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.

Sliding and ripping my purse

I was at a New York City museum with a set a very tall, very steep steps. I'm talking scary, almost vertical steep (I think this stems from watching the Top Gear Bolivia episode in which the TG guys drive down an almost vertical incline of sand to reach the coast).

I started going down the steps on my butt step by step, only this was even getting difficult as the steps themselves started getting smaller and narrower. I saw a handrail, so I thought my best option was to move over to the handrail and slide down it like a fireman's pole.

As I started sliding, my handbag got caught on the railing. I tugged at it, and it ripped (though none of the contents came out), and I went on my way sliding down. When I reached the sidewalk, I surveyed the damage. It was a patent vinyl black sack, and one of the handles had ripped completely. Inside I had been carrying around (who knows why), this vintage fur headband that a friend's mom had passed on to me -- and that was ruined too.

Andrew McCarthy, pregnant women, and Peru

I was at a lecture with my mom and aunt. The room was sort of like the old lecture halls in McCosh at Princeton. Andrew McCarthy came up to me and said hi - apparently we had gone to high school together. When he left, I told my mom and aunt (in Chinese) that he was a movie star and we had gone to school together. They said that I should invite him to have dinner with us after the lecture. When he came back, he had notes scribbled on paper and gave them to us. He said these were his ideas for a movie script.

Then I was with my friend who was pregnant and wearing a gray seersucker sheath dress. She was thin and looked great - just the baby bump. I realized that I had been rude in not congratulating her sooner on expecting. Her 2-year-old was running around under the dining room table - he was proportioned like a 2-year-old but only about 1/2 the size, like a miniature kid. I tried to pick him up and he was tiny.

Then I was at some tourist site in Peru, walking along a trail full of other tourists. There were red llamas, and small buffaloes. There were also horses running down the mountains, followed by jockeys on foot running after them. I thought, I should take some pictures... Then the clouds broke and it started to rain hard, so I made my way into a building. It was a hotel, and there was a woman checking in who looked like a girl I went to high school with - at least from the back. She was pregnant and wearing a slinky black cocktail dress with cutouts, only because she was pregnant the dress didn't fit and she only had it halfway zipped up. She and her friend started talking to me - first about how quickly the weather had changed, then they also had a bunch of CDs of local pop music and wondered if I wanted them.

Mods vs. Vampires

I was a vampire slayer - with a stake and everything! I had a gun too. I may have been some sort of undead myself, I'm not sure. But it was easy to spot the vampires because they wore plaid. The good guys wore stripes. It was like a Quadrophenia-like mods vs. preppies rivalry.

Four dinners

I was with redneckhunter and his brother, and I was eating KFC chicken. And redneckhunter's brother said to me "No wonder you're feeling bloated - isn't this your fourth dinner?" And I said, "No I only had one dinner ... and 3 snacks." Then we were in our kitchen and I was wearing these tall turquoise platform sandals - they had about 5-inch tall skinny heels and looked like stripper shoes.

On campus

I was searching online for a "black and white polkadot romper." I guess since we currently don't have working internet at home, I was at the computer cluster on Princeton campus. I remember being a little embarrassed at doing online shopping while everyone around me was doing schoolwork. I was having trouble typing though - every time I tried to type in "black and white polkadot romper" - it always came out as different words.

A very young undergrad sat at the computer next to me and he was having problems with Final Cut Pro or some other video editing software that I know, so I started helping him. Then he started kissing me, and I was like, what?! He said, just relax... Then he picked me up and carried me out of the computer cluster "Office and a Gentleman"-style while the other people in the computer cluster cheered.

Then I found myself outside near the football stadium, and I had a heavy backpack and was trudging my way back up the hill - much steeper in the dream than in real life. I decided to cut through a building, which was not a real campus building - only in my dream. Inside it was an abandoned and empty and dilapidated lecture hall - pretty cool looking.

I ran into a couple friends of redneckhunter's. I revealed to them that what I was carrying was a shitload of alcohol for a party to which they were coming, but even then, neither of them bothered to help me carrying the bag.

Fashionable fugitive

I was staying in a hotel with a girl who I had met last year on my honeymoon in Peru. She was a Chinese-American girl from NYC and I had a bit of a girl-crush on her. Anyway, in the dream, I found out that she was wanted for some crime and was on the lam, and she had disappeared again but left all her luggage in our hotel room. So I needed to run upstairs and find some clothes of hers to give to the investigators who were looking for her.

I went upstairs but instead of just grabbing the first things I found, I ended up going through her clothes and trying stuff on and getting distracted. She had some awesome clothes, including a vintage Chanel wool shift dress, very Joan-Holloway-Mad Men-style. She had a great black cashmere sweater with an awesome graphic lime green pattern on it. Finally I could hear the police downstairs talking, so I realized I should go down, so I grabbed those things and went downstairs, so of course I was mortified when they took the Chanel and basically threw it on the ground for the search dogs!

