Family BBQ and Race

There was a Moiseff - Trudelle dual family BBQ that had been planned for months and was taking place at the Priory.  Part of the days events included a race.  There were probably about 50 people involved, so more than just our two families.  The race was a total of 10 miles, but was not just a straight running race.  After the first half mile or so there was a competitive eating component to it.  I got to that part, and my task was to eat one box of chocolates and chug a beer before I could continue.  I felt fortunate that I only had to eat chocolates.  It was a lot easier than some other people's.  I kept trying to leave without finishing my beer and chocolates.  Some judges were there and would make me go back until I finished.  After another quarter mile, there was a long line of racers for the rope-swing component of the race.  I showed up to that part in about 20th place, and was irritated with myself for feeling so out of shape.  I also felt like this part of the race was pointless, since people were just standing in line, negating their previous efforts.

I started swinging on the rope swing, which started out pretty tame, just over a grassy hill.  Before long, I was swinging very high in the air, inside a huge auditorium, that was more like an airplane hanger.  I was up near the top of it, swinging in huge circles high above the floor as I held on with just my hands to the rope.  Nobody seemed to notice or care.  As the rope wrapped more and more around the pole in the middle, I got scared that i'd just slam into the pole at the end.  I was going faster and faster.  Somehow I landed on the floor and was unhurt. 

Then I was biking through Portola Valley with my friend Nick (from the first part of the dream).  As we rode past what is currently the retirement community, it had been converted to a church.  The church was on private land, so you couldn't see it that well.  It had a lot of ceramic statues on the grounds.  A little further on, where there is currently a big open field, and the Windy Hill open space preserve, was a ton of ugly industry.  Piles of dirt and cement lay around in gray rain.  Dump trucks drove around to quarries.  In the background, a lyric "city of the damned" from the background vocals in green day's american idiot musical kept playing as we biked through.

Then we went to a 49ers vs SD Chargers game.  It was raining a little, but warm.

Out of control Elevator

I was in San Diego, it was warm.  I was at USD and back in my freshman dorm, but it was different.  It had been re-done and was nicer.  I pressed 4 in the elevator to try to go to the 4th floor.  The elevator started going up, but then it didn't stop and the door wouldn't open to get out.  We went past the 4th floor up to the 5th floor, and then immediately started going back down, only much faster, so that we were floating in the elevator.  When we got to the ground floor, all of us (me, my friend Muller, and a few people I didn't know) would crash to the ground.  Nobody got hurt, it was just annoying that the elevator wouldn't work properly.  It kept doing that - we'd go up really fast past the fourth floor, then all the way back down, floating as if weightless, to the bottom.

Later,  my friend Chris and I we were walking around in the woods on the fringe of campus.  We were going to climb a fence to help a scruffy and homeless college kid who lived in a drainage pipe.  When we tried, he warned us that he had killed many people, and we shouldn't come any closer.  While we were pretty scared of the guy, he all of a sudden put his backpack on and started walking with us to campus.  He remarked at the new buildings and how nice they were, and how he hadn't seen them in years since he had been living in that drainage pipe.  At night, I was walking around.  It was drizzling, but not cold at all.  I walked by the soccer field in the valley, which is just used for recreation and is not the main soccer field.  I walked by, and it had been set up for the Womens NCAA title game.  I didn't watch the game, but it was Penn State against UCLA, and Penn State won.  There could only have been a few hundred people able to see the game.

A Tropical Vacation

Part 1:  Rachel and I were on vacation.  It was somewhere warm, and our place was right on the water.  The water came up to and underneath the room that we were staying in, so that we could have jumped from our balcony right into it.  We were only a few feet above the water, and  it was very very blue.  And very sunny.  We were in a resort or hotel, but there was nobody else around.  No neighboring rooms, hallways, checking in, etc...  Outside our room, dolphins swam by.  One of my colleagues, Brian, rowed a very small boat past our room.  I was in the room, but he was telling me how great the fishing was and how many fish he'd caught.  I let him know that I thought that was great, but I'm hanging out with my wife right now.  Later, Rachel and I were in one of those boats.  We were inside a very large rock cave that was well lit, so you could see how blue the water was and easily see everything around you.  The whole row over there we really hadn't seen anyone at all.  It was like this big beautiful area with almost zero people.   Brian rowed up to us again and held up a bag of fish, and went into detail on how successful his methods had been in catching him fish.  I looked at the bag, and saw they were small fish, like mackrel or something.  Part 2: Was at the cafeteria at USD talking about the Giants with my friend Nick. Part 3: I accidentally dialed the number for our pastor at 3:00 AM.

Bees and Whirlpools

I was at my parent's house in Portola Valley.  Miles was older than he is now, maybe 18 months.  He went outside and walked under the trampoline in the back yard.  My cousin's kids and their friends were jumping on the trampoline, so I told them to stop so that they wouldn't hit him.  All of them stopped right away except for my cousin's daughter, who was purposefully not stopping.   I had to sternly tell her again to stop so that Miles wouldn't get hit.  Then I felt bad for cracking down on her.

