show, especially at such an awkward place.

12007 December 09

I jogged to the east, down the road, which seemed like $P180. I followed the marks on the ground toward the carved pumpkin, which was sitting on the grass just off of the sidewalk, on the southern side of the street. I opened up the top of the pumpkin and lighted the candle inside with a match i had taken out of the small wooden box i was carrying. I was setting a trail, and i knew that $F1 would be following me. I followed the lines on the ground again until i came to another pumpkin. It was sitting on the northeast corner of a large open grassy park. There were streets on three sides of the park, and there seemed to be a modern academic building on the southern side. The grass was bright green, but the sky seemed overcast and chilly. A single tree was growing in the northeastern corner of the park, and i picked up the carved pumpkin and moved it to the grassy median between the sidewalk and the street than ran along the eastern side of the park. I opened the top and tried to light it, but i realized that i was running out of matches. I wondered if $F1 was far behind me. I looked to the west, noticing the illuminated pumpkins that i had already lighted on trail. They glowed softly in the darkness of the late evening. I could see the one i had just lighted, as well as two or three others, leading down the streets to the southwest. I could not tell if $F1 was coming or not, but i knew that i needed some more matches. I then noticed that the dark sky over the park was turning lighter. The blackness turned to a creamy black. The colour started to descend, and i realized that there was a snow shower moving into the area. This would make the pumpkins look more interesting in the dark. I turned my attention back to the pumpkin i had moved to the sidewalk on the eastern side of the street. I lighted a match, but, when i tipped it down to light the candle inside the pumpkin, it went out. I did not have that many matches left, and wondered what i should do. I was aware that there were three people in short winter jackets walking toward me, down the sidewalk on the northern side of the park. The tall man with them seemed to have a red jacket. They had stopped to ask what i was doing. I did not pay much attention to them as i tried to figure out what to do with the matches. I took the match that had just blown out and tried to light it on the small candle that i had been carrying with me. I thought about tipping the small candle into the pumpkin, but i knew that the candle would burn out if i did that. I held the old match over the flame of the small white candle, but the match seemed burned already. It was black and shriveled and curved to one side. It burned too quickly. I looked at the pumpkin to the northeast of me. It was sitting on the ground, already lighted, and the small white candle was sitting on the ground in front of it. I opened the small cardboard matchbox, noticing that there were only a few matches left. I took one out and lighted it on the candle. It flared up, and i realized that the white wick of the match was soaked in some kind of flammable liquid. I would not be able to use it to light the pumpkin. Someone was then standing to the north of me. I thought that it might be $Z, and i asked him if he brought any more matches. I would need them to light the tail. The others around me started talking, and someone mentioned the chicken from New Orleans. I watched the man on the commercial as he offered someone a disk of chicken, which he referred to by name. I knew that there was a humourous catch to all of these commercials, and i remembered the one where the man was sitting behind a counter in a dull-yellow blazer, looking like an anchorman. He talked about the chicken, but said “shit” in the middle of the sentence. It was a running joke with the commercials. I turned to the north and walked up the driveway that ran along the eastern side of the small white fast-food restaurant. The restaurant had a yellow overhanging roof, and i seemed to have just passed the drive-in window. I stopped at the end of the driveway, where several other people were standing. I thought about the commercial and how it seemed a special ad campaign. Someone to the east of me then attracted my attention. I was sitting on the western side of a long wooden table with the others. Many of them seemed to be part of $G3. A man just to the southeast of me mentioned the commercial about the chicken from New Orleans, saying that it had been taken off the air because it was too sexually suggestive. I said that i had remembered the commercial. A man from the northern side of the table asked me about the commercial, and i pictured the anchorman in a dark setting around a table with several other people. He had offered the people some chicken, mentioning it by name. I tried to tell the person to the north about the commercial, but i could not remember the name of the chicken. It was this name that made the commercial sexually suggestive. I remember someone mentioning it before. The man wanted to know if i really remembered the commercial, and i started to tell him the name of the chicken, but i could not remember exactly what it was. I said things like “chicken pung pa. . .”, “chicken po. . .”, and “chicken poon. . .”. I had made it obvious that i knew which commercial they were talking about, but i could not remember the exact details. I then thought about the entire ad campaign, remembering that there were many ads for this restaurant. I thought that they were ads for Hardees. The man in the ads would always sell a certain food product, but the running joke was that he would always say “shit” in every commercial. I remembered standing next to the Hardees restaurant in the narrow driveway. The driveway had seemed old and the pavement crumbling. I sat at the table with the others, thinking about these things.

12007 December 10

We moved to the south, toward the waiting train car. I seemed to be with my family. People were starting to get onto the small open cars. I was near the front of the car and noticed that there was a seat facing forward. I sat on the seat as the train started to move forward down the tracks. I looked ahead, to the east, realizing that i was sitting on the front of the engine. The tracks stretched down a long open area of tan rocks, through the leafless trees and hidden houses of the small town. There seemed to be a hill to the north of us. I noticed another blue train engine moving on a track just to the north of us. There were many trains running all around this area. The ground passing to the south of me seemed to be wet, and i thought that we were traveling down the length of a dock. I looked up again to see the long stretch of track ahead, and i noticed that we were approaching a crossroad. A small gray car came from the south on the road and stopped in front of the tracks. It then proceeded across. I felt tense for a moment, but realized that there was more than enough time for the car to cross before we reached the crossroad. I then noticed a large blue train pulling up to our track from the south at another crossroad. The train only paused for a moment before starting across the tracks. We would not be able to stop in time for the train, and i felt worried. I realized that i was on the front of the blue train and that i would be the first to collide with the other engine. As we passed the other engine, though, i decided that it was not really across our tracks after all. I then wondered why i had gotten such a good seat on the train. It seemed that our ride was over and that we were arriving back where we had started. I though that i should stay on the train in the same seat, but i wondered if anyone else would want it. I remembered that the front seats of this train, and of the train that had been sitting perpendicular to us were both empty. The business man in the gray suit walked toward our train from the north as we boarded. I remembered that the front seat of both trains had been empty, which meant that no one really wanted that seat. I wondered if it was because it was a dangerous place to be. I looked at the swampy water running along the southern side of the tracks.

I walked across the slope of the hill, to my car. The event seemed to be over, and i was heading back. There was someone else i wanted to talk to, and i looked up the slope of the hill, to the south, to see where he was. He waved at me from the passenger’s seat of a small car, which was traveling down the dirt road that descended diagonally across the hill from southeast to northwest. I felt suddenly disappointed to realize that he was with another man. I knew that they were going out together, and i felt a little jealous because i wanted to speak with the first man alone. As they waved, i realized that they were not paying attention to where they were going. The passenger’s side of the car rode off the side of the dirt path and the entire car tipped over and started rolling down the hill toward me. I felt suddenly panicked and started to run to the west. There was a small pine tree just to the southeast of me. I could tell that the car was going to miss it, but i thought that i could run behind it for some protection. I ran until i was on the west side of the tree, knowing that the car would have rolled past me already. I looked down the hill, but i could not see the car in the dark. I ran down the slope of dry field grass and onto the main road, looking for the car to the west. I could not see it, so i looked to the east. There seemed to be a creekbed to the north of the road, and i thought that the car would be over the shoulder of the road and in the creek bed. I could see the tail of the car sticking up from the side of the road to the east of me. I moved there, noticing that others were coming from the east. I looked around, but i could no longer see the car. I wondered if it had simply driven off on the road. I did not know what to do, and i asked one of the others where the car was. It seemed to be off the road in the creek to the east of me, but i could not tell. I started down the road to the east, thinking that the car might be in the creekbed to the east of me. There seemed to be a gravel pull-off on the northern side of the road to the east of me, and there were several other people standing in the road near it. They were looking to the north, and i wondered if they had found the car. I traveled down the road to the east, following it around the corners as i looked at the steep hill to the north. It was daytime now, and i could see the red and tan stones of the tall cliffs to the north of me. There were small sandy coves surrounded by the curving cliffs, and i felt that they were very familiar to me. I remembered being in one of these cliffs before. I had traveled here with someone in the past, and i had climbed part way up one of the cliffs. This was a special place, and it felt very friendly to me. I looked at the cliffs to the north, but they did not seem quite right. I was looking out the large window of the vehicle, which was traveling to the west, along the road. We passed the bulge of one of the cliffs and i saw into another wide cove. Again, the tall striped cliffs on the northern side of the cove were familiar. I remembered them, but they did not seem quite right. I wondered if we would come to the place that i recognized farther down the road. The bus rounded a corner, passing the large cement dam to the north. The hills beyond the dam were covered with green grass, but i still recognized the small buttes and spires that dotted the hill. The road turned sharply to the south, but we drove straight, into the driveway of a large industrial farm. The short driveway ended in front of a large red barn, which stood mostly to the south of the drive. As we left the bus and walked through the large white double sliding doors on the northern side of the barn, i recognized this place. $F1 was with me, as he had been when we visited this place so long ago. There seemed to be machinery inside, to the south of us. I told $F1 that i remembered this from when we had come here long ago. I described the fields to him, saying that it was just to the south of the main road that ran from $P3 to $P125. He did not seem interested in the conversation, and simply acknowledge what i had said with a hum. We turned and walked to the west as the rest of the people seemed to head to the east. The tour seemed to be following someone around the machines in the eastern part of the room, but i though that we would want to go into the center of the building, to the west. There was a tall metal machine to the south of us that seemed to have something to do with milk production. It was dull aluminum, with white plastic cylinders on the surface of it. We passed through the hanging plastic insulating flaps and into the supply room to wait for the people running this place to return. We were waiting for the operation in this veterinary place. I felt a little uneasy here, thinking about the medical procedure that we were waiting for. The doctors had left, so we would have to wait for them to return. $Z paced to the north of me as i rounded the western end of the large metal structure in the center of the building. I was pacing around on the western side of the room, looking at the hanging cloth dividers and medical implements in the room. Everyone seemed to have left for a break, but i hoped that they would be back soon. It was annoying that we would finally get through the queue only to have to wait for the doctors to return from break. I wondered if there were any people ahead of $F12. I felt that he would need medical attention rather soon, and i did not think that he should be waiting for the operation. Then the nurses returned and started putting sheets over one of the narrow operation beds. Several other nurses were in the room, setting up a couple more beds. I thought that they must have realized the backlog in patients and decided to start more than one operation room at a time. I paced around on the side of the room. I was not comfortable here, and i was worried that something was not right. I drove down the road to the west, thinking about the cliffs that were to the north of this place. I wanted to get back to the special place, but i did not remember where it was. I stopped the car and turned around. I must have passed it.

