Ambien and Behavior Modification Promote Weird Dreams

So here I am, sitting here with my first cup of coffee at 7:26 AM. I'm in the usual spot - Z's sweet computer with his way yucky uncomfortable blue fake-suede wingback. I just rolled out of bed a little while ago after tossing and turning since 5:45, after waking up from an awful dream.

I can't really figure out what is going on in my subconscious. I know this is kind of a weird period right now - Jobless and fixing to be completely $$less; Just quit smoking but on the patch which I don't really understand how that is like quitting - I just have more time to ponder how I could be outside smoking; Going to a job interview and contemplating giving up my new-found sense of family values to again go work a gazillion miles from home and never see my kid or Z.

Whatever. Oh, and I took an ambien last night. I'm not sure what the deelio is there, but lately if I take one I am staggering like a drunk after about 45 minutes. Nice, because it knocks me out. However, this stinking Henry VIII tome I've been reading to sleep sure hurts in the morning when I find it on top of my nose.

So here is our dream for the third day of 2007:

I walk into my kitchen and start freaking out. All over the countertops lie paper bags from several fast food restaurants - Krystal, McDonald's, Burger King. Inside they are jammed packed full of cheeseburgers and french fries. They are uneaten but the paper surrounding the burgers is cold, and you can tell they've been sitting there a couple of hours. They don't quite have that greasy stale smell yet, but you know it's coming. The fries look shrunken and hard.

Surrounding the paper bags are 4 or 5 used ketchup packets, twisted and mishappen in that weird way old-time aluminum packets get. Little dribbles of hardened ketchup line the surface of the packet opening. There isn't any ketchup on my countertop, thank god, but the sad shape of those nasty little used sauce packets is giving me a hernia.

I start yelling as I try to wrap up the food and put it in the fridge. I'm not sure why - neither Z or I will eat leftovers from restaurants. But it's the principle. There are at least 15 burgers here and some starving kid in Africa would die for one, I know it.

The microwave is looming. I just know it's dirty because I did something bad to it the other night when I was making spanakopita. Let's just say that butter explodes. So in my deep-seeded need for cleanliness I'm prepared to attack it with my greased lightning bottle and a thing of Parson's ammonia, if necessary. I don't care if Z is allergic to the stuff. Damn it...this is a crisis. I open the super-duper microwave door (this thing is big enough to stick a 20 lb. turkey inside) and discover a nasty old uneaten large sausage pizza. The surface of "Dead Pizza", as we like to call it around here, resembles a flattened pancake of lipids after it's pulled out of your ass through a liposuction tube. The little sausage pieces look like itty bitty puppy poodle droppings hidden under the layer of cream colored fat. I grab the pizza by the hard, thin rim of crust and throw it onto the floor face-down. More screaming ensues.

I run into the office to yell at Z while he's on the computer playing that stupid game. Inside, I discover a whole new set of furniture lining the walls - a few tall bookcases and two 11 ft. stacks of drawers, boxed haphazardly up to the ceiling. I start yelling at Z about the food and the mess and then the office and he stares at me blankly. I yell some more, and he tells me to calm down there isn't anything wrong or different about our living space.

Running back into the kitchen, I want to prove to him that my own eyes see a very different story how dare he challenge my perception, damn it. I notice that there are now burger crust crumbs and lettuce slivers and McDonald's special Big Mac sauce on my countertops. I just cleaned those f&ckers yesterday. I also see a bag containing an assortment of other odd items, like Scope, Gillette razor blades, and an Amy Lee CD. I grab the CD and run back into the office. Chucking the CD on the bed, I start yelling and moaning about how I can't believe he just bought a CD because I gifted him new CDs for Xmas and I know he hasn't listened to them all yet. I start hearing the sound of Amy Lee's singing and I know my face is turning purple and blotchy I'm so angry.

Awake.

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So tell me I'm just going through some cigarrette behavior modification issues. Or that I'm under stress. I made Z come hold me when I woke up, and I described the dream to him. He told me he felt like I'm angry with him about something. So I admitted the trash can issue I had in the dream the prior night (he changed the bag when it wasn't full).

I know that all of the little subthemes of this dream represent things I absolutely hate. I won't eat fast food when it isn't hot, and the sight of fast food trash makes me vomit a little in my mouth. Something about greasy food makes me think about the unclean greasy people who must have prepared it and eaten it.

Having a dirty kitchen drives me apeshit. I know I'm the only one who cleans it, and I don't do a very good job, but I can't stand to see anything on the counters. That's my prep space, dammit, and it better be ready for chopping food. Which I'm thinking about doing right now since I have this authentic tofu waiting in the fridge.

The items in the bag on the counter are all things I can't stand either. I grew up on listerine - the yellow kind. My great-grandmother annually gifted my Dad with a bottle wrapped in tissue paper with those ugly ribbon strings on each end. As a result, this was the only mouthwash I was exposed to. Besides, I have this deep belief that mouthwash is for people who don't properly brush or clean their mouths. Eww.

Anyway, Z swears by Scope which is outrageously expensive and smells bad. He won't use the generic kind he swears it's different. I'm not sure if he's aware of the true mechanics of generics - THEY ARE THE EXACT F&CKING SAME THING THEY JUST DON'T HAVE A NAME BRAND ON THEM. I'm not kidding. I saw it on Reading Rainbow when I was little.

Gillette razor blades. I'm not sure if their animal testing policies are the same, but they were the biggest offender for a long time. If you know me, I'm one of these subversive tree-huggers who refuses to purchase products that piss me off. Animal tested cosmetics are one of them - that's just vain and stupid. Besides, I'm not sure if you caught the Bloom County segment where the penguin finds his mother in a Mary Kay facility (?) They're shaving the little bunnies' butt hair off with razors, and applying some kind of Sea Breeze like astringent to see if it burns.

So there you have it. Welcome to some fun-loving Wednesday insanity. Welcome to your regularly scheduled programming.











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