Lady Gaga and mistaken pregnancy

Redneckhunter and I were at a Lady Gaga concert. It was a seated concert in a grand old theater. There were lots of dancers and she seemed to be performing David Copperfield-style spectacle magic while singing and dancing - lots of smoke and mirrors type stuff. In one number she appeared to grow taller and taller with larger and larger boxes appearing to grow out of her legs - it was very Alice in Wonderland.

Then I was in NYC at a shop and saw a woman who redneckhunter coaches in rowing. It took me a while to place her. I also ran into a woman from work, and I thought how strange that they'd all be shopping at the same store in New York.

The rower said hi to me while I was looking at some stretchy camisoles. As I examined the camisoles, I saw that the tags had labels like "For 4-6 months" or "6-9 months" and it took me a while to realize that they were maternity clothes and the recommendations were for when to wear them in your pregnancy. I thought, oh no, now she will go back to the team and tell them all that we are expecting! She seemed to be shopping for a dress to wear to her wedding (though to the best of my knowledge she is not engaged in real life...)

Being inconspicuous; Being ostentatious

Part One: It was pitch black outside my house, and I was coming up from the parking lot and had to feel my way along the curb and along the side of the house, up the stairs. When I got inside, there were a bunch of other people there in the living room. It seemed like they were hiding. A car drove up the street and started shining a bright light into the living room, and everyone crouched down so as to not be seen by the light.

Part Two: I was wearing a horrendous 80s bright purple harem pant jumpsuit. People kept staring at me in restaurants, etc. but I thought it was cause I looked like a fashionista.

More bad movies...

I was in my college art class with Powers Boothe, my former drawing teacher. It was the first class and he started it off by having us watch a movie. He said it was by The Weinstein Company, but it seemed to be some cheesy soft-core beach movie. I was on the end of a couch, my friend Melissa was next to me, my cousin 1000yregg next to her, and Powers on the other end. I fell asleep during it, but hoped that the teacher was too far away to notice.

After that movie, he said we were going to watch 2 more film versions of the same archetypal story - one good film, and one bad film. I had 2 thoughts - 1) there was a plot to the movie we just saw? and 2) there's a film version out there that's worse?

His co-teacher then joined us. She looked like Thandie Newton and she wore a red cosplay Gothic Lolita outfit - red and flouncy with big white ruffles, a white bonnet and white apron. She sat next to me on the couch and started bouncing up and down. I said to her, jeez you're like some yappy little dog that humps everything it sees.

Tom Waits again...

I was part of some sort of music conference. 1000yregg was asking if I had met a lot of recording industry people, but I told him that was what my business manager was for. I was supposed to meet up with some girl at a club, but missed her. The next morning, I was having coffee with Tom Waits - sitting at a high table at a sidewalk cafe on a small town main street. I was wearing my grey faux fur jacket, but also had with me a green leather jacket and 2 black leather jackets as well.

Tom said, c'mon let's go, and let's swing by the hotel first. I asked, which hotel are you staying at, and he said the same as you. So we got into a big convertible Cadillac, and I threw all the jackets in the back seat, and as we left, I said, but at some point we've got to go back and pick up the truck (which was Redneckhunter's old Toyota pickup), and Tom said, well, it's Kyle's truck now (Kyle is Redneckhunter's younger brother), and I said, no, you mean, it's Reid's truck now (who is Redneckhunter's youngest brother).

Dog stroller and fashion line

I was walking to work with a co-worker and a woman from my parents' church. Along the way we decided to stop in 84 Lumber and buy a dog stroller for these friends of mine who have a puppy. The stroller came with a doggie sweater too.

When we got to work, we were a bit late so we had to go straight to an auditorium for a presentation. The presentation was the pitch for a new fashion line started by the above friend with the dog (who in real life does work in the fashion industry). I sat next to her (actually I sat between her and her boyfriend) and gave them the stroller. They didn't seem to like it.

Food and Fetishwear

The dream started out with me walking on Princeton campus near the football stadium. Nick was busy, so I was trying to figure out dinner by myself, and was headed in the direction of north Nassau Street. So I made it up to Nassau Street, only this is a Nassau that only exists in my dream world. I'm pretty sure I've dreamed it before (though it could be deja vu). It's almost like Nassau, but with businesses that don't really exist. I walked past a dream-world health food deli, and decided to go into a sit-down restaurant that I had not been to. I thought to myself, I don't think I've ever eaten at a real sit-down restaurant with waiters by myself, so I should do it. I had a book in hand, so I had something to occupy me. As I perused the menu posted on the sidewalk, I ran into someone I knew (who was not in reality anyone I know). He was young (maybe one of Nick's rowers?) and looked like a young, less ugly, Peter Lorre (so probably a coxswain instead). Heading inside, and looking forward to dining alone, I was annoyed that Peter-Lorre-look-alike followed me in and sat at my table.