I jogged with the others down the shallow slope of the winding sidewalk on the southern side of the city street. This place seemed to be the northern end of $P104, and the tall modern buildings to the east of us seemed to be dormitories. I was jogging in a road race, but i seemed to be jogging at a leisurely rate. A section of the road to the east of us then seemed to be open fields, as though we were running past an airport. I said something to $Z, who was jogging with me. There was a paved parking area to the southeast, with a short chain-link fence just beyond. The grass around the parking area and across the field seemed to be dead and damp with the season. It was chilly here, but not uncomfortably so. I then noticed the construction workers ahead of us as we continued down the hill, with the tall hospital building to the east of us. There was some construction going on near the front door of the hospital, and the sidewalk ahead of us was covered with dirt and dry mud from the vehicles that had crisscrossed it, coming in and out of the facility. The construction worked had a yellow “slow” sign, and he asked us to slow to a walk as we passed by the front door of the hospital. I said something to $Z as we walked past the wide entrance to the pale stone building, which seemed to have a white metal roof over the door. I felt that it was silly for us to walk in a race, so we only walked until we were past the door, then we started jogging again. We did not want to wait for the construction to pass before we finished the race. We continued down the hill on the sidewalk. The sidewalk bulged to the west ahead of us as we approached the intersection at the bottom of $P104. The large dark layered structure in the bulge was a parking garage, which was attached to the hospital. I could feel the cool air from the structure as jogged past one of the entrances. I spotted $F47 standing at the corner at the bottom of the hill. He was directing the runners on the course, around the corner and to the east. I turned to the east, into the bottom level of the parking lot, telling the other that i had to us a lavatory before i continued on the run. I walked into the bathroom with the woman. It was a small rectangular room. I had finished reading the script, and spoke to the woman about acting the play and about how important it was to know the history of the character. I felt that if you knew the way of thinking of the character, it would be easier for one to act out any situation. This would help when the characters drifted from the lines in the script. The woman agreed that it would help ad lib some of the lines. I felt that this was an important bit of acting knowledge, and i wanted to remember it.

12007 December 12

I walked to the northern side of the old department store, where there was a large black bin on the floor. The store seemed old and crowded, and i approached the bin from the east. It seemed to be full of sale items. I was not that interested in looking through it, but i looked at the items in it as i passed. $Z walked along the northern side of the bin. As i reached the western side of the bin, i noticed that there was a small instrument case on the top of the bin. It looked like a small guitar. I felt interested in the black fabric case and lifted it out of the bin with my left hand. The zipper on the bottom of the case was open, and a white drumhead slipped out. The instrument was obviously a string instrument, but, since it had a drumhead, i thought that it must be a banjo. I wanted to buy the instrument, so i took the case to the west with me, where i could look at it more closely. $Z was standing near me now as i pulled the string instrument from the case. I held it like a guitar and tried to play it. It seemed awkward, as though it was not entirely ready to play, but it seemed like a very nice instrument. It looked like a fancy electric guitar with a wide tannish-orange body. I was crouching down on the ground to rest the instrument on my left leg as i played, and i noticed a clerk walking to the northwest of me. I asked him how much it was. I then noticed that there was a tag hanging near the neck of the instrument. I tried to read the tag without showing that i had noticed that it was there. The clerk did not reply to me, so i turned to face south, following him as he walked around me. The small white tag with the dark-yellow border spun around on its string, but i could still not see the price clearly. I asked the man again how much the instrument was. He answered be, but did not actually tell me the price. I felt annoyed with him, and harshly asked him what the price of the instrument was. The tag seemed to say eight hundred, but then it seemed to be over a thousand. It was too much for an instrument that was on sale. I looked down at the instrument, realizing now that it was a bass guitar. It had many strings across the face of the instrument, and i thought that it must be a special type of bass. In the center of the body, where the pickups were, there were several forks and spoons arranged parallel to the strings. This seemed very interesting, and i realized that they were there to give the south some special effects. It was a very complicated instrument, and i was very interested in it. I looked at the neck and noticed that the guitar was strung with nylon strings. Thin would make the sound special when it vibrated against the cutlery. I was very interested in the instrument, but i was not willing to pay so much money for it, so i put it back down. I turned to the north and started up the stairs, which ran along the western wall of the store and ascended to the north. They seemed very narrow, and the store around me seemed rather old.

12007 December 14

The people under the large pavilion moved around nervously, saying that there was a tornado coming. I looked to the west, at the northwestern corner of the pavilion. The cement floor of the pavilion was surrounded by short cement walls, and the dark roof seemed to be suspended by sturdy steal I-beams. I looked to the south, down one of the streets of the city. There was a long thin funnel cloud in the southern sky. I could see it between the tall dark business buildings of the city. I moved to the back of the pavilion. The others moved around frantically, trying to get everything together. I though that we would have to get down against the back stove walls of the pavilion to keep us out of the wind. The people around me were frantically gathering all of their stuff together, and i suddenly realized that i wanted to save the photographs. I realized that it was somewhat selfish of me, but i did not want them to be lost in the storm. I moved around the picnic table and looked at the structure of the western wall. The cement wall was covered with wooden paneling, which seemed to be a large piece of plywood that had been painted blue and strapped to the cement. I thought that i could hide the photographs behind the planks, but the boards on this wall were strapped tightly to the stone. I looked to the east, where i could see the same blue wood over the wall, but there were fewer people running around on the darker eastern side of the pavilion. I ran over there and pulled on the boards, noticing that they were looser. I took the large pictures, which seemed to be phonograph covers, and slipped them between the boards and the wall. I hoped that they did not get torn away during the storm. I then realized that it would not be a terrible thing if they did. I just wanted to protect them as best i could. I turned around and looked back to the south to see how close the funnel cloud was. I could no longer see it in the southern sky. There was a tall dark office building to the southwest of the pavilion, and i wondered if the tornado had passed behind it. I realized that, if it was moving off to the side, it was probably not heading toward us. I thought that we would actually be safe here.

I turned to the north. I was standing on the crowded street in the middle of the city. Many of the people were lounging around, and this seemed to be a party. Then there was someone coming down the narrow alley from the northeast. He opened the front door of the house, at the end of the long narrow room. The others started to hide the things so that the man would not see it. The man was some authority figure, and we could not let him find out what we had been doing. I watched the man come into the room from the second smaller room to the southeast. I was standing just to the south of the doorway between the two rooms. Several people stood in the doorway, blocking the view as i picked up the small white plastic basket and moved it to the opening in the wall, just to the south of the door. There seemed to be washing machines against the wall to the south of the door. The wall itself seemed incomplete, with missing surface panels over the top of the washing machine. There seemed to be a window or opening in the wall to the next room, and i had placed the basket on the bare wooden crossbeam of the bottom of the opening. There was evidence in the basket that we could not let the authority figure find. I was then standing just outside the door as the man started to argue with me. He was stern and commanding, but i did not take him seriously. He spoke harshly to me, trying to assert his authority, but i simply laughed at him and ignored what he was saying. I felt that there was nothing he could do to me. He became angry with this, but did nothing. He simply turned and left. I suddenly felt that i should not have been so callous with him because he would be vindictive. I knew that he would be back, and i felt that he might injure us. I started down the alley to the south, noticing that many of the people of the party had started to leave. There were still several crowding around in places, but they quickly disappeared. It was very late now, and the alley seemed to be deserted. I had a large metal key to open the shop that was in the northwestern brick wall of the alley. I inserted the key into the shop, and then turned suddenly to see an old man standing behind me. He had wandered up from the neighbourhood, but he had stopped to look at me. Once i turned, he tried to act disinterested and wandered off to the northeast. I felt suddenly nervous, realizing that the man was sent to watch me. He would report to the authorities that i was entering the shop. I tried to convince myself that there was nothing to worry about because i had every right to be in the shop; i did have the key, and i was here to get something. I felt nervous, though, because i knew that the vindictive authorities could still make it seem that i had entered the building illegally and was here to steal something. I felt that i had come here to get rid of the evidence, so i did have to be careful, but i knew that the authorities would not know what the evidence was once i had it. I crossed the bare wooden floor of the empty shop and stopped in front of the glass cabinet on the far wall. There were several glass counters in front of the northwestern and southeastern walls. I looked at the metal key handing in the glass cabinet on the wall. I had come here to take it, but decided that i should leave it in the case. I did not want to get caught with it if the authorities stopped me. As i left the shop and turned up the alley to the north, i realized that i should have take our white basket out of the building and left the other items there. This would have protected the evidence that the authorities were trying to capture.

