task of the month

I park a little red sports car by the side of the road and walk back towards a Target a short distance away. I pick up a few items like a pink teddy bear and a comb, then proceed to the check out. I feel like the lines are too long, so I head to the other side of the store, where there are more registers with no one waiting. Then I realize I'm carrying the straw from a small juice box, but not the juice box itself. It doesn't make sense, so I head back through the store to find the missing juice box. Somehow, I find myself outside in the parking lot, having bought nothing. You have to pay to park in the store's parking lot, but I see signs advertising their Black Friday special with $10 all day parking. Somehow, it seems like a great bargain to me. I go back to the little red sports car to move it to the lot.

I ended up doing a long WBTB, as I had to wait for someone to come over and pick something up. Once I went back to bed, I found that it took me a long time to fall asleep again, until eventually I realized that the dream had started while I was focused on dozing off.

I'm sitting on the couch, and I can hear footsteps on the stairs. But I remember that I had just gone to bed, so I know this is a dream. I get up and walk to the front door, then pass right through the screen door since yeah, I don't need to open doors in a dream. Outside, the sky is a deep shade of blue -- nothing out of the ordinary, but I'm just blown away at how realistic this all is. I start to run down the street, feeling the stretch in my legs.

Down the street, I see a guy shooting baskets. I stop to watch him, and when he notices me, he acknowledges me and says "Hey."

"Hey," I say back, imitating him. I continue to watch him, with seems to make him a little self-conscious.

After a while, he asks, "Is there something you want?"

I have a crazy idea at this point and start unbuttoning my top as I repeat, "Is there something you want?"

His eyes almost pop out of his head as he says, "Oh."

I rub my breasts as I repeat his "Oh," except I turn it into a moan.

He races over, grabs me and we tumble into the grass as we make-out. It's pretty good, but I get distracted by something else happening. There's a police car that pulls over a guy right in front of my neighbor's house, and I'm trying to see what is going on.

I'm at work when I hear a call for back-up cashiers. I head up front to see where I can help, but I'm confused by what I see. There's only one line, even if it looks a little long, and there's cashiers milling around with nothing to do. I question whether they really need any back-up and I decide I might as well hop on the first open register. There's a woman with several kids who had dumped a pile of things directly on the scanner. When I ask if she needs help, she says that she's using the self check-out and doesn't need a cashier. But we don't have self check-out. I realize she's a little confused, so I ring up her items. She tries to pay by check, but she signs the top of the check instead of the bottom. Also, she's signed with two names, and one of them is Sandor Clegane? Something doesn't feel right about this. I ask her for ID, and she tells me that she doesn't have one but it's her husband's check, so we'll have to wait for him. And we wait. And wait… Her husband finally makes his way over at a snail's pace. He takes a look at the total on the screen, but refuses to hand over any sort of ID. Instead, he claims they haven't spent enough money! He then wants me to tell him all the sales this week so he can figure out what else to buy.

By now, I'm getting really angry at how this family is wasting my time. I consider voiding the transaction and walking away, but I'm really not sure I can get away with that. I try to remember what this week's promotions are, but I'm stumped. It must be the first day of the week, and I probably didn't get a chance to check the weekly ads. But we have sales circulars for reference at every register. I grab the one at my register, except instead of a circular, it's a binder covered with flowers. I see a wire rack with more circulars, so I run to grab one. But when I take a closer look, I realize that they're just magazines. At this point, I see S, the security guy, walk past me in his uniform. I call out to him since I haven't seen him for a while. He stops, but he seems to shrink about a foot in height. He turns around and I see it's actually T, another coworker from a completely different area (who is also about a foot shorter than S). I ask him why he's wearing the uniform, and he explains that he's just helping out while S is on vacation.

I still need to find that damned sales circular. I decide to try grabbing one from another register, but there's a little obstacle in my way: a pond. Yes, there's a pond in the store, apparently. It's about five feet in diameter and it's blocking my path to the closest register. Oddly enough, it looks just like the retention pond outside my old junior high school. I skirt around the pond's edge, but somehow I end up walking through the water. It's not very deep, barely coming up to my shins, but I can feel my feet sinking into the mud. There's a girl I don't recognize working on the register next to the pond. I ask her for a sales circular, and she smiles as she hands over her copy. But this isn't what I expected. For one thing, it's handwritten, and it's dated May 6th. None of this makes sense… because this is a dream. There's a moment where I'm full of indecision, not sure what I should do: tell the irritating customers to get lost or abandon this dream scene entirely by spinning.

Almost immediately, the dream starts to fade. I focus on the sensation of sinking into the mud and try to ignore my real body. It's a bit difficult, but eventually I'm back at my register with this crazy family still not finished checking out until I tell them what's on sale. I hit the void key, toss the void slip at them, and walk away. I've had enough of them.