Next, I started getting stung by bees that lived in the walnut tree by my parent's back yard.  Every time I went outside, I'd end up getting stung.  The bee would get bigger and bigger every time.  I stopped going outside after awhile.   A lot of people gathered on the baseball field behind my parents house to witness a phenomenon.  At first I thought it was the bee thing, but it turns out, there were whirlpools that would appear and then disappear.  Each one was bigger than the next one.  The last one I remember was so big that most of the infield was covered with water.  I was out there, and looked back to where all of the water was draining to.  It was flowing to under the porch of my parents house, where there was a big pit.  We could see clearly into it because the porch was cut away and there were lights shining down into it.  The pit had a character that lived in it that I'd describe as a sinister / borderline evil King Triton.  It appeared that he was the lord of these massive whirlpools.

Green Day and Ping Pong

I was hanging out with the guys from Green Day.  They had been in a plane crash but had survived.  Billie Joe was describing what happened as we walked through the scene.  The plane had been flying at a very very low altitude and was either connected to or following the path of a chair-lift type system - essentially green metal towers with metal cables that were stuck into the ground.  There was wreckage and mangled metal all over the place.  As he described, not long after takeoff the wings fell off.   The plane was still flying without wings, so  a helicopter came in and had a claw like device that grabbed the fuselage and tried to fly with it in it's clutches.  Eventually, it was too heavy for the helicopter to carry, so it crashed in the green hills of northern CA.  Everyone was ok.

Part 2
I was at USD and it was nice and warm.  I was dressed casually in jeans, but wasn't wearing any shoes.  Since it was warm though, the ground felt great and it didn't bother me.  Some people were showing me around campus, which had changed since I went there.  When we went to the gym, I was instructed to stand in line for ping pong practice.  The coach was playing another student, and really exerting a lot of effort.  It was an intense match, and the coach was winning.  It turns out, the coach was one of my former customers from work.  As I waited in line to take my turn at ping pong, one of the other guys in line told me that this is actually Harvard, not USD.  And it's required that everyone play a sport, so the guys that play ping pong do it because it's the least amount of required practice and there's really no stress.  After ping pong I went to the library.  They were only allowing you to read one book at a time.  I remember standing under some banners that had pictures of old works by authors with the same last name as me. 

A second Chili Peppers Show in Seattle?

Part 1

The Red Hot Chili Peppers were coming back to Seattle for another show.  (They just played here a few weeks ago, then went to Canada, so I dreamt they were coming back on their way back into the USA).  Again, I had suite tickets for the show.  I was with my friend Shawn.  We were driving to see the show on I-5 by 85th in my accord.  It was dark out already and there was a ton of traffic.  It turns out, there was some sort of border crossing right there.  Everyone was either getting out of their car to walk, or just waiting out the long line.  Shawn and I got out of my car to start walking to the show.  It was an exciting scene, everybody was looking forward to the concert.  As we approached the police at the border, I asked Shawn where Miles was.  He said "oh he's asleep so we just left him in the car seat."  This bothered me quite a bit, because we just left the car in a massive traffic jam in the middle of the freeway.  It wasn't even officially parked in a lot or on a street. And my son was asleep in it, unsupervised.  I immediately said that I can't go to the show, and I started making my way back to the car.  I gave my ticket to Shawn to sell.  He posted it on facebook and it sold really quickly to someone that I went to elementary school with.  When I got to the car, Rachel was there with Miles, so everything was fine.  I couldn't get my ticket back so I hung out with them in the car.

Part 2

I was at the Priory pool, playing some games with my brothers and sisters and some people that I didn't know.  The pool had been nicely set up for a swim meet and had all the flags.  People were doing synchronized diving from dual diving boards.  I started swimming across with width of the pool, holding my breath underwater.  A bunch of people started following me.  We were passing right underneath the  serious swimmers that were swimming laps, and trying not to run in to them.

A business appointment that went wrong

I had an appointment to meet with someone about a loan.  They requested that I meet with them at their condo, which was on the 94th floor in a building in downtown Seattle.  It was dark when I headed over there.  When I got there, it seemed to be the same building as the downtown Marriott, which I only knew because the building is shaped like a tall cylinder.  I got into the elevator and pushed 94.  The ride up was taking awhile, and I realized that I didn't have my tie on yet.  I stopped the elevator at a lower floor and got out to tie my tie.  I don't remember getting back in the elevator but somehow I was inside someone's condo (with my tie on) and it was the wrong person.  It was about 6:00 on a weeknight, and there were a few people in there, having drinks and smoking.  They had a beautiful view of the whole city but didn't seem to notice or care.  I remember thinking to myself that they must not work.  Whatever the case, they weren't the people that I had the appointment with.  I apologized and started out towards door, but they got really mad and started yelling at me.  They said I had trespassed on their property.  I don't know why I didn't just continue leaving, but instead I got down on all fours and kind of started to cower as they just kept berating me.  They said they were performing a citizen's arrest on me.

Prince Harry and Yogurt

Was hanging out with Prince Harry.  He was about a foot taller than me.  He wore huge armor on his legs made out of wood, kind of like a catcher's shin guards and was generally a good guy.  Then my friend Andrew and I were talking about me investing in a Menchie's yogurt franchise.