We moved to the west, heading down the road of the suburban street. This seemed like $P1. I thought that i would have to meet $A437 somewhere in $P127, on the north side of the tracks. I remembered the place from before. I pictured the streets as i moved through the area. There was a building on the east side of one on the side streets that ran north from the main road, which ran parallel to the railroad tracks. The white building was some kind of company club. I remembered that there was a creek in the middle of the west side, and i thought that the club would be near it. I would be able to recognize which street was correct because there would be a stream near it. I tried to remember exactly where the building was that i had to meet the others in, but i could not pinpoint the exact location in the suburb. The streets looked familiar, and i had a memory of being there some time before, but i could not remember the exact location in my mind. I then turned around and found myself on the street in front of my grandmother’s house. $F45 and i stepped out of the car, which we had parked on the street in front of the house. I looked back into the car, noticing that $X11 was sitting in the passenger’s seat. I was concerned about her, and then i noticed that she left the car while we were not looking. I felt annoyed with her because she was being stubborn. I quickly reached down and grabbed her fur to stop her from running away. We then brought her into my grandmother’s house. I was in the upstairs bedroom of the house, thinking about what i should be doing. It seemed as though i had just woken up, and i thought that i would have to shower before i head out to the building in $P127. I then started thinking about the song that was running in my head. Something about it related to $A437. I thought about the words to the song, and realized that the main line stated “teaching the learners”. This referred to $A437, and i realized that the name and the words sounded similar, so there was probably a pun. I then heard my mother talking from downstairs. She was worried about the storm that was coming. I looked out the window to the west to see rain pouring in the side yard. It did not seem so bad at the moment, but i thought that the stronger storm would be here soon. I worried about what i should do in the approaching storm.

12007 December 16

The witch was trying to get the girl as the girl ran away. The girl was trying to escape from the witch, but the witch kept closing in around here. Soon, the witch trapped the girl, and i knew that the witch was mocking the girl. The girl stood in the middle of the dark area of the old castle, and the evil faces hung in the air around the girl, grinning at her in ghostly green apparitions. I felt suddenly nervous, thinking that the girl had been captured and feeling that she should have been able to escape because she was the hero of the story. I then noticed that the girl was relaxed and calm. She had gone in to the danger of the witch’s castle. This seemed wrong. The girl was trying to escape, and i did not understand why she had come back to the castle of the witch. I wondered if she was trying to hide in plain site, but realized that she would only be in more danger in the castle than somewhere else. I then realized that the girl was plotting. She had come here for a specific reason. The girl smiled in relaxed pleasure as she turned her face upward and faded from view. She had user her powers to move herself back in time. The witch was left standing in the empty room. She would not be able to get the girl in the previous time, and i thought that the girl could now defeat the witch by changing the past. This was a good ending to the story. I thought about the sudden twist and thought it would make a good ending to the story. I wondered if i could use a similar plot twist in one of my stories. I watched the scene play. The witch was after the girl. I knew that the girl would be trapped, and i expected the ghostly green faces to appear in the air around here as she stood in the dark room. Something changed, however, and the view switched to the next scene. The girl ran into the castle to hide. I followed her into the small gray tent that was in the middle of the large dark chamber. Something did not seem right here. The girl should have vanished already so that the witch could not get her, but she was still here. I started to feel nervous, thinking that the witch would destroy here. I watched over the girl’s shoulder as she put large green bills of money in the corners of the test. This was some kind of ritual. I looked at the northern side of the test as she placed the bills in the western corners. There was a large tear in the gray fabric of the tent. I wondered what to do. We were not safe here, and the girl had to go back in time. I started to feel that the plot had been corrupted. This was not working out like it had done before. The witch was coming, and she would get the girl if things did not change. I was fearful that this would be the case.

12007 December 20

I drove the car to the north, down the shallow slope of the long hill, on the wide paved road. I watched the traffic lights as i moved, making sure that they were all green. I had $K1 and $K2 in the back seat of the car. I was supposed to be driving them home, and i realized that i had been entrusted with them. It seemed strange that i would be allowed to drive them home alone. I came to the intersection as the light turned red. I tried to stop, but could not stop the motorcycle in time. It rolled a little into the intersection. I realized that there were no cars here, and that there were many people gathered on the grass to the west of me, so i let the motorcycle roll a little past the lights so that i could make a turn to the west just past the people. This seemed like a good idea, but then i realized that there was a large pond in the middle of the round park. I had come through a T-shaped intersection and driven onto the grass of the round median in the center of the large traffic circle. The people were near the southern end of the median, right near the intersection. I was annoyed that i could not got around the pond, so i turned the motorcycle to the east and rolled it back to the street. I had to push it across the intersection on the eastern side of the circle so that i could get a better look at the red light above me. This was not something that was normally done for a motorcycle, and i thought that i got into this habit by riding my bicycle. I turned the motorcycle around and faced the lights, waiting for them to turn red. No traffic had come up behind me, so i was not in anyone’s way. When the light turned green, i still had my feet on the ground around the bike, but i turned the right handlebar to accelerate. I looked down at the ground to see where the pedals were so that i could put my feet up. I seemed to be having difficulty with them. I drove to the northwest and walked into the upstairs bedroom of my parents’ house. I had to collect some of my things. I was aware that i had left $K1 and the children outside the house, on the motorcycle. I would only be a moment gathering my things. I walked around the small room, looking for something. I kept thinking about the people in the car to the east of the house. I was then in the living room, on the western side of the house. The room was large and white, and had no furnishings. I could see the kitchen to the east through a rectangular window in the wall. The window was below the kitchen cabinets. There was normally a doorway on the southern side of the wall, but the large square structure had been pushed from the western wall into the doorway, blocking it. I looked to the south, noticing that the large white cube was the fireplace from the western wall. It was interesting to see that the fireplace could me rolled from place to place in the room. I looked up, noticing that there was an indent in the ceiling around the molding of the fireplace block. I thought i could point out the mobility of the fireplace to my mother. I then remembered the people outside in the car. I moved to the west, heading away from the intersection at the bottom of the hill and into the room of the public building. I had come here with the others, and we were going to get changed to go swimming in the pool. I started to take off my clothes, but i realized that i did not have my lock with me. I felt in my pockets, noticing that i did not take my keys or wallet with me either. I would have to ride my bicycle back up the long hill to get them. As i left the building to head back, i remembered that i had left my blue bicycle at a rack to the southeast, near the junction of the rivers. The junction was near the bottom of the hill, where the traffic light was, but i knew that i had parked my bicycle on the northern side of the river, and the traffic circle was on the southern side. I moved to the east, down the northern side of the river. I had to find the path that led back to the bicycle racks so that i could get my bicycle. I was surprised that i had left it there without locking it. I passed some buildings and turned to the south at the gap between them. I could see the river to the south of me, and i wondered whether i was near the fork in the river or not. I moved to the south, noticing that there was a path running along the northern side of the river. I remembered that this path ran all the way to where the two rivers met, which was where i had parked my bicycle. I walked to the south, across the sidewalk and onto the square platform at the top of the stairs, at the beginning of the path. I turned to the east and started down the stairs, floating over the steps. There were several landings in the middle of the steps, and i floated over them easily. I thought about how i was floating, and remembered that it was something special that most people could not do. I then noticed two people coming toward me. They were holding each other as they climbed the stairs. The dark-skinned man was on the northern side, wearing a light brown jacket that seemed to be made of wool. He had short black hair an looked at the woman as they walked. The light-skinned woman was wearing a white jacket and had long blond hair. As i reached the landing above them, i lifted my left leg and floated over their heads, interested to see what their reaction would be. The man looked up at me with surprise. It was not normal for someone to be flying, and i knew that most people would not know how to do it. I thought about this as i passed over him and continued down the path. As i reached the bottom of the stairs, i did not put my feet down. Instead, i folded them under me and continued drifting down the brown-dirt path to the east. I remembered that flying only happened in dreaming, but i knew that such simple flying as i was doing right now could easily be done by anyone. It was just that few people knew about it, so few understood that it was so easy to float so near the ground. It was the high flying that was hard. I followed the path as it ran along the northern side of the river, curving with the river to the southeast. There were bushes between the path and the river, and the land seemed to be much higher to the north of the path. There also seemed to be a footbridge that crossed the path at one point. I knew that my bike could not be reached directly with this path, but i thought that i could hop the fence along the southern side of the path once i got to the river junction. The bikes would be locked near the highway ramp just to the south. I thought about this as i turned to the southwest and looked across the small dimly lighted room. There was a television in the southwest corner of the room, and $F45 was sitting cross-legged in front of it, hunched over to watch it. He had long hair, which was unusual for him. I made a joke with him by insulting his long hair. He turned and smiled widely at me. Then he turned his attention back to the television. I looked to the north to see $F45 lying on the small bed that was against the northern wall. He was still sitting in front of the television to the southwest of me. He turned to look at me from the southwest, grinning at the joke i had just made before he turned his attention back to the small television that was on the floor at the end of the bare mattress. He seemed to be in pajamas, and the mattress he was sitting on was on the floor in the small alcove in the southern wall of the room.