I start walking the perimeter of the store to give myself enough time for the dream to stabilize. I'm joined by S as I walk. At one point, we come across a large crowd that's blocking our way. S barges ahead, but he transforms into yet another coworker. I watch his back as his uniform fades away and turns into a different shirt. The crowd grows thicker and keeps me from moving forward. I don't know how to get through this obstacle at first, then I have an idea. I shout, "HEY! PREGNANT LADY COMING THROUGH!" The crowd immediately parts. I look down and see that I am very, very pregnant.

The store fades away and I find myself in a hospital birthing suite, lying on a bed, preparing to give birth. There's no pain. In fact, there's no pressure or any other sensation that I would have expected. Really, I just feel happy that I'm finally about to do this. The baby comes out -- except it's not a baby I see, but a six-foot-tall man wearing swim trunks. He's very tan and has extremely light blond hair that looks like it's been bleached by the sun. He looks at me and says, "Bro, I've gotta catch some waves. See you later!" before taking off. I'm confused why he would call me "bro."

Next to me, someone says, "You know, I had hair that light when I was a kid." I look over and realize the man standing next to me is Benedict Cumberbatch, and I remember him saying something similar in an interview last year. He stands up to leave, and I see that he's wearing a tuxedo and carrying a top hat. I ask him to stay. Actually, I start pleading with him to stay, but he says he has an event to go to. Then I wake up.

My goal tonight was to try for the bonus task, but my subconscious had other ideas.

It's raining heavily. My friend Lura and I are walking down a street in my neighborhood when she spots something in the tall grass. She pulls two large tortoises out of the grass. They remind me of the giant tortoises I saw in the Galapagos Islands and I'm at a loss to explain what they're doing in the Midwest. Lura says we should call Sea World to pick them up.

The rain continues, and I duck into a car to write a letter to Sea World about the tortoises. I glance at my reflection in the window and find that I now look like Ellen Pompeo.

Somehow, I've moved on and now my sister and I are checking out an apartment building. This place is very bland-looking, and judging by the age of the residents, it looks more like a nursing home. As we pass one doorway, I point out to my sister that it's a laundry room. There are two older women in the next doorway who overhear me, and they point out that some units have their own laundry hook-ups. They invite us in to take a look. Somehow, I end up sitting down at their kitchen table as one of the women prepares breakfast. She offers me some milk, which I decline. That sends her on a rant about how young people don't drink milk anymore while I struggle to explain that it makes me sick.

After a brief awakening, I go back to sleep while mentally going over the previous dream

I'm back in the apartment building near the office. There are two residents who are arguing over the landlord over the cost of their phone bill. His response is to post some complicated chart with rates. I can't make sense of it, so I move on to find the apartment I was in earlier. But I get lost in the maze of hallways. I can't even remember the number of the apartment. I turn a corner and find myself in a department store. I see a crib for a baby and it reminds me of the bonus task, which helps me remember that I'm dreaming. I try to think of a way to start the bonus task, but instead the dream shifts. Now I find myself on stage with a band. In the audience are members of many of my favorite rock bands. I remember that the advanced task is to perform for an audience, so I decide that my band is going to cover one of my favorite songs. However, the guitar player starts off playing Jimi Hendrix's "Purple Haze." I panic for a second because I can't remember the lyrics, but after a few bars, I manage to go along with it. I can see the ex-drummer of my favorite band is sitting right up front, and his head is bopping in time to the music. He seems to be enjoying it.

I "wake up" to find that I was sleeping in church. I'm amazed that I managed to stay asleep long enough to accomplish the advanced task, even if that wasn't my original plan. My college roommate is sitting next to me, and she tells me that she's done packing her things. I go outside with her to her car to say good-bye. I'm amused to see that her car has front-end damage and the driver's side door has been ripped away. She never was a good driver. Meanwhile, my car is parked right next to hers and its in perfect condition. I can't remember if I've packed, so I grab a few bags from my trunk and head back inside the "church." Oddly enough, this place looks like my pantry. There's a woman there who reminds me to pack any food that I brought with me when I moved into the dorm, so I start filling my bags with the stuff I find in the pantry: two-liter bottles of soda, jars of marinara, boxes of pasta… There's one package of spaghetti that looks like it's gotten wet, leaving all the noodles limp. It dawns on me that uncooked pasta shouldn't look like this even if the packaging gets wet, and this time I wake up for real.

I went to see a movie today and got my first look at the trailer for "Maleficent" with Angelina Jolie, who seemed to be making recurring appearances in my dreams.

After driving through downtown Chicago, I'm staying in a lakefront house where one whole wall of the house is windows facing the shore. While exploring the house, I come across Angelina Jolie. She's wearing half of her Maleficent costume and seems pretty confused. She gives me a phone number to call to bring her tour bus to pick her up.

