Dream Journal: Spying on a Competitor

I am discussing some technical stuff with a bunch of engineers. I suddenly realize that I am at a competing firm and proprietary information is being revealed. I need to figure out how to extricate myself without creating an ugly scene. I turn to quietly leave but someone in the crowd recognizes me. He's Gordon Lee, a guy haven't seen since high school. He asks me about what I've been up to, etc. and I carefully tell him everything except for the fact that I don't work at his company. I'm a little annoyed he's here because he's bringing attention to me and he was supposed to be a dentist. I finally slip into a dark room and try to be real quiet so everyone will leave. I think I am in the clear when a woman opens the door and looks in. Because the room is dark and I am crouching in the corner she misses me. I get out of the building through a sewer duct and find myself on the side of a mountain in the middle of the desert. It's going to be a long walk.

Dream Journal: My Next Game?

I dreamt about an 8-bit game. The game switched between a side scroller and an up-down scoller (like Gradius or Lifeforce). However, the theme of the game was a bunch of guys who were running away from gangsters. So instead of shooting stuff that appears from the top of the screen, you are basically dodging people who are chasing behind you. One of the levels in the game was inside a mall where the two characters on the screen are on skis and are running away from a mob of people behind them. Somehow I associated this scene with a similar scene from Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure which I had just seen over the weekend. The ending of the game seemed weird though I can't remember it.

Another Four Hour's Worth of Work... Barely Noticeable (And My Calves are Killing Me!) 

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A Less Cynical SWEC Picnic Poster 

My Arm Hurts

Six months ago, I could still throw a football around with my 13 year old cousin, Brian. Today, he threw the ball (in a pretty tight spiral, I might add) that went about 5 yards above my head and landed 20 yards behind me. I threw from that spot back to him and the football landed 15 yards short. I'm getting old.

Dream Journal: Apocalypse is Nigh

I would worry about the prophetic powers of my dream except for the fact that Macaulay Culkin was the "star" of my dream. So I was dreaming about a movie not a real world event soon to happen (I'd stock up on guns and clean drinking water just to be safe if I were you).

Anyway, my dream started with a mysterious code being disseminated on the Internet. No one can figure out where the code is coming from so everyone is curious to break the cipher and figure out the hidden message. However despite the efforts of the world'd best and brightest amatuers, the code remains unbroken. The United States gets interested so it assembles a crack team of cryptographers to settle the matter once for all. The team is of course headed by Macaulay Culkin. Interestingly enough, Doogie Howser, is also on the team so this is a team of crack ex-child stars as well. Anyway, part of the code turns out to be a treasure hunt of sorts so the team heads from point to point all over the world. The last checkpoint is in a pyramid under the sea. When the final door is opened, the team finds what seems to be a number of empty nuclear missle housings. It turns out that this was just a plot by Al Qaida to distract the world's best minds so that they could place nuclear devices all over the world. In the middle of the room is a countdown timer. The timer itself is encrypted and when the team deciphers it, it turns out they only have about 30 seconds left. The last scene is Macaulay Culkin doing his famous pose.

From Bitter Rant to Reality... The SWEC Summer Picnic Poster 

Dream Journal: Porcupine Asparagus

We're having a family dinner at a Korean BBQ restaurant. There is a grill in the middle of the table and the waitress takes out a huge platter of rib eye steaks with a plate of hamburger buns. We cook the steaks on the grill and warm up the buns but when we taste them, they taste bland. The steaks are left untouched after a few bites. I walk out to the courtyard to get a breath of fresh air. I see a bunch of asparagus hanging on a rope . I find that strange, so I take the asparagus and examine it. The asparagus has been grilled and looks ready to eat for someone. I guess that someone is me. I take a huge bite of the tied up bunch at the spears and to my horror it seems that this is a wild variety of asparagus and each thorn in the spear tip is as sharp as a rose's thorn! When I open my mouth and look in the mirror, I find that the entire bottom of my mouth is lined with these thorns that have embedded tightly into my mouth. I panic and try to think of what to do. I decide to stick out my tongue really hard to increase the blood flow and force the thorns out that way. It works slowly. However, when I'm done, my mouth is full of blood.

