Zodroyth

I am with an ill-defined a.n.other on a dark and dusty plain, the sky all brooding clouds, a chill wind blowing. All we can hear is the pained mewling of a cat, a horrible sound that makes one's blood run cold. Ahead of us, slowly emerging from the gloom, seems to be the hull of a boat supported on huge great timber stilts that are set into the sand(?) along either side - it sits up off the ground and has a flat bottom of sorts. It seems this pained screeching is coming from under the boat – it's taken us some time to home in on the source, a task that has caused us much anxiety. There in the darkness appears to be a cat, hunched down and near-invisible in the half light. Soon enough it emerges, a horrible one-eyed creature, its hair dirty and matted, and practically trundles (like K-9) along on its haunches, terrorising us-

I am at the (grand) home of Dee, one of the front-of-house security guards at my current work. I am in a large purple hued (living) room and using a fat Sharpie marker I am drawing sweeping curves on his sofa, trying to follow the line of the folds and creases in the blue patterned fabric. Quite what has possessed me to do this I do not know – Dee has a fearsome temper – and I simply stare at and examine the material, unsure if my act of (well-intentioned?) vandalism will remain undetected for long-

I meet Dee's (dreamescape) wife Penelope as she emerges from their (old fashioned, traditional) kitchen. She is very petite and mild mannered, her dark hair drawn back in a ponytail. She wears a very pretty light purple evening dress that plumps out from her hips down (a la Dorothy from Oz)-

Kellmdam

I am out for lunch with my old work colleague Gee Ess – indeed, this is if if we are still in our previous employ – and 2 a.n.others (of which one is yet to arrive). We are taking them to the Village Curry House in Tradeston, Glasgow and are to be seated outside at the rear of the restaurant (a dreamescape invention). This area is made from red monoblock paving that is square-ish in shape and curved at the furthest corners, a small raised section forming a boundary with the neighbouring residential property, their outdoor space being an exact mirror of the Village's. It is around 3pm and as expected the restaurant is quiet but the outdoor seating is messy and disorganised. Our table is right at the boundary and seats six, two each side and one at each end/head. Gee sits on the left with his back to the house and the other attendee – the fourth has still not arrived – sits diagonally across to the right, facing the neighbour's. It seems to be up to me to tidy up – although a mustachioed Indian man (the manager?) shuffles furniture around – and I use a long spoon-shaped carpet sweeper to suck up crumbs, made all the more difficult by the appliance's tiny brush tip (and my spending some time trying to figure out to access it to empty the contents)-

Our starter arrives, a large plate heaped with fat spicy sausages. Around this time several people emerge from the house across the back, chatting loudly and having a few drinks. Whether it's down to our proximity to the boundary or the alcohol being consumed (or not) an argument breaks out. One of the party people is the Danish actor Mads Mikkelsen, who sports long, near-shoulder length hair, swept back, and large aviator-style glasses – I remember thinking 'he's short sighted just like me'. He is accompanied by a dumpy lady with a black bob haircut. I say to Mads, “I'm sorry we didn't mean to upset the Swedish”, and admit to Gee shortly thereafter – following Mads kicking off – that I was simply trolling him-

Later Mads is up angry in my face, frustrated that I keep responding with “Yow” and “Nay”, and asking me, “what is that?!” (being my attempt at an Icelandic 'yes' and 'no'-

Gretanto

I seem to be undertaking pub quizzes – I'm looking for the third establishment on my list, having already won £25. Consulting my newspaper clipping I eventually locate the place and, after a bit of searching, the quiz (master). It's £10 entry and there's only ten questions. I do okay, my answers mostly overheard from the surrounding participants, two nearby older ladies in particular, the ninth question's answer is (the singer) Bjork, and the tenth being, “What happens (right) here on the thirtieth of August?” (which somehow, by a process of oblique mental filtering, I know)-

I win £9.01(?) and am quite happy if confused by the fact. The film actor Taron Egerton and his pal are not so pleased. They seat themselves at my table and endlessly labour their point, not satisfied that an “outsider” won (something). Taron softens his approach as I calmly make my point, but his friend on my right is harder to convince. Am I hoping to make the train with my former work colleague Ayy Gee or will she arrive and assist me in my argument?-

