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    CanisLucidus

    The Menthol Arcade

    13 Comments
    by
    CanisLucidus
    , 02-09-2013 at 04:31 PM (988 Views)
    This was a short but pleasant lucid after drinking a 3-bag brew of peppermint tea during my WBTB. I woke up for the WBTB on the late side (4:45 or so), so I didn't stay awake for very long. Probably because of this, my waking life memories were a little tough to access.

    Color legend: Non-dream Dream Lucid

    Lucid #64: The Menthol Arcade

    I'm in a dark arcade playing Street Fighter II with my friend SC. We're talking smack and he says, "I bet you can't win a sumo wrestling match." I say something really brilliant like, "Bring it!" and the game starts.

    I'm on the righthand side and both of us are playing as E. Honda. I look down at the game's controls and I'm disappointed to see that it has no joystick and each side has only 3 buttons instead of the usual 6. The weirdness of this sticks in my mind and after thinking it over,     I realize that I'm dreaming.

    The game starts and neither of us moves at first. I jam on the buttons a bit and my player starts E. Honda's signature "Hundred Hand Slap". I will him to start drifting to the left and he slides along for a few seconds.



    Before I can land a shot, the screen goes black. I look over to my left and SC has vanished. I'm completely alone and all of the machines are off now. I turn away and start to explore the rest of the arcade.

    The arcade's divided into two sides, and the side that I'm on is arranged around an enormous air hockey table that's at least 4-5 times larger than a normal one. I wonder what someone would do if the puck got stuck in the middle of that huge thing. On the opposite side of the room I see an emergency exit. I think about exploring the other side of the arcade but it occurs to me that I probably have goals I want to work on, and outside seems like a better bet.

    I keep verbally reminding myself that this is a dream until I reach the exit. I push on the crash bar, the door swings open, and I'm staring out into a milky gray void. I'm nervous about walking out there but I feel like there's no going back now.

    There's a bit of a drop as I step into the void, but my feet land on something solid a couple of feet down. I feel like I'm wearing my work shoes. The scene goes totally dark, but I'm ready to DEILD. I start swinging my arm around, imagining that I have a gladius. Nothing happens for a few seconds, but I still feel relaxed. I start swinging harder, throwing in a few man-grunts for emphasis.

    Some sort of wind sweeps up from below and picks me up off of my feet. The wind starts to swirl and soon turns into a cyclone. I can feel myself spinning and spinning, and I think that this is great -- LaBerge suggests spinning as a way to change scenes. I'm confident it will work, and sure enough I see a colorful, spinning scene start to emerge.

    The wind dies down, the spinning slows, and I'm gently set down on a vast, jeweled mosaic that stretches in every direction as far as I can see. There's a slightly reddish glow on the horizon and what looks like a set of distant mountains. I'm awestruck by what I see, but it's just a few seconds     before the dream ends.
    NewArtemis, Alyzarin and PennyRoyal like this.

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    Comments

    1. Xanous's Avatar
      Nice one! I love it. Im surprised you continued to play the game. I would have walked away I think.
      I'm impressed that you didn't wake up in the void and the cyclone actually took you to a new scene.

      BTW I totally forgot the Gladius trick last night. Darnit!

      Well this makes me want to revisit the menthol for sure now! Do you really think it was the tea or just you getting lucid on your own? Perhaps it just make you wakeful enough to figure out a DILD? Interesting.
      CanisLucidus likes this.
    2. CanisLucidus's Avatar
      Thanks man! Yeah it's sort of funny that I kept playing games even in a lucid dream I wanted to see how the gameplay worked, I think. I was pleased with the graphics... just wish I'd had an actual fight.

      I think I held on in the void strictly thanks to the gladius trick... that thing has saved my button over and over. It's really just your bicycle trick except that we wave a sword around instead,but it really works wonders. I hear you on kicking yourself when you don't remember one of your favorite tricks. It's hard tonkeep everything innmind. I'm convinced that WBTB work helps with keeping these tricks in mind.

      And I am required to answer that of course it's me and not the menthol. It seems to just make dreaming a little stranger but leaves me relaxed. I think those both help. I'll have a better idea after more trials I think.
      Xanous likes this.
    3. Xanous's Avatar
      And I am required to answer that of course it's me and not the menthol. It seems to just make dreaming a little stranger but leaves me relaxed. I think those both help. I'll have a better idea after more trials I think.
      Well yeah of course its you even with Galantmine. I was trying to see if it was more like a placebo but I think you answered it for me.
      CanisLucidus likes this.
    4. CanisLucidus's Avatar
      Well yeah of course its you even with Galantmine. I was trying to see if it was more like a placebo but I think you answered it for me.
      Yeah, you can never totally discount placebo. It's an extraordinarily powerful effect and we lucid dreamers are just as vulnerable as anyone (if not moreso.)

      One argument against this is that I expected menthol dreams to be kinda "sexy" from what I'd read, and this has completely not been the case so far. I'll admit that I've always liked Street Fighter II, but never like that.

