I was in a village in western asia. it was high enough to be cold at night and low enough to be near a reasonably populated valley.

I was staying in this confusing place, like an inn from some fantasy book. it was all weathered wood. there was a hallway that led to my room, which didn't have a door really. there was sort of a gate that led to where this couple was staying. they were sort of slick. then there was a door to the right of that, where some friends were staying.

we were all part of some reunion that felt more like getting a party together in a role playing game. but I think the reunion consisted of us ex-crew members of some starship. but not everyone expected to see everyone else there; I know I didn't. I think Evan from my work was part of the crew. the slick couple, though, were not a part of this.

I was with a large gathering of people, at some low wooden house in the hills. I think I was 8 or 9. the area was very very green, with a clearing around about half the house. the clearing was terraced.

I think there was to be some sort of wedding, and we were set up as participants. we all lined up outside to form some sort of procession into the house, and there was to be some sort of ceremony then celebration. I was near the end of the line; I think it was organized by height and I was one of the youngest in the family.

I was given some sort of flag to wave around, or two strung together perhaps. a lot of people had them since this was sort of an asian (japanese?) thing. I was supposed to know how to wave it around just so as we walked in and the music went. I didn't. I faked it O.K., but it was obvious that I was faking it. so while I didn't get in trouble, there was a sense of disapproval for me and my nuclear family. I looked up at the flags and was appalled to find that one of them was an American flag. it was so out of place, here.

it felt like twilight, but it felt like that throughout the dream. I wonder if I thought of it as twilight because we were in the mountains and so always in shadow.

so I had this really clear dream this morning, vivid imagery, almost a clear plot. I woke up very pleased. then when once I got out of bed, it faded out but the dream from the day before came back really clear. so this is it.

I was at burning man (again?) but it was being held in late October, and instead of at blackrock, it was in this other place that was nevertheless desert, but more like scrub. maybe more like out near Palm Springs.

it was no longer beating-down hot and on the day of my dream, it was overcast too. it was the last day of the festival and some people were packing up and others were having some sort of parade or procession, complete with improvized floats etc.

I don't think I was a participant in this dream, I was just along for the ride so to speak. I knew what was going to hpapen in advance too, it was like the hwole thing was a flashback. unfortunately when I knew it in advance I had more details than I remember now at the end of the day.

so anyhow it started out with this sort of desert tableau. maybe in the middle east. at this army installation, there was this group that was sort of experimental, and they thought they were ready to face the world. the problem was they had no idea how unprepared the world was to face them. I understood this but it hadn't sunk in really, until there was this sort of late-afternoon face off between the group's leaders and the army.

I guess this group was a bunch of comic book characters, that had somehow been rendered into existence. folks who weren't necessarily human looking. it would be like if the Tick was for real I suppose except (a) it wasn't that character set (b) it wasn't all superheroes (c) these guys still looked two dimensional.

I was driving north from Oxnard to home. Trillian was with me. for some reason we stopped at the side of the road right past the first exit past the bridge over the river.

there was a fairly steep embankment leading down to a flat area, and then a lake or pond or wide slow river was there. everything was very green with reddish rock showing through on the steeper part of the embankment. it was a grey overcast day but not particularly cold. I let Trillian out the passenger door and she bounded joyously down the hill to the edge of the water. I was worried - worried that she wouldn't come, worried that she'd run past the car onto the 101 behind me. worried that she was all in mud.

lately I keep having a recurring dream, which happens two or three times a morning, but fades pretty well. here's my first attempt to record it

I need to take the BART north to Santa Barbara, which is past my normal stop. this is for some evening event. I am with a male friend, maybe big Mike, and becuase I want to see in front sitting in the car isn't good enough, we climb on top. there are little rails to hold on to, and it's OK to sit there clearance-wize except in the transbay tube, which isn't between me and Santa Barbara.

not all the ride is through tunnels and there are parts through a greeen country that is very beautiful.

we get to downtown Santa Barbara and it's more like down town Ventura. I go to dinner in a nice restaurant with 4 opther peopl, one of whom is Heather. we eat at a round table next to a wall with a staircase, near the front of the restaurant. somewhere in there I lose my shoes and am barefoot. while waiting to leave the restaurant I have my pants which are too long hanging down to hide the fact I am barefoot. when we leave we are supposed to hook up with more people and go dancing, but I need shoes. I fuss until everyone agrees to stop at my white (pickup? minivan?) and get a spare pair of shoes, they are blue keds. it's several blocks' walk out of the way, something I dislike becuase I am barefoot.

karine and I were in the back lot of a volkswagen dealer when we came across their new model. it looked like an 80's Rabbit but with different proportions. it was about 55% of the width, and about 2 feet longer. it was also taller. but the detailing and taillights and everything were the same. it was red.

karine fell in love with it instantly.

we looked inside (inside it was very different!) and as she was admiring it, and I was trying to figure out how the passenger had so much room in a car that narrow, a sales dude came by to talk to us. one of the first differences, he said, was that the fan had flywheels. we looked and there was this fan where you would expect a sunroof to be. except it was locked behind this curvy panel. karine's first jetta had had a similar fan but it was under the dash where the engine in a van would have been.

karine said her fan had been very noisy and looking at the fan with this new model we saw there were 3 places on the blades where these plastic things resembling zip ties were attached. I pulled one off to examine it and the sales dude beamed. we were suitably impressed at this exhibition of quieting technology.

o my god i have been working too much. the dreams just vanish within a minute of waking.

except for this morning. i dreamt that i was using cygwin to build a 64-bit version of sendmail for windows. i had to work my way through it all using just command prompts. i didn't understand what purpose it could possibly serve but my company was going to port our software to this.