I woke up somewhere around four AM and decided to make a WILD attempt. I'm not usually as successful at these when I know I have to be up in a few hours, but apparently I'm on a roll this week.

I'm in a bar. I focus a little bit on stabilizing the dream, running my hands over the bar top and noticing details (where these rounded bullnose countertops?). I even drop a quarter in the jukebox and sit back as a Huey Lewis song comes on. I remember that one of the tasks is to do tequila shots with a DC. The first DC I come across, believe it or not, is Angelina Jolie. She seems like a cool person to have drinks with, so this won't be so back. We order a couple rounds of tequila shots with lime and salt. I haven't actually done this before, so it takes me a little while to figure out how to coordinate taking a shot before doing the salt and lime. Angelina is kind of amused at this. I start telling her about my problems at work and she listens carefully before suggesting that maybe I'm too good for my job. She talks a little bit about her kids and what baby products she found useful (since I sell baby gear). After a few shots, I suggest maybe I could come home with her and watch her and Brad have sex. This makes us both giggly and I wake up.

I'm on a cruise ship sailing into port. I'm lounging on the Lido deck and looking at the ship parked next to us, which appears to be from Royal Caribbean judging from the distinctive crown and anchor logo. Everyone else is buzzing about going ashore, and I should probably be getting ready myself, but where am I? I have no idea what port this is. I have an idea that feels brilliant: I'll check Google Maps on my iPad and see what my current location is. But it's not so simple. Google Maps takes forever to load, refuses to show my location, and seems really hung up on a landlocked plateau in South America. I give up and run to my cabin. There's a Costco reusable shopping tote on the floor, and I ponder whether it belongs to me or to one of my roommates. I'll have to see where I can get one for myself. I pop into the bathroom and use the toilet. I look out the window as I'm going -- and realize that this isn't a toilet, but actually a lounge chair on the balcony and people on the ship next to us are watching me pee. I look over and realize my stepmother is sitting on the lounge chair next to me, and she has a look of disgust on her face.

I must have started to wake up. The dream ended, but I realized I was still physically asleep while my mind was awake. I needed to take advantage of this!

I really can't remember my last dream (in fact, I didn't remember anything from the cruise ship until I got up later) but I can remember only one of the tasks of the month: use the Force. I picture an inflatable blue ball, sort of like a cross between a basketball and a soccer ball. I toss it around a bit using the Force to guide it up and down, back and forth. The ball deflates and one of my coworkers appears, a woman who is not that bright. She offers to show me where I can get an air compressor. I follow her until she finds the appropriate model. Then, using the Force, I shove her away and prevent her from saying any more useless things. Then I use the Force to insert the needle attachment into the ball, connect the hose to the needle, and telekinetically flip the on switch on the air compressor.

I feel that using telekinesis just isn't enough. I let the Force flow through me, and suddenly I feel thousands of Expanded Universe characters crying out in despair over being erased in the new movie. That's a shame. I really liked Jaina Solo.

I try to think of other things I want to do, and I see a door open. Inside are a couple of men wearing suits. I remember a dilemma I was having with my boss and I summon him out of the room. Then I use the Force to pin him against a wall and tell him, "You will approve my request to supply power to the display models in my department." He looks terrified and nods in agreement. I can hear birds chirping outside and realize I'm losing the dream. The problem with using the Force for everything is that my sense of touch helps me stabilize. I summon a light saber so I can grasp the hilt. Unfortunately, instead of a "real" light saber, I get my friend's toy light saber. I feel the plastic hilt and try to focus on summoning a more realistic light saber like one from the movies, but I wake up too quickly.

I'm on a tour of haunted cemeteries. A few things seem a little off. There's this house that shows up several times on the tour in different places, almost like the house is following me and keeps appearing every time I look over my shoulder. Another weird thing is that we're told that the haunted cemeteries are the ones where slaves are buried, and one of the first ones we visit has a wooden gate with the words "Slave Entrance" scratched onto it. Why would a cemetery need a separate entrance for slaves?

I start to wake up, but then remember that I need to stay still with my eyes closed. It takes a little while before anything appears, and I start counting to stay focused. I find myself at work. Remembering the tornado task, I step out through the back door and look to the east. The sky is sunny, but as I focus, storm clouds appear. Then I watch the tornado form in the distance. It comes towards me as the base widens. I listen for the sounds of the storm, remembering that it's supposed to sound somewhat like a train. Instead, I hear thunder and… is that the score from the movie "Twister?" I just watched that movie the other night, and I really did like the music. I reach out to measure the width of the tornado with my hands – and find myself back indoors, holding a coiled-up rug.