      Hey, so are you sad that I'm no longer typing my comments from a Kindle, spelling everything wrong, replacing spaces with "n" and getting auto-corrected into a boiling rage? I hope my helplessness was good for a laugh.
    5. Xanous's Avatar
      Yeah, you can never totally discount placebo. It's an extraordinarily powerful effect and we lucid dreamers are just as vulnerable as anyone (if not moreso.)
      Honestly I hate using the word placebo but you do gotta keep that in mind. Like Calea Z. I had some tea last night and got nothing. I even took it with some B6. But I was super sleepy though so who knows? I wish there was more data available on this kind of stuff.

      One argument against this is that I expected menthol dreams to be kinda "sexy" from what I'd read, and this has completely not been the case so far. I'll admit that I've always liked Street Fighter II, but never like that.
      What about Chun-Li?

      Hey, so are you sad that I'm no longer typing my comments from a Kindle, spelling everything wrong, replacing spaces with "n" and getting auto-corrected into a boiling rage? I hope my helplessness was good for a laugh.
      I was comforted that you were typing more like me.
      CanisLucidus likes this.
    6. The Sandman's Avatar
      I keep verbally reminding myself that this is a dream until I reach the exit.
      Nice. I've been there before.

      I start swinging harder, throwing in a few man-grunts for emphasis.
      That's right. Do the man thing! Lol!

      This ending sounds awesome. Too bad the dream ended.
      CanisLucidus likes this.
    7. CanisLucidus's Avatar
      Quote Originally Posted by Xanous
      Honestly I hate using the word placebo but you do gotta keep that in mind. Like Calea Z. I had some tea last night and got nothing. I even took it with some B6. But I was super sleepy though so who knows? I wish there was more data available on this kind of stuff.
      Don't worry, "placebo" isn't a dirty word to me. Will and confidence are a huge part of achieving lucidity. The placebo effect always has to be taken into account.

      This is why all that freakishly detailed record keeping pays off in the end. It's easy to be fooled. We want to be fooled. But I think that in the end the records help us tease out real patterns. For example, the effect of galantamine or B-vitamins are really well established for me now.

      What about Chun-Li?
      Ha! I can't even raise a proper denial because that was the first character I started with back when I was a kid. I can guarantee that E. Honda never did anything for me though.

      I was comforted that you were typing more like me.
      You hit DV on your phone all the time, don't you? I have no idea how you manage that. I'm the worst at this. Managing quotes in particular is so much easier on a PC!
      Xanous likes this.
    8. CanisLucidus's Avatar
      Quote Originally Posted by The Sandman
      That's right. Do the man thing! Lol!
      The man-grunts were pretty awesome. And then seconds later, I appear in that awesome mosaic scene. Coincidence? I think not! Total MGILD (man-grunt initiated lucid dream, of course.)

      Quote Originally Posted by The Sandman
      This ending sounds awesome. Too bad the dream ended.
      Thanks, Sandman! Yes, the ending blew me away. I wanted so badly to see what was in store for me there.

      I think that I'll have to make it a goal to return to this dream location. The image of it has really stuck with me.
    9. PennyRoyal's Avatar
      For some reason it made me laugh that in the middle of a Lucid you stop to think about what would happen if the puck got stuck in the middle of the air hockey table

      You should have gone for E. Hondas flying headbutt thing instead of gliding over

      Sounds like a fun one.
      CanisLucidus likes this.
    10. CanisLucidus's Avatar
      For some reason it made me laugh that in the middle of a Lucid you stop to think about what would happen if the puck got stuck in the middle of the air hockey table
      Heh, you're right. Knowing me, I'm just lucky that I didn't decide to spend the LD "fixing" the table and making it the right size. I've been much more successful when I learn to overlook stuff like that and just go with the flow. I had one friend show up a couple feet too short in one dream and I frittered away the rest of the LD trying to make her a normal height.

      You should have gone for E. Hondas flying headbutt thing instead of gliding over
      Ha! Great idea! I don't even have to worry about properly holding back to charge -- I can cheat as much as the AI.

      Thanks for the comments. It really was fun. I guess my mall rat days really came back to me on this one.
      PennyRoyal likes this.
    11. PennyRoyal's Avatar
      Haha np. I was just reading some people's DJs trying to jolt my memory for some NLDs of my own.
      CanisLucidus likes this.
    12. CanisLucidus's Avatar
      Haha np. I was just reading some people's DJs trying to jolt my memory for some NLDs of my own.
      This is a great reason that I love to hang around the DJ section. I get tons of inspiration and ideas from reading other people's dreams. After a while I begin to wonder whether I've ever had an original technique idea of my own, LOL.
      PennyRoyal likes this.
    13. PennyRoyal's Avatar
      I was reading some DJ entries yesterday and it triggered me to remember 4 dreams from my childhood one after another. I decided It might be a good method for dream recall.

      I begin to wonder whether I've ever had an original technique idea of my own, LOL.
      Most(all?) techniques are adaptations from a few basic principles of LDing, so that can probably be said about everyone
      CanisLucidus likes this.