Dave B. is in financial trouble, maybe with the mob. I'm introducing myself to one of his lawyers, a woman, and I say, "DB is my brother-in-law; my sister is his wife."

I have purchased SV's house. I had apparently been renting it before, or living in it somehow, but when I come home, this is the first time I've come to it actually owning it, not staying in it as either a guest or renter.

I come home and open the windows--they're like French windows that open inward like the pages of a book, the one on the right is behind a small wooden or metal chest of some kind that's sitting in the deep windowsill. Then I open a drawer in a table beside a chair and put a notepad and pen inside, which is another indication that I now own all this, rather than borrowing it.

There's another pad and pen lying on top of the desk, which I know must belong to SV; I decide I'll leave it there a little while, but soon, I'll be able to remove it and either put it away or throw it away.

I'm talking to D, just chatting, and I suddenly realize that every time I've sent him a letter, I've only put one regular stamp on it, just like the other bills and letters that I mail. I remember that if I was sending more than just one sheet, I would weight it at the post office and put on the right amount of postage, but just for a one-sheet letter, I'm sure that he's been receiving them postage due, if he's been receiving them at all.

I tell him, and apologize, and he shrugs as if it's no big deal, and says he doesn't mind.

I'm talking to Bob and other people in his family, and I see M walk by. I say, under my voice, to Bob, "M's walking?" and he shrugs and says, "Yeah." No one told me! and I rush after him to ask what's up, and he starts to tell me, and I wake up.

I was driving in my parents' neighborhood, and I saw police snipers setting up just off the street on McClendon, and as I drove on down the street, I saw police shoving my brother into the storm sewer for protection. My two sisters were at home, I knew, and my brother appeared as a child.

The police wouldn't let me go down our street to get to our house, so I had to go to someone else's house; someone was nice enough to let me come in and stay there. They had apparently just moved in, most of the rooms were empty. I noticed a diamond ring on a desk and thought they were very trusting, with strangers in the house, and thought briefly about taking it, but didn't, of course.

In one of the rooms was a "cattery"--a large polished wooden armoire with doors that opened outward from the center. Inside were shelves filled with cages and cats--I counted them, there were twenty, all tabbies with furry, fat faces. And one capucin monkey. I can't remember, but apparently the cats had something to do with the monkey, they were required if you had a monkey, or something.

I want to leave and go home, but I still can't. I tell the people that I guess I'll leave and go the other way, toward work.

I'm in the hospital for some kind of minor surgery; Ann and Lynn are in the room joking and laughing, and after they leave I say something to the (male) nurse about him probably being glad they've gone, but he says, "You're lucky to have them here," and I realize he's right. He asks me about my dad, asks what he does, and I say he's retired now, but he used to be a draftsman/tool designer/checker at Bendix, and then I can't remember if that's right, if that's the last company he worked for. [I realized after I woke up that I think the name changed (or was taken over) to/by Allied Signal.]

The nurse gives me a couple of small pills (like the pills I really take in the mornings, and then a handful of larger pills (like the vitamines I really take), and a glass of water. I say, "Am I supposed to take them all at once?" and he says to try. So I do, and get most of them, but there are three little pink and white pills at the bottom of the glass, and I joke about how it's bad when you get the ones that float, and he says just to drink the rest of the water and they'll go down that way.

[I had been talking to JB at work about taking handfuls of pills at once--that I had been able to train myself to do it, when I used to not be able to take more than one pill at a time.]

I had been working on the HE newsletter, and there was something wrong with it. No one was talking to me about it, though, they were just talking about it amongst themselves. I said, if it's wrong, just tell me and I'll fix it, don't just run around ans act like I can't hear you."

I had apparently used (embedded?) a font that not everyone would have. The newsletter is displayed on an easel, and it's animated--I'm proud I figured out how to do it, but no one has noticed.

I was sitting at someone else's (Dave's) desk who had the same computer as me; they were new and we had gotten them at the same time. I start gathering up my stuff to go back to my own desk. There was a stack of Wired magazines on the desk, and some Wired calendars. Someone comes by with the mail, and there are bills from Wired, one addressed to Barb.

Someone tells me to go into the next room, that there's a surprise for me. It's a Christmas party--someone walks up to me with a dish shaped like a camel, full of cigarettes, and I think they expect me to take some.

The food is odd, although I know there was a professional chef--there os pasta, but the noodles are still in their packages, having somehow been steamed in situ, and the red sauce and white sauce are mixed in the same dish.

I reach over Lisa S. and someone else at a table to fork up some peeled, sliced oranges and grapefruit; it's the last of it, and I feel bad, but everything else is so strange . . .