Haunted?

I have been like a day behind in blog posts all week, and I'm not even sorry. I've been busy devising various future plans, and they involve school supplies and almost NO CHANGE, so there is no down side.

However, while making up a dramatically awesome five year plan, I have done some other stuff.

I found curtains for my bedroom at Target, then had to drive to a second Target in order to get four panels for my two windows. Two panels per window = curtains. I don't know why people don't just sell them in two packs. It would make life so much easier. Who wants just one panel? People who like the effect of having a sheet tacked to their window?

I finished this sweater and modeled it badly, then blocked it. It's drying next to our dehumidifier down in our creepy ice-cold basement. It is so cold down there, I didn't bother checking how dry it was this morning, because I wanted to avoid the cold. Check out my Instagram (link on the sidebar) for terrible pictures.

I'm nearly done with Hilary Mantel's second Thomas Cromwell book, Bring Up the Bodies, which is as excellent as Wolf Hall was. These books are a commitment, they are not light and airy reads, but they are not to be missed. I look forward to seeing how the BBC has adapted Wolf Hall for television later this year!

And, on a completely unrelated note, I had the world's most freaky dream last night, which is as follows:

Mum, The Brother, and I were going to Chicago on a trip, but the weather was sucky, so we had to stay overnight in a house. The house belonged to my former high school choir director. It was a nice, giant house, but the first thing the owner said to us when we walked in was, "Be careful, this house is crazy-haunted." 

And it was. From the second I walked in, it seemed like this specter was targeting me. Words appeared on walls, objects flew toward my head at high speeds, photographs tumbled off shelves as I walked by...it was creepy. We decided to leave because for some reason, my family didn't want me to be murdered by ghosts, so we packed our stuff. Then, the ghost actually appeared in front of me to impart wisdom, because it wasn't just your garden-variety ghost, it was my future self, haunting this house in order to meet with my current self and give me insider-knowledge about the rest of my life. 

Ghost-Laura even gave me a fountain pen, some stationary, and a few ancient Egyptian artifacts, because why not? Apparently the only way G-L thought I would pay attention to her was if she scared the living crap out of me. So, I don't know what that says about my psyche, but probably nothing good.

The first thing I did this morning was tell Dad the dream, and he laughed so hard, it gave him a coughing fit. He also said he could tell I was a librarian from the dream. I don't know what that says about librarians, or me, but there you go.

No pictures today because I'm too lazy to find them.

Workout Wednesday: What Is this Strange Madness?

On Saturday (I think it was Saturday. Could have been Sunday. Or Monday. That too.) I took a brief nap. This nap was because Paul wanted to have a bath and not a shower after mowing the lawn. That's cool, but I'd wanted to work out, and if he took a bath, I would likely have no hot water for mine. Because that happens.

I need hot water. Baths made of cold water are a form of torture. Seriously. Check out what they said about them during the Geneva Convention*.

So I took a nap, knowing I would then work out when I woke up.

During my nap, I had a dream.

Now, the last nap I took resulted in the Dogs of the Dance dream, which was pretty freaky. In this dream, I was in a small studio--like a yoga studio--only this studio was for people who wanted to do 30 Day Shred. And Jillian Michaels was leading the group. Like in the DVD, only what it would be like if you were IN the DVD. So we worked out.

And then Jillian was like, "It's time to settle our accounts!" And it turned out that for each workout session, we had to pay $7.00. Not bad. Plus there was a $19.99 registration fee. I tried to give her my debit card, but she was like, "We don't have a card reader until after January 1st, so I said "Okay, I will go next door to my bank."

She then gave me a discount because I had stuck with her program for so long. See? All this dedication even pays off in my DREAMS**.

So I went to the bank and came back and paid Jillian, and that was my dream. But here's the thing. I started thinking after I woke up about how expensive it would be to actually pay that kind of money for doing the 30 Day Shred. So I MATHED it.

Say I had only done this workout plan thing for the minimum 30 days. At $7.00 per day for 30 days, I would end up paying $210.00 PLUS the $19.99 registration fee. Meaning I would pay $229.99 for 30 days at this dream-studio.

Which means it would ALMOST BE AS EXPENSIVE AS JOINING THE YMCA. Except not really. The Y is more like twice that much for a year. Because it wants to support the community, so it has to be affordable for everyone. Everyone who can pay $495.00***. (Hint: that is not me****.)

Did I mention that the YMCA is the only option if you want to join any kind of gym in the town where I work? It would be cheaper if I were willing to make a 30 minute drive to work out at my alma mater, but I can't join there and pay for the extra gas it will take to make the trip. I can do one or the other. Hence the DVDs.

But back to my dream. Did you notice that Jillian has invaded my dreams? Because I DID. She will not even let me take a nap without plaguing me. See? Instead of resting, I had to do the 30 Day Shred in my dream and then I had to do it AGAIN when I woke up! That is totally not fair.