I put the rug down and find a flower pot. It's already filled with soil, and I drop a single seed into it. Nothing happens at first, so I wave my hands over the pot as if I can make it grow. A single stalk shoots out, followed by two more, but there's nothing on them. I force the shoots to retreat back into the soil and come back as something more interesting. The second time, it comes out with a single daffodil. Much better. I wonder if there's anything else I can get out of this that would be more interesting, so I send the daffodil back into the soil. On the third try, an oak tree starts growing out of the pot and shoots upwards. My first thought is that I should climb it, since climbing trees is something I've done before in lucid dreams but it's not something I can do in waking life anymore.

This tree isn't so easy to climb, as the branches are too far apart for me to get both a handhold or a foothold, but I manage to get up into it. I look up and see stars above me, which reminds me of the bonus task. Could I climb the tree all the way up into space? I start climbing higher, but I can't see to get far enough. I start waking up again, but I go back to counting to stay focused. My counting turns into a launch countdown as I sit in the cockpit of a space shuttle. I blast off into space, though I seem to have lost the shuttle somewhere along the way. I watch as the planets zoom past me, first Mars, then Jupiter and Saturn, until I get to my destination: the moons of Uranus. I picked this planet because its moons have Shakespearean names, and one of them happens to be my given name. I land on "my" moon, which seems awfully tiny. It's like I'm standing on a large boulder. I stay on it for three orbits around the planet. This starts to get a little boring after a while, so I start spinning to see where I end up at random. I find myself on the surface of a moon. This time, the moon is large enough that I can see the lunar landscape all the way to the horizon. The sky above me is dark and full of stars. I can even see Jupiter and at this distance, it's as large as the sun appears on Earth.

There's a space capsule on the surface, and I walk into it. There's an astronaut inside who is going about his usual routine. He looks at me, comes towards me, and, um, we get into some really kinky activities. While I am flipped over on my belly while the astronaut guy does stuff, I'm watching plants growing in a hydroponic bay. There are roses growing in a pot, and more rosebuds appear and bloom as stuff happens, which seems pretty cool.

I'm in a church. Little bags containing rosaries are passed around. As the congregation begins to pray the rosary, I take mine out of the bag and realize something's not right. My rosary has all the beads squished together with no spaces and it's much smaller than the ones that everyone else has. I start to recite the first prayer, but I get confused: is it an Our Father or a Hail Mary? Why do the words sound wrong when I say them? Why am I saying the prayer out loud and everyone else is praying silently?

I don't want to call attention to myself by saying the wrong prayer so I head to the back of the church, where there's a diner(???). I sit at the counter and call a friend, who wants to come meet me after the service is over. But in the meantime, she asks me to order her some "deep fried moo shu." Immediately, I think this is completely bizarre dish name. I'm sure the waitress behind the counter is going to think I'm insane for ordering, but she and the short-order cook don't even flinch.

I start thinking back to the deal with the rosary and the church service, and the scene shifts. This time, I'm in a hospital corridor. I walk into a room and see my dad in the bed, hooked up to machines. Now I know this is wrong because he's been out of the hospital for weeks. I know now that I'm dreaming, and I start spinning because I really do not want to be in this place.

At first, I find myself in some kind of subterranean chamber where the walls are made of packed dirt, but then the walls turn white and the diner counter appears in front of me. There's a square-shaped plate in front of me with Chinese food. I think of the Easter egg task, and brightly-colored eggs start appearing on the plate. I select a violet egg and open it. A tiny bird flies out of the egg, and when I look closer, I see that the egg also contains a large aquamarine set in a massive gold ring. Then I pick up a second egg, a light gray one with a snowflake etched in white. When I open it, a tiny frog jumps out and hops away.

I start trying to remember what the other tasks are and remember that one of them is to prank a DC. The diner fades away and is replaced by an office. I see a guy walking past me and ask him, "Hey, can you do me a favor and run down the street to get me a Diet Coke?" He agrees and steps outside through a glass door. As soon as he's gone, I lock the door so he can't get back in. But I realize that this is a pretty lousy prank, not to mention I can't be sure he'll come back in this dream. I turn around and see another guy, and think of the most basic prank I can remember. "Dude, your shoelace is untied," I point out, then snicker as he stops to check his perfectly-tied shoes.

The church service from earlier is still on my mind, and I wonder if it's due to my anxiety over Easter coming up (I'm not a practicing Catholic but I'll have to go take my Dad to Sunday Mass). I start wondering if I'll remember what to say at the right time. The next thing I know, I start making up my own creed: "I believe in evolution. I believe in making up my own mind on what to believe and letting others believe what they choose…"

I was really onto something there, but then the phone rang and woke me up.

Having not focused on lucid dreaming for a few months, I showed just how easily I can get back into practice by hitting two more in one night. Also, it looks like it helps if I do them on my day off when I'm more relaxed and able to sleep in.