Varjolta

I am in a large square garden space (in Partick?). There are lots of tall plants and it feels walled, if not oddly internal. The colours are drab and gloomy and in the centre of the shrubbery sits a long rectangular structure divided into eight equal squares. There are eight of these on each side of the object (hamster?). I know that this is some sort of graveyard and that these large squares are individual screens that serve as video playback for the deceased. The bottom left screen flicks into static life as I press a button to resurrect John Travolta. ('Is he actually dead?', is a constant thought from here on.) John's huge face fills the screen – he looks much as he does now, a round smiling face with a (dyed) goatee beard. He says something and the picture shifts to two (seeming) C-list English celebrities hugging jubilantly. I discern this footage is from some late (post-)career edition of Celebrity Big Brother. John almost seems to be addressing me directly-

Sovvid

 

I am on a film studio lot, standing looking towards two doors, each leading to a (different) internal film set. Studios 15 and 16? The veteran horror film director John Carpenter is standing at the door of Studio 15 and will not allow (me?) access. He is quite defensive and our (mostly one way) argument continues for some time. I just know, and am somewhat puzzled as to why he is filming a movie for the James Bond franchise -

Swell Reptiles - The UK's biggest online reptile specialist

I am now witness to a tortoise that has become separated from its shell cartoon-style, the animal slick, pained and bloody and the shell a solid object (with holes for the head and legs and no other visible crack or damage). I think the tortoise will be okay just as a car slows and scrunches over the top of its sorry shape (which holds up remarkably well, the vehicle's tyres bumping up and over no problem) -

Khussg

I am in some large, mostly empty, cinema-cum-theatre. It feels distinctly old fashioned. I am hoping to see a documentary (on the film Chungking Express). I keep moving from theatre to theatre looking for both an audience and a screening. Noticing posters for (a documentary on?) Sunset Boulevard I somehow keep getting muddled up, frustrated that I am constantly now asking ushers for that film and not my original choice -

I am now in a vast, busy auditorium and an American football is being thrown by the crowd, itself moving with some sort of momentum towards the back of the room. Stuart Braithwaite of Mogwai is there (of course!) and, in the few catches and passes that I complete, I am anxious that I impress him -

Lewal

I am sitting in a long anteroom – aware of a larger (living) space at my back. I am seated in a single-moulded stylish white plastic chair. There are two more chairs to my right, nearer the (open) entrance/doorway through, and a further single chair opposite me. My younger bother sits next to me and Emm Kay, a former female office co-worker, is in the seat next to him. We seem to be taking/awaiting instructions from the (unseen) individual across from me -

Emm is smoking a fine cigar which she informs me is a 'WALL-E' brand. I say I had no idea that the animated film tied-in in such a way. I'm glad of my brother as I hide myself behind him somewhat, embarrassed as I am in the presence of Emm. The instructor then begins to tutor us through putting on some sort of roomy/rubbery space suit (that seems to cross over into oddly shaped swimming pool safety inflatables) -

Atokad

I am in a Woody Allen film. I am sure myself, work colleague Gee EmmCeeGee, A.N.Other and the actress Elle Fanning (Super 8, Neon Demon) are present. We are riding about young – at least as young as Dakota (Fanning)! - and carefree-

Only we come to a strange construct - sturdy steel bridges on either side for a triangular shape and we look over the third edge (to where the structures converge) and into the dim gloom below. I seem to the only one of the 4 of us who can discern a monstrous toad-like dragon creature hunched in the shallows, sheltering confident in the shadows under the low bridge to our left. I can just make out its fearful shape, its eyes lifeless and impassive. Is it Gee who is suddenly running there and swept up by the creature before I can bark a warning? Is the scene itself looping in the dreamescape, only now I'm down there too, helping/watching him fend it off by rapidly inflating a canvas dinghy from his backpack, thereby buying him/us precious time...?-

Arbrab

Red leather pepper lung-

A young, naked Barbra Streisand huddled under the bedsheets. “I can make you pick.”-

Tutbic

I am changing into swimming shorts behind a sort of timber canvas upright structure. There's some anxiety that the nearby waitresses(?) can see my p*nis (they can't) and I fret about my (not actually naked) nudity-

I am walking along a slender concrete lip at the seawater's edge. To my left the lip slopes sharply upwards to the pier/promenade about 2 metres above. I entertain myself by singing (with a sort of applied tuneful echo) my perceived lyrics to King Biscuit Time's “I walk the earth, get stuck in the middle, can't see your love, can't feel your love” refrain over and over, imagining I am thrilling the old couples who are passing by overhead-