No one should have to double up on exercise in their dreams.

In other news, I figured out how I was getting those strange bruises on my knees. Yeah. 30 Day Shred. It is when I am doing the lunges and lose my balance, as I often do. I randomly dropped to one knee yesterday and I knew, that was where the bruises were coming from. So now, to avoid knee bruises, I have to fall backwards or sideways instead of forward.

Because not falling is not an option.

* I totally made that up. But it SHOULD have been in the Geneva Accords.

** Usually my dreams are not this nice. They usually involve me being suddenly struck mute, being blinded, or being unable to stand. Kind of like my life while I'm awake.

*** This is the annual price for a single adult. It can be paid up front or monthly, but paying monthly makes it more expensive. Also, you MUST commit for an entire year. So, even if you like to run outdoors except when there is a foot of snow on the ground, you don't get the option of joining for part of the year. They have to pay off that fancy new building.

**** Yes, I'm bitter about this. And sure, they have an arrangement where you can apply for a "scholarship" to make it cheaper for you to join, but the problem with that is the same as with financial aid for colleges: the poor get help. The rich don't need help. The middle income folks get no help (and cannot afford to go while still paying for things like a car, a house, medical stuff, heat, electricity, and the like). I have the form at home to apply for this aid, since my student loans take out such a big chunk from my income, but I haven't gotten over the rage enough to fill it out. We'll see.

Ask Me About My New Felted Slippers!

I finished another pair of the French Press Felted Slippers last night. But I started felting them too late, so I didn't get to sleep until something like 1:30 in the morning. I had to wake up at 6:00. This after a weekend of lying in bed, waiting for sleep.

Friday night I was curled up in bed, sleepless, listening to the rush of water and gurgles from the bathroom sink. As I waited for the evil person in the bathroom to be finished, I got angrier and angrier. Didn't this person know I had to work early in the morning? And it was way late. It was like TWO in the morning. And I couldn't sleep with all that NOISE.

It sounded maybe like someone was doing THIS:



I listened to more gurgles from the sink until finally, I'd had enough. I stormed out of my room and pounded on the bathroom door.

"Just a minute," Paul replied.

Paul.

Curse the fiend! He was the one ruining my life. He would have to PAY for what he'd done. He must have filled the tub with live waterfowl, to make that kind of noise. Didn't he understand how massively cruel he was being. He was destroying my will to go on. If he wanted to keep using water, he might as well have just killed me right then and there. It would have been more merciful. Jerk.

"You need to stop waiting this late to get ready for bed," I snapped. "You woke me up with all your noise, and now I'm lying there, and I have work tomorrow. You know I can hear all the noise from the bathroom in my room. The pipes are right next to my head! It's like you're bathing an elephant in there, with all of that splashing."

"I just got in here," Paul said curtly.

"No, you didn't," I replied. "I can hear everything. I heard you getting washed up, and it WOKE ME UP. You need to stop doing this. It's getting worse and worse."

"I haven't even flushed yet!" Paul seethed.

And as I stood there, bleary-eyed, I realized he was telling the truth.

You see, I'd heard the water running for what felt like hours. And the toilet had been flushed five, maybe six times. The sink had kept gurgling and gurgling, and I was sure I'd heard the bathtub filling up.

One person would not make all of that noise.

"Oh," I said, realizing the full impact of what had just happened.

"Just give me a minute," Paul growled.

"I am so sorry," I replied.

Silence was the only reply.

"I've been lying there listening to the water," I said. "But there was no water. I dreamed it all."

More silence.

"I thought it was going on too long. And it was. Because it was a dream. I'm sorry."

I went back to bed.

You see, I have a recurring semi-nightmare of not being able to fall asleep. I remain curled in bed, panicking more and more as I worry about the next day and how exhausted I know I'll be at work. The dream, like all of my dreams, is so vivid that I fail to realize it is a dream until I wake up. Then I think, Gee, I'm pretty well rested for someone who didn't get any sleep last-- And I know that it was the same dream again.

Lately, I've been trying something called lucid dreaming. I will be lying there, thinking I'm stuck awake when I need to sleep, and as a test, I try thinking about, say, a new book from a favorite author. If the dream changes at all (like, I see the book or start dreaming about a library or something like that), I know I am actually asleep. It's like a wakeness test for Dreaming Laura. It keeps me from spending my whole night dreaming the same miserable Insomnia-Dream.

But this thing was new. It was my normal nightmare, but with water gurgling. My dream had reached a new low. And Paul was the innocent victim.

When I got back to bed, I fell asleep almost immediately. But when I woke up that morning, I started thinking about Poor Paulie. I had totally screamed at him, and for no reason at all. He was innocent. All he'd been ding was...well, using the bathroom, and I had been horrible.