…I'm standing in the front hallway. I know this has to be a dream because I was just in bed, and I confirm this by noting that the hallway seems larger and the closet seems smaller than usual. I wonder what I'll find when I turn around, and what I see is Michael Fassbender. (Yeah, at all those Fassy pictures on Tumblr before bed really paid off!) Oddly enough, he's wearing a priest's roman collar -- must be due to that interview I read about him wanting to be a priest when he was little. The first thing that comes to mind is that I want to give him my heart. How romantic, right? I try to reach into my chest. It's like there's a gap where I can get my hand through, but then I hit a bony plate halfway in that stops me from reaching my heart. I try to think of another way to get my heart out, including the possibility of reaching down through my throat. This is pretty gory stuff, actually. Not what I was thinking about when I set out on this task. I look over Michael's shoulder and there is Benedict Cumberbatch, all dressed up in his tux like he's going to some awards show. And as I look at him, my heart just floats out of my chest and into my hands. It's a large heart-shaped ruby that seems to be glowing. I give it to Benedict and he cradles it in his hands as he promises he'll take good care of it.

At this point, there was a noise outside that woke me up. I checked my watch and realize I have another two hours before I have to be up, so I roll over and try to go back to sleep for lucid dream #2.

I'm walking through work as I listen to "We Go Together" from the Grease soundtrack playing. Wait a second -- they don't play music at work. I see that there is an extra block of aisles where there shouldn't be one and I know I am dreaming again. I look at my hands to stabilize the dream, but my hands start flipping up and down, faster and faster until they're beating like a pair of hummingbird wings. The store disappears and I see a mountain appear, the same mountain that has shown up in a few previous dreams. I start to fly up towards the top but think to myself, "No, wait, I was supposed to do something else."

Returning to the ground, I see my coworker Kathy. I've noticed that she turns up in a lot of my dreams hanging out with my friends even though we barely speak to each other at work. I walk up to her and ask why she keeps showing up in these dreams. She tells me, "Because I represent the possibility. I represent what you could be if you would just open up and try harder." I'm not quite sure I'm satisfied with her answer, but I consider it for a moment. Then I decide to try something. I step into Kathy's body to see what it's like to be her. The mountain appears again, this time completely covered with snow. I remember the bonus task of the month and find myself on skis. I've never really skied before, so it takes me a little while to figure out how to start skiing up the mountain. I settle into a sort of cross-country skiing up the steep incline. I do have to pull myself along at times, but I make it to the top, where there's a flat ledge. Kathy is waiting up at the top and tells me that I did a great job. There's a guy waiting there, too, but I can't make out his face. He stands behind me, takes a linen suit jacket and wraps it around me to keep me warm. The jacket seems more like warm weather wear, though. Since it's not enough, he wraps his arms around me and pulls me closer. I wish I could see who he is because I know who I want it to be.

And then my cell phone rings, waking me up.

First time I successfully used DEILD! One thing I use sometimes when I'm having a dry spell is to review and old list of lucid dream goals, and one of mine was to visit Venice.

I'm not quite awake after the last dream ends when I decide I want to go for it and return to the dream. Instead of the restaurant I was dreaming of, I'm now walking through very deep snow headed towards a small building with white siding. It looks like a church. Outside the door, there's a man waiting for me. He's wearing a red sweater, his dark hair is cropped and he has a round face. There's something about the way he looks at me that makes me uncomfortable. He asks, "So, how have you been taking care of yourself?" It feels intrusive. I look down at the snow and wonder why I'm even here.

I try spinning and find myself in the upstairs hallway of my house, where the paint colors seem a bit more vibrant than I remember. Unfortunately, Creepy Sweater Man seems to have followed me home. I head downstairs and he follows me -- oooh, wait, those are really cool shoes sitting on the floor by the front door. Are those mine? I pick up one of them. It's a black wedge sneaker with all these metallic accents. I trace one of the metal pieces as I listen to Creepy Sweater Man trying to get my attention. Then I cut him off to ask a question: "Who is my soul mate?"

Without any hesitation, he answers, "Gerard Butler."

"I don't even know who that is! I've never seen any of his movies," I reply. I can't even picture what the guy looks like, and I get a little upset.This is not exactly the answer I was hoping for.

Creepy Sweater shrugs. "I really don't know anything. I just took a guess," he says.

The scene shifts, and now I find myself in a partially lit room full of pottery, and I'm holding a pair of vases. At least Creepy Sweater Man is gone. I'm right near a window, and when I look outside, I see that I am in Venice. I've always wanted to come here! I can see a canal just outside this building, and I race downstairs to get closer to the water. I come out onto a balcony that is about four feet above the canal. It has the feel of being in a video game where you have to navigate three dimensional levels on a 2D screen. I see a gondola waiting on the canal and I worry about how to get there, but then a ladder appears that allows me to climb down.

Once I'm in the gondola, the gondolier sets off and starts to sing "O Sole Mio." It's a song I usually enjoy, but today I'm a little impatient. I cut him off and ask, "Who is my soul mate?"