12007 December 21

The red SUV ahead of me pulled off to the side of the road, so i pulled up to the curb behind them. I had been following them through the city streets to the west. We were trying to find someplace, but i thought that they might not know exactly where they were going either. I followed $F54 down the slight hill of the sidewalk that ran on the northern side of the street. There were stone buildings next to us, some of which seemed to be old theaters. There was a group of people standing on the street at the end of the buildings, where there seemed to be a widening of the sidewalk. $F54 asked the people standing there for directions. At first, they seemed to be hooligans, but i realized that they were all standing around in loose sweatpants and running jackets. I thought that they might be the local $G4. $F54 asked for directions from them, and they replied to him. I thought that this area was $P56, and i wondered if there people were actually part of the $G4 from $P56. They were not speaking that well as they replied to us, though. It seemed that their sentences were broken and did not exactly reply to the questions we asked. There was a small group standing near the curb talking to $F54 and myself, but i looked around at the others, who were scattered around the small rounded area where the sidewalk bulged into the curve of the buildings. This place seemed to be a small park. There was grass in the center of the round area. The person responding to us was wearing a faded maroon sweatshirt. I looked to the northwest, across the round courtyard of dry grass to see two in gray sweats standing against the gray stone wall of the building. I then started to wander to the west, thinking that $F54 would get the directions from these people. I wanted to look around this area. $Z followed me. We came to the end of the main street of the town. It ended in front of a small traffic circle around a small grassy park. There was a bush at the end of the road, on the edge of the park. I wandered around the bush and then started back up the street to the east. The group of people on the northern side of the road called to us as we passed them, heading back to our cars. I was not sure whether we had gotten the correct directions from them. It also seemed that they might be teasing us as we passed. I stopped and asked them if they knew where the $G4 run was, thinking that they would recognize the term and realize that we were part of $G4. They replied to us, but did not seem to respond to the questions. I looked around at several of them as they spoke to us. I did not recognize any of them, and i felt that i should recognize at least some of them if they were $G4. I then noticed a man and a woman near the front of the group. The man was bent over a little, holding on to the parking meter on the side of the road as the woman faked humping him from behind. I walked back up the street to my car, thinking that i would simply have to follow the others, hoping that they knew where they were going. The red car pulled out of the driveway and backed to the west, onto the street. I was not in the gravel driveway of a small house, which seemed to be to the southeast of me. My car was still parked on the northern side of the driveway. I got in my car, which was the last car in the caravan. I had walked out to the road to get the paper, so i was a little slow following them. I got into my car and pulled out of the driveway and onto the main road. I would be following the red car, which was, in turn, following the large van. As i got to the road, however, they had already started over the crest of the hill to the north. I followed them as quickly as i could, but i could not see them once i came over the top of the hill. There was an intersection at the bottom of the short hill, but i did not know whether they had turned to the west, or stayed on this road and headed around the corner to the northwest. The area was wooded around me, so i could not see that far on either road. As i reached the intersection, i looked to the north. I could not see them and decided that they could not be that far ahead of me, so i decided that they must have turned west. I turned west and headed up the steep hill. The road at the top of the hill leveled out a little as it headed over the open countryside of rolling hills. It was dark now, but i could not see any car lights ahead of me. I felt nervous and wondered if i had gone the wrong way. I tried to shift as i reached the top of the hill, but my car was having trouble. I had to catch up to them so that i could follow them. At the top of a hill, i could see tail lights ahead of us, but i was not sure whether they were from the cars i was supposed to follow. I could see quite a way to the west, now, and i noticed that there were many cars ahead of us on the road, but they were all pulled off to the south side of the road. Something was happening there, and i started to feel uncomfortable. I kept driving, thinking that i was traveling back toward $P14. I then noticed the beams of light fanning out in the darkening blue sky of the western horizon. They looked like search lights, but there was something strange and foreboding about them. It seemed to be very dark by now, but the sky over town seemed to be light, as though it was daylight there. This seemed very wrong, and i tried to figure out what was happening. For a moment, i thought that the light might have come from an atomic bomb, but then i realized that there was no mushroom cloud in the sky. I looked ahead down the road, not seeing the cars that we were supposed to be following. The lights on the horizon worried me, though, and i watched the strange things as i approached. I felt very uneasy about heading back into town.

12007 December 22

I looked down the length of the bedroom and out the large doors at the western end. This house seemed like my parents’, but i knew that it was a new house. The brown wooden doors seemed to cover the entire wall, and they opened out like barn doors onto a wide covered balcony. The view beyond was filled with dark green from the summer forest beyond. The air seemed thick and heavy, but i noticed that there were no mosquitoes as i walked out onto the porch. I thought that they must have disappeared since it was so late in the year. I looked out over the lawn, and the air seemed dense and foreboding. As i turned to walk back into the house, i thought that there might be a storm coming. I also imagined that the mosquitoes would notice that i was out on the porch and come after me. There was no screen over the big door. It would be good to leave the large door open when we sleeped in the summer, but the mosquitoes might get in with no screen. I wandered around the inner rooms of the house. This place seemed new, and i felt worried about something. I listened for thunder, thinking that something was going to happen. I rounded the outer walls of the wide stairwell, looking at the pipes and wires running down the inside wall of the room. This was a mechanical room. I opened a door on the bottom level of the room and walked out to the south. I looked to the west again, afraid that the storm coming was going to be dangerous.

I spread out the sheet, trying to get comfortable on the ground. $F45 was to the north of me, moving around on the sheets and mattress. I rolled over on the ground. I felt very comfortable for a while, but started to feel uncomfortable as i moved. I could not seem to get comfortable on the yellow sheets anymore. I stood up and tried to arrange the bed more. The bed was just outside the front door of the house, on the grass or stone path to the west of the house. There was a bush to the north of us that ran along the southern wall of the old brick house. The main door to the house was on the southern wing of the house, directly to the west of us. Someone else was then there, and i explained that we wanted to get comfortable on the mattress. I looked to the west, at the large fancy house. We were at $P52, and there was a large house to the west of us that seemed to have belonged to the president of the university long ago. I turned to the east and walked into the house, looking around at the large open spaces. This was the old faculty house. The room around me seemed very nice, but i knew that no one would be able to live in it. It was used for special events now, but i imagined that it had remained a private house. I wondered what the university would do if a private house remained in the middle of a university.

I stood in the center of the group. The american natives were singing a rain chant, because it had been dry here. They were mad at us, and expected us to bring the rain for them. I stood still with my arms in the air, trying to feel the energy flowing around me. I knew that, to bring rain, we would have to cool off the air until the water started to precipitate. The chief of the natives stood to the southwest of me in a feathered headdress. He was watching me to make sure that i brought rain. I wondered if i should tell them about the energy transfer necessary to get the rain to fall. I felt that it might be easy to absorb the heat from the air around me, but it would be harder to absorb the heat from the upper atmosphere, where the rain water might be. The energy of heat would have to be pulled down through the sky and taken into our bodies. I thought that ever taking in the energy around us would cause water to precipitate on our bodies. I imagined that my body would be covered with water, and the water would start to flow over the ground. This would not be enough water, thought. It would only provide water for a small area of ground. We would have to find a way of reaching out into the sky to absorb all of the heat from the air where the moisture was. I then considered whether the air was actually humid. It seemed that it might be very arid here, and i looked into the blue sky, wondering if there were any clouds. We could condense water from the air, but only if there was water there to condense.

12007 December 23

The two men spoke as they continued walking to the west. Toby McGuire, who was playing Peter Parker in this film, described something as an interesting metaphor. The other man thought that it was a good description. He had described the edges of the car as though there was a thin crust on it. This was a metaphor for life. I thought that the metaphor was a little too obscure for people to understand. It did not seem to describe the situation well enough, but i thought about and seemed to like it. I wondered if i could use it in one of my stories. I then realized that it was from this movie, so i should not use it, but then i realized that this was not as much a movie as a scene that i was watching.