Clearly, I am the worst sister in the world.

I waited patiently for Paul's normal wake-up time, and I gave him a bit more time after that to be fully conscious (we are not morning people). Then I called him and apologized again. Poor Paul. He so did not deserve my rage.

After all that, two more nights of minimal sleep were not really a good idea. But what did I care? I had a giant hole in my slipper. That had to be fixed, before I stepped on something cold, like the basement floor, and the cold surface made my foot icy cold through the fist-sized hole in the sole of my slipper. Okay. Maybe not fist-sized. But it's definitely quarter-sized. Silver dollar, maybe.

My new slippers are lovely. They're drying now. I have buttons waiting. But the whole sleep situation makes me regret felting them. I am exhausted.

I have also watched too many episodes of The Cosby Show in a row, while running up and down the basement stairs to check on the felting process. I need to buy tennis balls so I can dump them in the washing machine and speed the whole process up considerably.

Now I'm just sit here, wishing I knew how to make coffee that didn't taste like feet. I'm sure this will be worth it tomorrow, when I can pull on new comfy slippers. But right now, I'm exhausted. Knitters have demanding schedules.

Dreaming

Two nights ago, I woke myself up singing in my sleep. In case you were wondering, it was the David Cook single, whatever it is called, which I hate. I was singing a song I hate as I slept. How I knew the words, I don't know. I think it speaks for the amount of bad radio in my area.

I sing often in my dreams. Usually I am cast in a musical of some time, told at the last minute, and thrown out on stage to perform songs I don't know. If not that, I go out on stage and decide to ad lib, only to discover that everyone loves what I do onstage, no matter what it is. That kind of dream ends with me breaking out in spontaneous ballet or flight.

But last night I had the kind of dream I get that haunts me throughout the next day (today). In this dream all of the horrible things I think about myself or think that other people think about me come true and are acknowledged by those I love and trust. In this kind of dream, Dad tries to kill me, or Mom decides I am a horrible daughter and says mean things about me to other people. Everyone decides they don't want me in their lives anymore, and I have no where else to go because everybody in the dream that I know hates me and wouldn't take me in.

These types of dreams end with someone killing me, or with me crying in the dream, unable to stop and wondering where the people are that usually come and soothe me in real life when I am upset about something.

But last night, things took a different spin.

I was at home, but we had to move for some reason. So I was packing, and I was pretty happy, the dream's way of tricking me into security. Okay, my subconscious' way of tricking me. Whatever.

The problem was Myst, my cat.

We rescued Myst from a pretty horrible situation when she was a kitten. We didn't even know if she was a boy or a girl when we got her, because she was half wild and wouldn't let us get anywhere near her. Maybe not the best pet choice, but we fall in love first and reap the consequences later in my family.

The first day she was home with us, she fled from our care into the brush. I knew we would never find her if she ran too far and she was just a kitten, so I tried to catch her, running through poison ivy and catching her as she ran up a tree and paused at my eye level. She then clawed the heck out of my arms as I carried her back toward my family. And we figured out she was a girl.

Myst and I now have a special bond. From the time I accidentally slashed my own wrist opening a can of her cat food to the time that the screen door slammed as I was holding her in one arm and coffee in a Styrofoam cup in the other (causing the cat to leap out of my arms in fear and me to, resulting from Myst's springing from my arm, throw the cup of scalding coffee into my face and open eyes, we have been special buddies. Myst never left me all through the time I was recovering from both surgeries. She comes only when I call her. She presents me with her prey, usually still alive and eager to run around the house as I try to catch it, including a baby wood duck, chipmunk(s), squirrels, mice, and a toad.

But in my dream, my special little kitty friend hated me. She didn't just avoid me the way my animals do in my dreams when they hate me. She pursued me with the intent of causing me bodily harm. She slashed my hands and arms, bit my legs, yowled at me with rage. I finally caught her and tried to calm her down. She bit me repeatedly and tried to get to my face so she could do more damage.

When I put her in the only place I could restrain her, a purse of my mom's from ages past, I discovered the zipper was broken. I still held it shut though, and my hands were slashed and bitten as I did so.

What a horrible dream. Where did this come from? Before I went to sleep, she was following me around purring and rubbing against me, trying to get me to carry her around with her. I found her a nice place to sleep (she likes soft blankets in little corners where she can be hidden and still see everything around her), then petted her while she got settled. When I woke up, she was right back on my lap. And I picked her up and hugged her, hoping to get rid of the nastiness my dream had left behind.

It didn't work.

I am still down. My cat loves me, right? This wasn't some kind of way for my subconscious to tell me she doesn't? No. It couldn't be that. But if it wasn't, where did it come from? Anyone know anything about dream analysis?