"The gentleman waiting at the bridge, he is your soul mate. You will see him soon," says the gondolier. I'm thinking that he means the famous Bridge of Sighs. I wonder how I'm going to meet someone there because there's no access to the bridge from the canal. As if the gondolier is reading my mind, he instead takes me to the Rialto Bridge.

I don't even remember getting out of the gondola as I'm in such a hurry to get on the bridge. As I'm climbing up the bridge, I can see Benedict Cumberbatch (an actor that I am very familiar with) waiting at the top. When I get to him, I ask, "Do you know who my soul mate is?"

He looks a little surprised by my question. "Darling, it's me," he answers before leaning over to kiss me. I'm so overwhelmed that I wake up.

This was a lucid dream that was a bit unexpected. I was having a lazy Sunday morning lingering in bed. I had already turned off my sleep tracker and was trying to review my last dream of the night (involving tea with a Tibetan monk) when I managed to fall asleep and re-enter it.

I'm back in the monastery, which is basically a rectangular stone room with a doorway leading outside. The monk is pouring tea for some kind of tea ceremony. One detail seems out of place -- my dad and sister are lingering near the entrance. I don't remember them being here in the previous dream. I pull out my phone and try to read an email in order to do a reality check. The text of the email doesn't make any sense at all. The room starts to fade a bit, so I try spinning to keep the dream going. The scene shifts to my workplace. I think about my goal, which was to accomplish two of the tasks of the month in one dream since I usually wake up right after finishing just one task. I realize that there's no way I can do any of the tasks at work, so I try spinning again.

This time, I find myself on a beach at the base of a mountain cliff. There's some dim light in the sky, but it looks like the sun has just disappeared behind the horizon. I decide that I'm going to write my name in the sand. First, though, I need to find a good place to do it. The strip of beach I'm on is very narrow, and there are waves washing up from both the sea and, oddly enough, there are waves coming in the opposite direction from the mountain. I walk down the beach until I found a wider stretch. Then I proceed to write my given name in the sand. The sand itself feels almost liquidy as I spell out my name. When I'm done, the sand starts to bubble like boiling water until my name is no longer there. It's kind of funny to me since I'm not really fond of my given name anyway. Once the sand settles, I go back and write my nickname "Thena" in the sand. I accidentally walk over the "n" and "a" at the end, but I'm able to fix them. This time, the name stays put.

I want to try one more task, and I struggle to remember the details of the volcano task. But when I turn to scan the horizon for a volcano, I find Obama standing right behind me. His proportions are a little bit off. He's only an inch or two taller than me (I'm barely 5' tall while I'm sure the real Obama is over 6' tall) and his head seems slightly larger than the rest of his body, like a bobblehead. I immediately start repeating, "Oh my god, I am so sorry." This isn't who I planned on punching when I first read the task! But I have to do it because I'm not sure when I'll get another chance. So I punch Obama with my fist making impact with the right side of his face. I don't think my punch has all that much power, but Obama reacts as though I really hurt him. He even spits out a tooth that was knocked loose. He gives me this icy glare as though he's really angry. Then he turns around and walks away.

I try again to remember what was involved in the volcano task, but I'm fuzzy about the details. I remember climbing a tree in a previous lucid dream just because I could, so this time I climb straight up the side of the cliff. When I reach the top, I look around for a volcano, but there isn't one. Then I dive off the cliff into the sea. I go straight down into the water before surfacing. This time, I see a sunny island right in front of me with a single mountain peak that dominates the whole island. There's smoke rising from the top, so I know this has to be an active volcano. Something that amuses me at the time is that I can even hear Hawaiian music. I decide that I'm going climb the side of the mountain, but it bothers me that I can't remember what I'm supposed to once I reach the top. But the sides of the mountain are so smooth and so perfectly sloped that it feels a bit like climbing up a slide. I end up sliding backwards and then wake up.

Went to bed at 2:25 AM (damn novel keeping me reading until the very end!). It took me 24 minutes to fall asleep, with minor awakenings at 4:45, 5:24, and 6:30. I was really restless around 8:30 AM. That was when I decided to do a WILD while half-awake, but I didn't think it was working. In reality, once I gave up I started dreaming.

I was at work. I had my new clear water bottle with me, and at one point I realized there were bubbles in my water. On closer inspection, there were bubbles coming from the bottom of the water bottle. I couldn't see anything that could be causing the bubbles. I showed it to a coworker, who checked her water bottle and found the same thing. We set both bottles down, side by side, and watched the bubbles. I laughed and said it was probably Thor's fault, because gods do this kind of thing, right? I was willing to bet Thor or Odin would pop-up at any minute. My coworker and I went down an access corridor back to the main sales floor. Just inside the door to the sales floor, there was a family with two small kids. I asked if they needed any help since I had a feeling that they were looking for the bathroom, and the woman said that they didn't. Then I told them that this was an employees only area and they would have to leave. The woman gave me a dirty look, and I moved on without checking to see if they left the access corridor. I took a quick glance around the sales floor, then I ducked into another corridor to make my way to the bathroom. It looked nothing like our work bathrooms. The stalls were stainless steel but looked really aged, as if they hadn't been cared for in years. There was dim light coming from a window but no interior lights. I was shocked to find another woman already there. I moved past her, went into a stall, and realized it was too narrow to even turn around. Then I woke up.