12007 December 26

I turned to the east, back toward the center of the room. I was at the person’s house for the small dinner party. Everyone seemed to be dressed up in sweaters, so it seemed that this was a winter-holiday party. Several people had just entered the room and a man was hanging up some coats in the small closet in the northern wall. The entrance door was in the northern end of the eastern wall. I looked at several of the people entering, and was surprised to see that $A343 was one of the people who had just entered. She smiled as she spoke to someone next to her. She had long blond hair and was wearing a red sweater with an embroidered design on the front. I felt suddenly uncomfortable knowing that she was here, because she had just gotten a divorce from another friend of mine, who was already at the party. I did not expect her to show up knowing that she was here. I looked around the room for a moment before i noticed $F47 standing to the southeast of me, in front of the dark couch that was against the southern wall. He was facing west and had his mouth agape in surprise. He did not expect $A343 to be there either. I felt bad about the situation and walked to the east, out of the room where the guests were gathering. I wanted to comfort $F47, but i did not know what exactly to do about the situation. I came to the eastern end of the small room, which seemed to be to the east of the room i had been in. There was a young man there, to the southeast of me. He seemed separated from the party, but i spoke to him for a moment. He joked around with me and tried to pull me to the ground. He was oriental, and he was wearing a light-tan long-sleeve shirt and off-white pants. The slipped behind me and grabbed around my waist, forcing me to the ground. I realized that he was trying to wrestle me, and i was interested in challenging him in the sport, but i crouched on the ground as he tried to figure out how to capture me. I let him try a few different moves for a moment, wondering whether he was interested in wrestling or grappling. He then reached his right arm over my right shoulder and around my neck. I was wondering if he was going for a rear choke or just trying to grab my upper body. I hoped that he was trying to go for a choke, because it meant that he was trying to grapple, but he did not seem to do anything. I turned to the north and headed back across the bedroom of the small house. I now seemed to be in one of the front rooms of the lower floor of the house. The white walls were bare, and there did not seem to be any furnishings in the room. There were large dark window looking out to the street to the north of the house. I then noticed my mother walking down the street to the west through the window in the old green wooden door. I called “mom” to try to get her attention. When she did not answer, i started calling in a more desperate tone. I felt suddenly different, and rushed to the door as if something was wrong. I knew that there were people to the west of me. They had heard me trying to get my mother’s attention, and they realized that i sounded worried when i did so. This was somehow part of a scene. I rushed to the door and tried to open it, but it was stuck. The large brass doorknob on the right side of the door turned, but the door did not pull open. I felt panicked, and the people moved to help me. I thought about this scene for a moment, watching the man with the short blond hair pull on the doorknob and call mother. He seemed retarded, and i felt upset with him. Some people were then to the northeast of me, talking about what was happening at the party. They were talking about something wrong and mentioned the people arguing. I felt upset and told them that the people who had just gotten a divorce were friends of mine. I felt choked up as i told them and started to sound scolding, as though i was trying to make them feel bad for talking about the arguments in the party. I stomped off to the northwest, entering back into the large living room at the front of the house where the party was. There were people to the south of me chatting. I knew that something had happened at the party, but i did not see any conflicts at the moment. Several of the people to the south of me seemed to be from $G4. Something felt wrong about the party, and i thought that i should gather my things and head out. I turned to the south and started up the stairs, which were against the western wall of the large living room. At the bottom of the stairs, the room opened up to the west, forming an L-shaped room, with the main section to the east of the stairs. There was a wooden railing running down the side of the stairs, and there was a man slowly descending. He was wearing dark pants and a light-coloured T-shirt. I knew that he was from $G4, and several people had mentioned him. He was somewhat drunk, and he was known to be a nuisance. The man’s name was Dirk, and he was from another chapter of $G4. He started teasing me as i headed up the stairs, so i ignored him. He had a glass of beer in his hand, and started obnoxiously talking as he tried to block my way. The then put his cup down and bent over on the stairs. He stood on his hands, trying to balance on the stairs. I was annoyed with him and tried to push past, but his feet swayed in front of me as he tried to keep his balance. I knew that my mother was watching me from the party below, and i had to get my things from upstairs so that we could go. I pushed the man’s feet to the east, over the top of the railing. I then walked into the small bedroom at the top of the stairs. The room seemed rather crowded, with bunk beds in the nook in the eastern wall, a dresses just outside and to the north of the nook, a bed against the southern wall under a window, and a desk against the western wall. I turned to the east to get my bags when i noticed the young man sitting at his computer in the nook in the eastern wall. There was also someone at a computer to the west, and a third somewhere in the room. They were the computer geeks of the house. I said hello to them as i tried to gather my things.

12007 December 27

I turned the corner and started driving my car down the road to the northeast. We were out in the country, and there were trees on both sides of the road. I knew that there were a few houses scattered along the side of the road, in the trees. This road was very familiar, and reminded me of the intersection near the Stewart’s in $P181. The traffic ahead of me seemed to be slowing down because of an obstruction in the road. I felt annoyed and tried to figure out what was going on. The truck ahead of me swerved to the right to go around something ahead in the road, but some of the other cars were turning around. I could see the yellow barriers that had been crudely placed across the center of the road, blocking traffic. It seemed that some of the cars were going around it. I realized that there were no police here, and i wondered if this was construction. I drove closer to see what was blocking the road. There was a sign in the center of the road on a roughly cut piece of plywood. It was white with roughly spray-painted words on it. I could not make out what they said from where i was, but i had to stop the car because there was a man in denims and an old blue jacket walking up to me. He did not seem to be part of the construction crew. He asked me if i could see the sign, and i told him that i could but could not read it from here. I asked him what it said. He told me that the sign warned that there was a nuclear bomb in the road. I could see crude wooden barriers on either side of the road, in front of the houses. There was a bright yellow object in the center of the road beyond the sign, which i assumed was the bomb. A car coming the other direction drove around it to continue down the road. I felt uncomfortable here, realizing that the vibrations of the cars could set off the bomb. I asked the man if there was any quick detour around the bomb, and he told me that there was not. I wondered if i would have to go all the way back to $P14 and find another route. I started back down the road to the southwest, thinking that i did not actually have to travel to $P6 today. I was just driving this way for practice. I would really be traveling tomorrow. I would have to look for a better way to get to $P6 when i got back home. I looked down the road toward the bomb again, noticing that several other cars were driving around it and only a few were turning around. I thought that i should probably get out of this area before the bomb was set off. I knew that it would be a very large explosion, so i would have to be quite far away before i would be safe. I was sitting in my car on the side of the road when i looked to the northwest to see that the large blue and white tractor-trailer that had been in front of me. It was turning around in the side street to the northwest. I then realized that it did not really turn around. It continued driving down the road, and i wondered if the road would reconnect with the main road somewhere ahead of the bomb. I would have to investigate that when i looked for directions. I then realized that i was still near enough to the house on the eastern side of the road. I looked down at my laptop and decided that i should search for directions while i was still within range of internet connection. I searched for directions from $P14 to $P6. At first, the map seemed to be too wide range, and i realized that i had selected a city called Beck, which was on the northern most tip of Maine, as my destination. I moved the point to $P6 and looked at the line. The roads did not seem familiar, but i realized that, at least, they did not pass through the area where the bomb was. I wondered if it was really a shorter route that i should try. I thought that i could grab hold of the route and move it on the map slightly to get it around the bomb it i needed to. I seemed to be back down the road now, farther from the bomb as i looked at the map. I thought that i had gone back to the intersection and turned to the southeast. I had originally come from the southwest. I then looked to the northeast again, down the road at the bomb. There was something of interest here. I noticed the woman walking in the front yard of the house to the east of the bomb. She and her husband were stacking wood into a crude wall around the front of the house. I thought that this would help protect the house against the blast when the bomb went off. She dumped an armful of thin sticks onto the wall, forming a small cluster of tightly backed branches among the stack of larger logs. I was standing near her husband as he talked about the bomb. He seemed to be the man who had come to my car earlier. He looked a little ragged, as though he was not well kempt. He seemed to have messy chin-length blond hair and a bushy mustache. I watched him speak to the other man as he held the long rifle. He pointed it to the east for a moment as they both stood along the southern wall of the house, surrounded by autumn trees. The man shot at something to the east, and then hung the gun casually over his left shoulder. He spoke to the other person, tipping the gun so that the barrel went behind his back and the stock over his head. He seemed suddenly concerned about something and brought the rifle back over his shoulder and held it in both hands. He cussed and said that the rifle would not be out of alignment. I realized that he must have hit the barrel on the ground. The gun was very long, with a white plastic stock. It seemed complicated, with a thick sight glass mounted on top. I realized that it was a special weapon that could correct for distance and other factors to keep the bullet on target. The man had taken it from the special military, and he was going to use it against the people who had planted the atomic bomb. I wondered if the gun was broken. The man showed me the rifle. I could see through the scope as he targeted some things in the distance to the east. He was showing me how well the gun worked. The view panned over several small animals, and i realized that one was a small wolf pup. I felt suddenly worried that he was going to shoot the dog, but he did not. He fired the gun at something, and it seemed to drop over. I looked to the east, down the length of the hilltop through the forest. We were standing just to the south of the house, and there was a long hill running down to the south of us. At the bottom was a small field where a small herd of domestic goats roamed. The man had been shooting animals for food, and i thought that he would shoot a few more to have the reserves of meat before bomb went off. He fired at a few small animals to the east, and i noticed that there was a delay between when the man fired the shot and when a small red stain would appear on the animals and the animals would freeze in shock before falling over. I looked in the scope as i scanned over the young deer that were in the pen at the bottom of the hill now. We should shoot one more, so i looked for one that did not seem too young. I found one near the center of the far wall of the pen that seemed stockier. I aimed the gun at its heart and fired. There was a second where nothing happened. Then the animal stiffened for a moment before falling to the side. A small red spot appeared on its gray and white chest right before it started to fall. The other animals did not seem to notice. I turned to the west and walked around to the front of the house. The man had gone inside through the front door. I stopped in the carport, which was just off the front of the house, in front of the door. It was dim under the wide roof that hung out over the front of the house. There seemed to be a wall to the west, supporting the end of the roof. I stopped in the carport, wondering what i should do. Something suddenly seemed wrong. There was a long trailer in front of the door to the house. It was bright yellow, like a construction vehicle, and it was quite battered and worn. I looked for a place to put the gun down, since the man had gone inside. I walked toward the trailer when i noticed the beeping on the trailer. It seemed like the bomb. The man stood in the doorway, behind the screen door. He was smiling at me as he told me that the beeping noise was the bomb getting ready to go off. I realized that the Geiger counter on the trailer was showing residual traces of the bomb. I set the rifle on the end of the trailer, noticing that it was now a little floppy. The man was part of the plot. I felt suddenly scared, realizing that the man was the one who had planted the bomb. I had to get out of here, so i turned to the southwest and walked around one of the columns that held up the roof of the carport. I realized that the man had been the one who planted the bomb all along. He had only pretended to be a victim. This meant that he was going to detonate it intentionally. I noticed the wall of stacked wood outside the carport and hoped that i was not that close to the bomb. I stepped through the wall of logs and onto the road. I looked down the road to the northeast to see how far i was from the bomb. To my dismay, the yellow container was only about ten metres from where i was. I was too close, and i started running down the road to the southwest. I had to get back to my car and get out of the area as fast as i could. I realized that the authorities must have known that the man had set the bomb, otherwise they would have blocked off the area. They had purposely treated this as if it were not a threat, allowing the man to set off the bomb and kill more people. The authorities would then blame the explosion on terrorists and win more public support. I had to get out of here and ran across the street. I was heading to the southwest, trying to cut across the grassy area to my car, which was on the other road. As i ran toward the tall pine tree in the front of the other house, i realized that there was no way that i could get far enough away before the bomb went off. I felt that i would be dead soon, and realized what it was like to know when you would die. I kept running across the lawn, which was covered with rust-coloured pine needles. I wondered whether i would notice being killed by the sudden heat of the blast.

