Water ride NYC

I was driving in with a couple people into New York City, and I decided to ditch them for the train at the last minute before going into the tunnel, so that I could go on this underground water ride. From the subway, you could ride on an innertube over rapids, while people tickled your feet and butt from below. It was a little odd having strangers touch you, but I was assured that all the volunteer ticklers had a strict ethos of non-groping -- it was a community and everyone looked out for everyone else. At the end of the ride, you exited out into a nice cafe with free snacks and beverages and mingling.

Bizarre Foods

I was with Andrew Zimmern of Bizarre Foods and we were in a boat in China helping our hosts pull up thousand-year-old eggs that had been made not by being buried in lye, but instead had been preserved underwater in a river.

My mom passed by somehow and asked what it was, and was surprised when Andrew Zimmern told her pi-dan (Chinese for preserved egg) because she had never seen them made this way underwater. I told him he should be proud to be eating something my mom had never even heard of.

Speechless with Tom Waits

Redneckhunter and I were at a funeral/parade out on the Benjamin Franklin Parkway in Philadelphia. Then we head to lunch with some other funeral-goers. As we sat down at our table, I noticed Tom Waits sitting at the table across from us! Turns out our friends the Worthingtons knew him and introduced him. While I, the superfan, was just dumbstruck and couldn't think of anything to say to him, Redneckhunter was just chatting up a storm with Tom about some spot on the California coast that they both liked.

Underdressed and underwater

I had to attend a dedication ceremony for a dormitory at Princeton, and I looked down and realized I was wearing jeans with holes in them, and I needed to go home to change. It was a long walk home, and I was running late.

Then I found myself having to do a reality-tv-style challenge that involved wading into the ocean. Some of the other challengers chose to wear flotation devices, but I figured the water was cold and I'd probably last longer keeping myself warm by treading water. However, as I waded in, the water didn't get any deeper than a few inches. There wasn't enough water to properly do the challenge, the judges thought, so they decided to move the challenge to a pool. Since it didn't seem to be as fair or interesting in a swimming pool, they decided to change the challenge to having us choreograph an underwater dance routine in the pool.

Arab Chinatown

I woke up on a tour bus traveling through what seemed to be a Chinatown in a Muslim country (Egypt perhaps?). Signs were in Chinese and Arabic. I realized I was on a Princeton trip, and I still had work I needed to do. Someone wanted me to make an animated e-card with ET flying past the moon.

Then I was no longer with the tour, but instead with just my family in a van. My uncle was driving the van, and my cousin was navigating with help from the GPS. Looking out the window I saw someone dressed in a military uniform (in China, military surplus is quite popular attire) taking a dump on the sidewalk. When we got to our hotel, I decided to change out of the flimsy ballet flats I was wearing into more substantial shoes.

Cake Desk

I was in school with James Allan from the band Glasvegas. Then things got a bit horror movie-ish. I can't remember exactly...

Turns out though, it was just a movie, and I left the theater (a big theater, like Lincoln Center). As I was leaving, someone offered to show me a desk made entirely out of cake that apparently was a prop in the movie.

I met up with my cousins outside -- we were, naturally, on our way to go eat somewhere. Then I was in a hotel room, watching Italian television. The show on the TV was called "Lupo" and was some sort of gritty cop drama. The main character Lupo was a real asshole, and in the scene I was watching, he shoved his dick into a bad guy's mouth.

The Fortress

I was scaling a fortress wall of some kind, along with many other people. There were people on the inside of the fortress helping us over, and so a huge shirtless muscle-bound guy basically picked me up and lifted me over the wall.

Then we were in a cafeteria getting lunch. I couldn't decide what I wanted. There was a special on pork belly served over a salad, but I was leaning toward the spicy chicken rice bowl.

After that, it was like I was in the world of Game of Thrones, in a cathedral that looked kind of like the Princeton chapel. There was a "champion" who was supposed to accompany the king - he looked like Alside from True Blood. But the king didn't like him, and instead summoned two dragons which appeared from out of the cathedral rooftop, perhaps gargoyles come to life. Everyone had to cover their faces with orange Shamwows when the King passed. There was also a "talking head" in the King's entourage - the head sat on a platter, but was fully alive, with no body.

Scary Pets

I was with my friend Tricia in my parents' basement, and she had her "pets" with her. The main pet was a huge snake -- Anaconda-huge. Only not only did this snake strangle, it bit too. I was terrified, but she just laughed at me. She also had a baby giraffe, and I finally was startled awake when the snake lunged at the poor giraffe's head.

Lost in Penn Station

I was supposed to go to New York for work with a couple of work colleagues, and I was walking through Penn Station with them. We were in a hurry - in my head, I was thinking that we were going to miss the train from Princeton to New York (even though we already were in New York). Even though I was a daily commuter through Penn Station for 5 years, things looked familiar but confusing to me now. I took them down a set of stairs to what I thought would be the lower level, only it went down directly to the tracks, and instead of being full of other train riders waiting for the train, it was full of homeless people, people just loitering, drinking, and doing drugs. Instead of walking back up the stairs to back track, we thought we could cut through to a staircase we saw down the line that lead out to the street. However, in order to do so, we had to step over homeless people, squeeze past scary looking men hanging out on the steps, etc. Nobody really harassed us that bad, though some dodgy people tried to talk to us. When we got outside, I saw it had put us out on 37th Street, about 4 blocks north of the main Penn Station entrance. Again, the city streets there looked completely different than what I was expecting.