At this point, I wanted to try for a DEILD. But I was acutely aware of sweat beads rolling down my nose and the sounds of a garbage truck making its way down the street. Plus I really could not bring myself to re-enter that awful bathroom. I rolled over and figured that I'd probably blown it, but I wasn't willing to give up yet. I watched some of the HI, which reminded me of daisies, then clouds, until a solid image formed that I could interact with…

And the image that came to me was a young Tom Hiddleston with his pre-Thor curly hair. I remembered the task of the month was to hug the first DC you come across, so I told him, "Okay, I'm hanging onto you until I get my chance." He looked pretty confused. And then I realized that I had to engage more of my senses than just sight since I could still hear the damn garbage truck outside, so I went to touch Tom's hair. Actually, I did more than just touch -- I started running my fingers through his curls. Now he was really confused, although I saw the hint of a smile. His hair really wasn't very soft. It was very coarse and felt a little bit like straw, which was not what I expected. But it seemed to do the trick and the dream finally solidified around us. We were in the upstairs hallway, but where there was supposed to be a light fixture, there was a miniature version of the sun. It was way to bright to look at, so I rushed downstairs and outside. The sun was much less intense out here.

I still felt the need to touch things, and the grass seemed like the next best thing. I plopped down on the ground and started rolling around in the grass. Tom stood over me and laughed. Then an animal appeared next to me, and at first I thought it was one of the dogs. Instead, it was a sheep. I got up and plunged my fingers into the sheep's wool, which was really soft. And then, for reasons I couldn't understand, I ended up climbing onto the back of the sheep and riding it like a horse while Tom led the sheep down to the street. Then I directed him to take us to the local park. There was a field we had to cross to get to the park, and the grass kept getting higher and higher until it was brushing my knees. I looked up and saw mountains in the distance behind the houses. "Guess we're not in my neighborhood anymore," I said to Tom and the sheep. I trailed my fingers in the tall grass until I hit something gooey. It was like a little hill of -- cream cheese? Okay, that's weird. Fortunately, I see a nearby stream. I bend down and plunge my fingers into the water to clean them off. The stream becomes more of a fast-moving river with a steep bank, and Tom has to hang onto my feet to make sure I don't get carried away by the rushing water.

We find a bench and sit down. I can feel the hard bench underneath me and realize that I'm pretty much done waiting for this dream to feel real. I tell Tom about how much he means to me, how I started with "The Avengers" and then went back to watch all his movies, then all of the interviews he's done, and how I really appreciate him. He seemed pretty flattered. Then I asked if I could give him a hug and embrace him. At first, he seemed a little stiff, but then I felt his arms close around me. He grabbed my butt and pulled me closer while I rubbed his back.

And then someone rang the doorbell, the dogs started barking and there was no way I could block all of that out to stay in the dream.

So I keep having dreams about my evening and weekends job, which has been a little frustrating because I don't really like spending my waking hours there! Tonight, I woke up from another dream about work around 6 AM and attempted a WBTB, where I had this WILD.

I was back in the same scene where the previous dream left off, but at least this time I knew it was a dream. I looked around, seeing the whole store around me and letting the images solidify. Now, I had to have a little fun with it! To my left, I could see a manager and a group of coworkers gathering for a short meeting. I went over to join them, glancing down quickly to make sure that I was in my work uniform. Remembering the task of the month, I decided to rip it off. I didn't even get that far as my clothes simply disappeared. There was no discernible reaction from my dream coworkers. I started to walk away to see if I could find someone else who might react. I glanced down again and realized that I was now wearing a very skimpy blue bikini. Oddly enough, it seemed to fit me very well -- that really should not work on my body type. I started removing the bikini top, but that's when one of the the dogs jumped on the bed and woke me up.

Woke up at 6AM after nearly 7 hours of sleep and decided to attempt a WILD. I kept falling in and out of it, but I remained still and tried to follow where the images took me until it stabilized.

The image faded and then became solid and clear. I was now watching Severus Snape drinking from a tea cup. The room seemed to be bathed in a warm glow of light coming from behind Snape. It's not what I expected from the dungeons. The liquid in the cup looked much too creamy to be tea. It looked like a thick creamy soup with two red spots floating on the surface. I'm disappointed that he's not drinking a potion.