I walked into the lower floor of the building. We had to stay here because of the bomb that was going to go off on the street near us. I walked into the lounge, thinking that i would have to do my job from here. I looked around for a moment, trying to find a computer to work on. There was a wall just to the north of me where a food counter was set up. There were several machines on the counter serving coffee and other break-room things. I stepped past the counter and into the main part of the room, which opened up to the north and south. To the west of me were two long tables, running from the western wall at fourty-five degree angles. They both seemed like meeting tables and both seemed cluttered with papers. The one on the north had people sitting around it. As i got closer, i noticed that the one on the north had a computer monitor on it, but the other did not. I would need to use a computer here in order to do my work, but there did not seem to be any that i could easily get to. I looked around the room, but did not notice any other computer monitors. The one at the table seemed to be the only one, but the table was in use for a meeting, so i would be unable to use the computer there. I felt frustrated and wondered what i should do. I looked around the room, agitated. There were more people sitting at tables near the northern side of the room. I was aware of the bomb that had been planted outside, but i wanted to get to work down here where it was safer from the explosion. I turned around, looking at everything in the room. There did seem to be more computer monitors to the north, but people were sitting by them. Then i noticed some near the entrance door on the eastern wall. I started toward them, but remembered that the bomb outside was an atomic bomb. I worried that we would not be safe here because the bomb would simply evaporate the entire building.

12007 December 28

I walked through the house, chatting with the others from $G3 as i passed through the rooms. It seemed to be late at night or early in the morning. I stepped into the front room of the house from the doorway in the northern end of the western wall, realizing that the room was filled with decorations of white lace. Puffy white curtains hung from front window, which seemed to be on a door, and the tables and chairs were covered with the white material. I knew that this had been done as part of a ceremony, but i was surprised that $G3 did not clean it up. No one outside the ceremony was supposed to see the decorations. I then heard a knock on the front door of the house, which was in the center of the northern wall. I knew that we would not be able to let anyone into the room until it was cleaned. I only opened the door a little way to say hello to the people outside. I said that i could not let them in, but they did not seem to understand why and seemed annoyed. I turned to the others in the room, who were starting to clean up the white material from the room. They did not understand why i did not let the others in, and one of them seemed to have opened the door. The young men in suits came in. They were surprised at me for not letting them in and stood in a group just inside the door. $A120 stood in the center of the room and asked me if the people had pins. I remembered that people who were joining $G3, but were not yet a full part of the group, were given pins that they would have to wear on their shirts. I looked at the chests of the men, noticing that the tall skinny man with the short dark hair had a shiny brass pin on the left lapel of his dark-blue jacket, which he wore over a white shirt. These men were joining $G3. The people in the room did not seem to mind that the future members saw the decorations of the ceremony. I told them that i did not know that it was okay for them to see the trimmings. I said that, when i was still active in $G3, we did not let anyone but a full member see the ceremonial decorations. I felt uncomfortable and slightly out of place here and started to pace around the room as the others continued cleaning. I then noticed the table on the western side of the room. This place now seemed darker and more cluttered, with kitchen utensils here and there. The large wooden table seemed to be a chef’s table. In the center of it, a small oddly shaped animal flopped. It looked like a baby ocean dinosaur, and i remembered that people would call it a “sea horse”. It had smooth wet bluish-gray skin and four stubby flippers sticking out around the football-shaped body. It’s neck extended from one end of the animal. The neck was short now, but i knew that it would grow in length. I thought that this animal was from the new movie that had just come to the cinemas. Several of us were gathered around the table, looking at the animal. As i stood on the eastern side of the table, i mentioned the type of animal i thought it was, saying something like “plesiosaurus”. I was not sure that i got the name right, however. The woman near me asked me to repeat the name, so i said it again, but told her that i did not know if it was the right name. I just recognized it as a creature thought to be extinct. The baby creature seemed rather helpless, rocking a little on the wooden surface. The man, who had been standing on the western side of the table, then suddenly poked the creature, stabbing it in the head with two of his fingers. The creature jerked as the fingers punctured the skull, denting in the eye sockets. I was shocked and repulsed by what the man had done, but i felt that there was now nothing that i could do. I felt upset with the man as he walked away, laughing at what he had done. I felt bad for the animal, but realized that the animal would now be angry. I knew that it would soon be a large creature, and i started to walk away. I headed north along the side of the table, thinking that i should leave before the creature becomes vengeful and kills people.

12007 December 29

I was heading back to the west on the street that curved through the suburban area. I looked down at the map of the city that i had been holding. It was folded into a small square, but i could still see the hooked curve marked in tan on the map, which had short tan lines radiating out from the outside of the hook. As i opened the map, however, i realized that there were sections missing. I had most of the top part of the map, but there was a large curved arch across the upper part that was not there. There were also several pieces in the lower section of the map that were missing. I tried to figure out the city form what i had, but realized that i was missing too much of the map. I remembered getting the map long ago, when i was a child, and i had thought that i had most of it already. I must not have collected as much as i thought i had. The map had something to do with a Saturday-morning cartoon that i used to watch. It had some kind of secret that was revealed once the map was put together. I felt intrigued by the map. It was something both special and comforting to have, and i wanted to know what the city was on the rest of the map. I knew that it was an island city, and it seemed to be the City. I noticed the woman who was sitting in here car on a side street just to the north of me. She had a map as well, and i wondered if she had more of it than i did. I asked her about her map, thinking that she must have watched the same forgotten cartoons that i had watched as a child. Her map had the same curved piece missing as mine did, with the same fingers missing from the top of the curve. I then noticed that her map was slightly different from mine. I looked at the details in the upper left corner of the map to see that they both described the same streets and land forms, but they were printed at slightly different scales, and used slightly different details to mark things. My map seemed older than hers, and i wondered if she had gotten hers from a more recent printing than mine. I knew that i had mine since i was a child. I started to look over my map more carefully, unfolding it to see if i could get any further details on what the complete map held. I suddenly realized that the back of the map showed a larger area. The front had been a close up of the City, but the back seemed to show continents. At first, i thought it had something to do with the island where the City was, but then i noticed that it was a much larger map. The map showed North America, but it appeared to be stretched a little from north to south, making the continent look narrower. I then noticed the large number of islands in northern Canada. The western part of the country was broken into many oddly shaped islands. I then noticed the yellow lines in northwestern Canada, which depicted the streets of the City. They formed a rough cross shape, with a wide double line running northwest to southeast. The shorter double or triple line ran across it at almost the midpoint. There seemed to be many yellow dots all around the lines, which marked some features of the city. I noticed that most of the city was now under the water of the western ocean. The yellow lines that marked the city streets seemed large, and ran out for quite a way into the ocean. Only a small part of the city seemed to be on land, crossing over a small white island off the coast of northern Canada. I felt excited to have discovered this information, and i looked around the city. It seemed very large and extensive, running quite far into the water. This was a special place, and i wanted to know more about it. I thought that i could go there, and remembered the City as i had dreamed it so many times before. The island was labeled in roman letters, but it seemed to be in another language. I translated the label on the northeastern side of the island, where there was a wide bay, as saying “Mouth of Hell”. The actually text on the map said “Matter de” followed by a long word that started with a G. The word almost seemed italian, but i knew that it really should be from some germanic tongue where the word was the name of the underworld in the local religion. I looked at it for a moment, thinking that “matter” must translate as “mouth”, but then i thought that it should really mean “mother”. This confused me a little, so i tried to figure it out.