Bitter Rant: Coworkers Don't Appreciate the 80s

I attended the summer picnic committee meeting for my company with big hopes of pitching an awesome Back to the 80s Theme. When theme picking time came, I heard some rather lame suggestions being thrown out. So imagine my surprise when my 80s suggestion was met with the silence that only indifference could make. Ok, I'm not saying that the 80s idea was perfect. I also understand that my particular age range has created a sort of rose colored filter for that time period. It is like my kryptonite, man. But I don't understand how my fellow employees think. One would believe that since we are all intelligent, rational thinking engineers that we would make intelligent, rational decisions. So how in the world could 18 people vote for a Disneyland theme over the 80s?!

That's fine. If this company can't appreciate the 80s then it doesn't deserve it!

Dream Journal: My Dad Makes Horrible Pancakes

I'm about to leave for work. I pass my pops in the kitchen making himself a breakfast of fried rice or chow fun or something. When he's done, he decides to makes use of the hot oily wok by dropping in some pancake batter. He makes about a half dozen 3 inch pancakes and throws them on top of his fried rice. He asks me if I want a pancake and as I'm intrigued. I give it a try. They taste horribly bland and watered down. My dad's dream of opening a Roscoe's Fried Rice and Pancakes is crushed.

Dream Journal: Who Missed Who

I caught this browsing through Shockwave.com. Anyway watch this movie:

Who Missed Who?

and tell me how you interpret the ending. There is one interpretation which is creepy but does not quite make sense and another where the woman is making a certain statement about old men. I'm leaning toward the former.

Dream Journal: A Big Drop at Disneyland

I'm at Disneyland with Ngoc and my family. We are done with the park and are on our way out. We pass by an innocuous looking roller coaster with no line so I suggest we get on one more ride before we leave. My sister and I hop onto the lead car and the coaster gets going. To my utter horror, it turns out that after we cross the first bend, there is a 200 foot drop straight into a lake. The track just ends right before water so your car just dumps you into the drink. We are going so fast that when I hit the water, I end up bottoming out about 20 feet into the lake. I don't know how to swim but I somehow manage to kick my way back to the surface where I see my sister also treading water. I am worried about Ngoc (she's scared of heights) and my parents and look around for them. I see them standing by the side of the lake dry as a bone. Turns out they never got on at all and are laughing at us.

Dream Journal: A Scene from The Sun Also Rises at CPK

I'm inviting a bunch of people to dinner at a CPK in the mall. I don't recognize most of them but they are my supposedly close friends. We all arrive and begin ordering when my old pal from college, Brian, walks in. I am surprised because I don't remember inviting him but I quickly make as if there were no mistake and sit next to him and start chatting. However, the lady sitting right next to me is clearly annoyed that Brian is here as she gives the impression that they are out of Brian's class. This confuses me as I'm not sure how I got mixed up with these people (and how high class can you be if you're eating dinner at CPK?). Anyway, she makes snide remarks for the next few minutes until it infuriates me to the point where I make a big scene at the restaurant. I apologize to Brian and ask if he would like to head down to the food court for different fare (Hot Dog on a Stick anyone?).

Prep Work Before Painting My Bathroom

My bathroom has totally been pwned by mold and mildew. In addition, parts of it are peeling off and looking pretty gross. Before I get to paint it nice and smooth again, I gots to do me some prep work. Scraping through four layers of neglected paint is hard, hard work, though. I spent nearly all Sunday afternoon scraping and all I doubt I got more than 20% of that crap off. That is even after I drove to Home Depot to get myself some heavy artillery, a heat gun. I figure at this rate, by the time I'm done, the mold would have evolved to a high level of lifeform and crawled (or swam or flew) away.

By the way, contrary to what you may think the respirator is not for protection against dust and airborne mildew. In actuality I have a terribe phobia of being attacked in my bathroom by a sarin armed Japanese cultists. Damn the Internet and its uncanny ability to affect us impressionable pilgrims in search for spirituality.

One day's worth of work, scraping my mildew infested bathroom.