But I take a step back and see that at the other end of the table, there is a small rack holding some vials of liquid. The first one has a liquid that reminds me of the color of figs. It doesn't look particularly interesting. But the second is light orange in color. It fizzes and seems to emit light. Somehow, I am given that it contains Higgs Bosen particles. I take off the stopper and drink the whole thing. I start to feel a tingling sensation all over my body. Then it starts to feel like my muscles are starting to spasm.

Snape shouts, "You foolish girl! What have you done?" He forces me to drink the last potion in the rack. It's a pale robin's egg blue and seems to lightly shimmer. At first, I don't think it does anything. Then I feel like I am falling backwards. I fall through the floor and see myself passing through clouds. I stretch, and suddenly I have wings. I use them to catch an updraft and do a loop. When I reach the top of the loop, I realize that the transformation is complete — I am now a Pegasus, a winged horse. I fly through the clouds for a while, focusing on the way the air feels against my feathers. I seem to be white or light gray in color, though my wings have spots of color.

The clouds break at one point and I find myself flying over the Jefferson memorial on a very sunny day. I try to decide if I should land somewhere, but then I am swallowed up in clouds again.

Then Snape is back, and he's riding on my back. "Having fun?" he asks. I laugh. "Bet you've never flown like this before!" I tell him. He sneers and says, "I don't need a horse to fly." He leaps off, disappears into a flash of black ribbons of light, and is gone.

I try to follow him, but I find myself landing in the aisle of a warehouse store. The floors are made of cement and I focus on the clop clop sound of my hooves. Eventually I see a shape at the end of the aisle. As it comes closer, I see that it is an older woman wearing a yellow sweater. She seems pretty confused to see a winged horse in the warehouse store. After a moment of staring, she leads me to the end of the aisle. On a shelf, there is a black lacquer box. I have a strong mental image of using my hands to put carrots in the box. The woman gives me one of the carrots.

Snape reappears and leads me to the exit. The store is closed and there are big metal gates that have been lowered to block the doors. I simply relax and walk through them. There's a large parking lot outside, and I try to see if I'll have enough room to do a running take-off. Snape seems to have other ideas, though. He pulls one more vial out of his robes. This one has a potion that looks like mother-of-pearl. He gives it to me and I drink the whole thing. Suddenly, I am melting. I look up at Snape as I transform into a puddle of liquid on the floor. He is laughing the whole time.

This one's actually from yesterday. Let's hope it works.

Rough night to begin with, but it ended well after all. I got up at 5 AM to do a WBTB, except I couldn't get back to sleep. After trying for a while, I got up again at 7 AM. I got something to eat, watched TV for a while, and got some business out of the way. When I started feeling drowsy, I went back to bed.

I'm sitting on my sister's bed as she talks. She's complaining about the landline not working because the company hooking up the phones has no idea what they're doing, so we have to stick around until they send someone to fix it. I randomly start telling her about the Sodastream I bought a while back. She asks if it adds sugar to drinks. I try explaining that it depends on the drink mix and they make sugar-free ones, but she repeats her question about sugar as if she doesn't hear me. I lay down on her bed and tune her out as I start doze off.

Then I feel skin brushing against mine. I opened my eyes to see that I'm naked under the sheets, and that there's someone else in bed with me. At first, it looks like my long-term boyfriend, though he seems quite a bit pudgier than usual. Oh, and he's naked, too. I scoot a little closer, but then it hits me that my sister's bedroom is really weird place for the two of us to get it on. I start thinking back to the weird conversation with my sister and realize that this has to be a dream.

I sit up, but now I'm in my parents' bed. Worse, my dad is entering the room and screaming about catching me with my boyfriend, who quickly vanishes. And I'm still naked! This seems like it's quickly turning into a nightmare, but at least I maintain lucidity instead of panicking. I remember the task of the month and spot the small mirrored detailing on the headboard. I try to push through one of the tiny mirrors and get rejected -- not that I could put more than a finger through it anyway.

I jump out of bed and run to the nearest place I can hide, which turns out to be Dad's closet. He follows me and continues to yell. I need to get out of this situation. Opposite the closet entrance is bathroom vanity with a sink. Above the sink, there's a mirror. I'm still a little cautious after my last experience with a mirror, so I want to test it. I grab a jar off the counter and throw it. I'm expecting the mirror to shatter, but instead, the jar bounces off like a rubber ball hitting concrete. I take a running leap and dive headfirst into the mirror.

Passing through the mirror is much easier than I expected. I find myself falling through blackness at first, but then there's a lot of light. I land in the waters just off the beach of a tropical island. It looks so beautiful, like it came out of a picture postcard. My sweetie appears next to me, floating on an inflatable raft with his sunglasses on and a tropical drink in his hand. He smiles at me and says that he's been waiting for me, but he knew he wouldn't have to wait long. He had faith that I'd be able to do it.