We were coming back from the hospital-like building, and i was driving my mother down the road, heading to the west. We headed over the rolling hills and through the forested area. The road was narrow, and some of the trees seemed to hang over it. The road turned to the right a little as it came out into a clearing, heading to the west across a damp field of tan field grass. The trees seemed to run along the northern side of the field, and a hill seemed to rise to the south. As we drove, i realized that we were no longer driving on a road. The road had degraded to an open area on the grassy field. It seemed that there was a car ahead of us traveling across the packed grass of the field. I drove out across the field, but felt uncomfortable about doing so. I could see that the ground was muddy, and i thought that the car might get stuck in the dirt of the field. I looked down at the tracks left by previous cars in the soft ground. I was worried that we would get stuck because we seemed to be slowing down. I tried to speed the car up so that it did not come to a stop. I was worried that we would not be able to get it going again if it stopped. As i tried to accelerate, i could hear the tires squeak as they started to skid on the ground. I had already shifted down into first gear, so there was no way to gain any more power. I did not want to cross the field, so i turned the car around and started to head back to the eastern side of the field. I looked down at the small red car in front of us as it traveled over the rocky ground. It strained to pull us. I could see the thin white reigns looped over the top of the car as it struggled in some of the deeper mud puddles to pull us back to the shore. I did not think that it was going to make it. I looked up at the eastern end of the muddy pond as we headed back toward the wooden gazebo and dock. The gazebo was square, with walls on the northern and southern side. It was open on the eastern and western sides, looking more like a covered gate or archway. There were decorative crossbeams on the top and sides, and all of the wood was unpainted and turning gray. The small dog that had been pulling us led us just to the south of the dock area, but the water level in the pond seemed to be very low, so the dog could not pull us up the rocky shore. I tugged on the reigns, turning the dog to the north, heading along the shore to the center of the dock. I thought that it would allow for boats to disembark. We were still too low to easily climb out, but the small dog kept jumping at the walls, trying to reach the wooden deck at the floor of the gazebo. I pulled the rope from around the dogs collar and tried to loop it over the decoratively carved beam end that was just below the center of the peak of the roof. It seemed to be a bulbous flowered head of some kind. I managed to loop the rope around it, but, when i pulled down to try to lift my mother and me out of the mud and up to the dock, the head popped off and fell into the water around us. I was annoyed and tried to think of another way to pull ourselves up onto the dock. I was aware of a old tan station wagon on the road to the east of us. It had come from the south, and stopped to see what we were doing. I felt that the man leaning out the driver’s window might be angry with us for getting in the pond. I started to climb up the rocks just to the south of the dock. The car beeped its horn. I felt that they were angry and trying to get our attention, but i ignored them. We had to get out of the water and back onto land. I wondered if they would get out of the car and harass us. I turned to the north and started walking along the shore of the pond. I looked back over the pond as i started. It seemed rather small, and the water was smooth and still. My mother was with me as i started to round the northeast corner of the pond and head back to the west. We seemed to have been out for a walk, and i told her that i wanted to jog the rest of the way home. There was a road leading west just ahead of us, and it seemed like the way we were supposed to go. I knew that my mother would not want to continue to exercise, however, so she would probably walk back to the car and drive home. I then realized that it seemed to be a very long way home, and i started to feel that i did not want to do it. I was then surprised to realize that my mother was actually jogging at all. It seemed strange that she would be exercising. She was wearing a light-black sweatshirt with matching sweatpants. I looked out over the pond, which now seemed to be to the south of me. The water was very smooth, as if it were ice. Weeds grew up around the sides of the pond, making it look as though it had not been well maintained. I stepped out over the pond and started to fly. I passed low over the water before turning to the west and heading down the road. There was a long snow-covered field to the south of the road, and i started moving over it. The land to the south of the road sloped up gradually to the base of a tall ridge of old worn forested hills. The lower part of the slope was an open field, covered with a thick layer of snow. There seemed to be ski slopes to the south of me, but i moved diagonally across the field, to the southwest. There were important things there, and i felt that i must go to see them. I tried to fly toward the center of the field, which was partly on the lower slope of the hill. I had to be careful to avoid the power lines, which seemed to stretch from east to west in front of me. I watched them as i approached. I wondered how i would fly under them in this helicopter. I carefully passed them, making sure that i did not get entangled. I then flew to the center of the field, where a team of young men and women were standing on the slope in their winter parkas. They were gathering to work on the project, and they seemed to be from a college research group. They had flown in by using the propellers in their hands. I stopped to the west of them and looked at the large black propellers i had. There was one spinning in each of my hands. I held them so that they were spinning over my head. I tipped them to the east a little, thinking that i could control my flight by holding the blades over my head and tipping them in the direction that i wanted to move. I moved a little, but it seemed difficult to maneuver them, and i could not get off the ground. I realized that the wind was making it difficult to control the rotors. I kept trying, but noticed the large letters on the ground that had been written in the snow of the slope. There was something secretive about the meeting of this research group. Not just anybody was supposed to be here, and i wondered if i would be questioned. I started to lift from the ground, but i had trouble controlling the props, and i did not fly that far. I landed near the eastern end of the field, and i walked to the east, across the large lobby of the ski lodge. This place seemed to be a hotel as well. The walls were bare wood, and the place had a rustic yet elegant feel to it. The expedition was gathering here to get ready to head up the mountain to the southwest. I felt anticipation thinking about the people that would be exploring, but i felt that i had to leave this room before the officials came. I walked to the east, into the hallway that ran from the large lobby. The corridor was darker, and there was a metal elevator door just inside the hall, on the southern wall. I went into the elevator, following the thing that had been brought back form the expedition. The thing was on a rolling table and it was covered with a black sheet of a flexible plastic material. The men that were moving it did not seem to notice me, so i hoped that i could get a close look at it. As i came close, however, i realized that there were several large objects between the table and me. I would not be able to fit into the elevator with the object. The scientists who had been pulling the table looked back at me, waiting for me to leave the elevator so that they could close the door. I stepped back into the hall, disappointed that i could not make it into the elevator. I had to think of some other way to get to the thing, so i started to plot. A man walked up to me from the east. He was oddly shaped, with a bulging waist and hips but a narrow body. He was dressed in a dark suit and top hat, which made him look like a stereotyped circus announcer. His long black hair seemed greasy, and he had a long mustache that hung on both sides of his mouth. He was playing the character of the bad-guy magician. He leaned into me and tried to convince me that i should get him the small object. He told me that it would help me figure out what the scientists were up to. I felt uncomfortable about the man as i stepped back from the elevator, letting the metal doors slide shut. I knew that i should not trust him, but he seemed to be trying to discover what the secret was as well. I then saw the scene a little in the future. The magician grabbed something from me. He had tricked me and allowed me to be captured by the others. I was angry with him, but i knew that it had been part of the plot. His character could not have done otherwise. I was then looking down the hall to the east as the magician stepped away from the other man. Walls of a metal cage fell from the ceiling, trapping the man in the center of the hall as the magician waddled like a stereotyped villain to the north, holding his hands in front of his chest. Everyone had been tricked by him, which was the purpose of the magician character in this story.

I passed through the narrow doorway and stepped down into the bright long narrow room of the library, heading east. The circulation desk was a curved counter across the southern wall of the room. The walls and counter were both made of pale wood, and the counter seemed to be covered with red formica. There was also a red line just below the level of the counter, across the face of the counter, where the top of the trim had been painted. There seemed to be stairs in the room: a few stepping down in front of the desk, and one or two stepping back up as one headed toward the eastern end of the room. A few people were gathered in a corner at the northeastern side of the room, where they were watching the large movie screen, which was on the eastern wall. I watched the screen for a moment as the black-and-white movie started. It was an old movie, and i remembered the scenes. I watched the man wander through the old house. He was Cary Grant, and the scene focused on his face for a moment. He was playing a lawyer in the movie, and he was working on a case that was more complicated than he realized. His daughter brought him a small bouquet of tiny white flowers that she seemed to have picked. He thanked her. I knew that this was a spooky movie, and the beginning part was just setting the scene for the scary part. The people on the screen moved around in the black-and-white flower garden. I thought that it had something to do with the lawyer’s now house. The garden was rectangular, with long dirt beds running between the wide stone paths. The lawyer pointed out his favourite flowers to the man working the garden. He then looked around curiously. He was looking for the type of flower that his daughter had picked, but he did not see it in the garden. He asks the two people with him in the garden where his daughter goes to get the flowers. Both the man and the woman shrugged, but the woman, who seemed to be a nanny, said that the daughter could not have wandered far. It took her so little time to get the flowers and return. I knew that this mystery would be part of the surprise shock at the end. I had to get going, so i walked down the short corridor and out the door to the east, coming into the square flower garden. The path seemed to run along the northern side of the garden before turning to the west and heading down the gentle slope of the hill. The dirt beds that ran east to west in the garden seemed dry this time of year, as though it was late autumn. I headed to the southwest, across the grassy slope of the campus hill. I was floating along as i moved across the quad and came to the large flat open area. The grass of the quadrangle was well trampled, and there were tables set up around the east, west, and north sides of the area. The students were setting up events for the last day of class. I flew over the field, line of tables, watching a young woman setting something up. As i was passing over the center of the field, i realized that i still had the wrapper from the gum in my left hand. I had put the gum in my mouth in the library. I flew toward the western end of the field, where i noticed a large dark-gray garbage can just beyond a table. I flew lower to the table and focused my attention on throwing the paper into the garbage can, which was lined with a black plastic bag. I then flew out over the bright green lawn to the west. I wondered if the woman, who was setting up the stand just to the north of the garbage can, would mind that i was using the can for my trash. I then thought that the garbage cans were borrowed from the library, so they should be public waste cans. I turned around to fly back to the east, but hovered for a moment over the grassy lawn. There were dark storm clouds blowing in from the northeast. They were moving quickly across the sky, and i could feel a strong wind blowing against me. I was unsure whether i could fly against the wind, but i knew that the people setting up the field would be impressed by the fact that i could fly. I lifted my arms, knowing that there was a pair of wings strapped to by back. I thought that the strong wind would catch the wings and lift me into the air, but i worried that it would be too strong, and i would rise too quickly. I imagined the ground moving swiftly away from me. This would be dangerous, because i realized that the wings on my back might break with the sudden strain of a strong wind. I looked down at the grass. I had not risen at all. I was simply floating over only a little way over the grass. I walked back to the east, where i entered the library. The movie was still playing, but it seemed to be near the end. This was the part where the people were talking about the girl and her flowers. They were still trying to figure out from where she had gotten the flowers. The plot hints that she was getting them from dead bodies. This was the unnerving plot twist of the film, but i did not think that it would be as shocking to a modern day audience. I moved around in the room for a moment as the movie ended. The reference desk seemed to be on the northern wall of the room, and the room now seemed to have book shelves along the northern and eastern walls. There were several small shelves that ran out from the northern wall. I turned to the south, where the circulation desk was, and asked the librarian about the movie they had been watching. I described it as the movie with Cary Grant. She said that it was a movie by Rob Dean. She then pointed to a long flat book that was sitting on the edge of the counter in front of me. He picked it up and handed it to me as she spoke about it, saying that it was about the director. I flipped through the pages, thinking that it did not tell me exactly what i wanted to know about the movie. The first part of the book had text, and some black-and-white pictures that seemed to be from the movie, but most of the book seemed to be of old coloured cartoons. I thought that the director must have been a cartoonist as well. I flipped through the rest of the book, noticing that most of it was text. I tried to remember the person’s name, thinking that it was something that i should remember for later. I wanted to watch the movie later with $F45, because he liked good movies. I then wondered if he would like an older movie. He might not like it because it was so old, even though it was considered such a good movie.

12007 December 30

I started to run to the south, through the twisted trees of the wooded area. Several other people were with me, and we were looking for something. Others went in different directions. The trees had no leaves, and the ground was grayish-tan. I knew that we were heading into a swampy area, so i tried to be careful, not wanting to get my feet wet. I ran carefully, aware that $F55 was following me through the wooded trail. He moved off ahead of me, to the southeast, looking for a path through the dense branches of the thicket. There was a fence just to the east of us, and i knew that if we stuck close to the fence, there would be a trail of clearing that we could follow. I noticed a break in the branches to the southwest of me, so i jogged that way and found myself on the other side of the woods, at the edge of wet swampy ground. I could see that the land ahead of me, along the edge of the fence, was rather dry. This would make a good trail. I called back to $F55 that i had found a good trail, but i could no longer see him in the woods. He must have gotten caught in some of the brambles along the path. I then noticed the people to the north of me. They were starting out into the swampy ground. I called to them, telling them that they could cross where i was, where the ground was higher and not covered with water, but they started through the water anyway. I looked back for $F55 and could see him heading toward me along the edge of the fence. I told him that i had found the path through. He must have gotten lost on a side trail. I then looked back to the west to see that the people were wading through water that was up to their waist. One of them seemed to be $A514. I wished they had heard me when i said i had found a dry trail. I watched $F54 wade through the water with an annoyed look on his face. I headed to the south, following the mounds of dry land that wound across the water. I turned to the southeast about halfway across, trying to avoid what looked like a large mud puddle ahead. I hopped over a small oval puddle as i approached the high mound to the east. Once i reached the path than ran along the southern side of the area, i started jogging to the east with the others. There were four or five of us now. After only a few paces, we stopped, and i looked to the north. $A514 had pointed out that there were many wild turkey in the field to the north of us. I looked down the long steep hill to the north of us to see the open farm field. The row of weeds along the fence was just to the west of us, crossing the side of the field. There were several round dark-gray animals moving around in the field. They were scattered all across the filed, but there did not seem to be many of them. I turned to the south and spoke to the man about the birds. He said something about the book that he had in his hand. I looked over the books that he had handed me, trying to figure out what i wanted. The others moved around as i tried to decide which books i would want. I then looked at the bookcases along the southern wall of the basement room. This place seemed to be my parents’ house, and there were all of the books that my parents were trying to get rid of. The man walked over to the shelves and started looking at the books. I looked at the case to the east of me. I was now is a wide alcove set into the southern wall. There were shelves on all three sides of the alcove. The books on the eastern side did not seem to say anything about turkeys, as i though they would. I held on to the book about the topic i was interested it, but the man walked over to the center of the large set of shelves and started examining the books. I felt that we should look through all of the books ourselves. I did not want the man to take any of them until i could see what they were. My parents said something from the northeast of me. I then noticed that the man was looking at two large hardcover books with faces on the spine. They were old Hardy Boys novels. They were much larger than the ones that i had when i was young, and i thought that they must be much older. I did not think that we should give them away. I told my parents that we should keep all the books for now and then donate what we did not want to the library book sale. I did not want the man who was appraising the books to take any of them yet.

12007 December 31

I turned to the north as the other person started back to the south. He had been standing to the west of me in the gym. I thought that i should get some more exercise, but i was worried about hurting my back again. I walked up to the large white metal piece of gym equipment. It seemed to be a pull-up machine. Someone was already on the machine, and i realized that there were others starting to enter into the weight room. It was no longer early in the morning, and the students were starting to arrive at the gym. It was nice while no one was here, so i thought that i should start doing an exercise before the gym filled up. I turned back around to the south. There now seemed to be a pool to the west of me. I headed back into the area where the weight machines were, noticing that many of them now had people at them. Several yellowish-orange divider walls stood in various places around the equipment, dividing the room into strange shapes. Someone to the southwest of me called my name. I looked at the young man on the rowing machine. He was facing and looked at me, but i did not recognize him. He seemed attractive, with short blond hair and a round face. He was wearing a long-sleeve dark-blue running jacket with dark running pants. I was not sure whether i should say hello to him, because i was not really sure whether he was the one who had said hello to me. I paced to the south, watching the man as he passed behind one of the dividing walls. The dividing wall ran along the southern wall of the room, and the man had been working out to the southwest of the wall. I had seen him as he rowed on the western side of the wall, but i was walking to the eastern end of the dividing wall, so he disappeared for a moment. I stopped on the southern side of the wall, looking around for someone i might recognize. The man still interested me, and i thought that he might be the member of $G3 that i had met at a wrestling match, but i was still not really sure. I turned back to the north and started pacing again. I then noticed someone on the southern end of a large machine doing lat pulls. He was wearing a brown T-shirt, and i recognized him as a member of $G3. I wondered if he was the one who had said hello to me. It seemed that there were several members of $G3 here that i knew.