I encounter a very old man a couple of times. He has a drawn, lined face with a porkpie hat jammed low on his head, hooding his aged eyes. His bronzed body is sagging and weathered and he wears a baggy pair of canvas swimming shorts – one of the elderly swimmers in JAWS comes to mind. What's most striking and fascinating about this character is that on each forearm he has a large basketball sized (or bigger) sack of skin that has a surface mottled like that of a giant orange-

King Biscuit Time - I Walk The Earth

Nonnel

I am in some dreamescape underground walkway/tunnel. I am semi-stuck behind a delicate young woman who is dressed very chic with tremendously long streaky blonde hair. As she is on her phone (seemingly taking pointless selfies) she is meandering all over, making it awkward for me to squeeze past. When I see her – is she talking about 'some c*nt' - having finally passed I realise she is very pretty, with strong sharp features and the most beautiful eyes-

I am now in an underground chamber watching some show about (motion) comics on a widescreen television. It is presented by a comedian called Sean (who I do not normally like). He has curly hair, ruddy cheeks and circular John Lennon glasses and I am affected when he gets quite emotional with a James Cosmo-alike comic book artist. The James fellow, with a great bushy beard, beams a wide smile into the camera, his eyes filled with tears. (I imagine my artist friend Jay Dee is watching and similarly moved.) The end titles feature Batman (as drawn by the artist Scott Snyder) battling with a hoodlum in the back seat of a car-

https://alchetron.com

I go the wrong way along a tunnel, diverted by some maintenance works – do I see the comedian Frankie Boyle working away at a typewriter in an underground office, or do I just know that he does? I remember thinking I really should give him some Braw Books. I don't want to make two trips but have no books on me-

There is a weird elevated entrance down to some further network of tunnels. For some (unknown) reason I clamber up towards the ceiling, in part tangling and part suspending myself between service pipes and a chunky utility box. I am certainly on CCTV-

I am now outside at some sort of red metal dispenser box, scrolling slowly through the menu of items. There are four French teens, two boys and two girls, hovering impatiently at my back. One youth (who looks like Lazzaro) jumps ahead on the menu and selects a box of matches, also my choice. I call him "you French b*stard!" and clock him on the nose, knocking him on to the seat of his pants. I break into the dispenser box, quite sure a single box of matches remains. There's a bag inside the box and tearing it open I see that inside that looks to be a box of matches (only it is all covered in splashes of pure orange juice). It isn't matches after all but some long clear plastic box for lighting timbers(?). I then attempt to repair the box, trying to fit a new bag of items in beside a burst old rucksack-

Kluhcin

My old Studio colleague Dee Arr and the (Animal Kingdom) actor Luke Ford are attempting to revive a rangy dreamescape version of The Incredible Hulk, his arms covered in tattoos, moptop hair perched on a gnarled, goggle-eyed face complete with hook nose and a mean, downturned mouth – very sombre and unsettling looking.

Eee EmmCeeVee (from my work) is quizzing me over a kettle – do I show him I've poured out the boiling water? - as Dee and his cohort succeed in inducing the Hulk to raise his arm-

Nortle

I am holding the (Braw Books - Sketch Sunday) baby, a hand under each armpit. It is covered in a myriad of tiny tattoos and has a crescent moon-shaped scar, yet to fully heal, on each bare buttock (as if it has been deliberately sat in broken glass... by me?)-

I am in a sort of cafe/restaurant, all rustic and rickety, bright and airy. A lady, Kay Cee, from my work keeps making jokes about bl*wjobs and is eventually asked outside to explain her rude conduct. It is 3:30 and we are already packing up (our work?) to finish at 4pm. I make a joke about our (architectural?) project, saying we should have put an "egg shop" in the rear courtyard (of our housing project) instead. Everyone, including Kay Emm, finds this hilarious, even when I repeat it a second time-

I am with another work colleague Ay Dubya and we are pleading with a (Sun newspaper) photographer not to publish photos of us trying to fix her computer (on company time... with the Taxpayer's money!). But, then again, aren't we doing it during our lunch hours?-

tardis.fandom.com/wiki/

I am chasing the actor Paul McGann's brother – who IS Paul McGann! - down the street. He's surrounded by a gaggle of teenage girl fans and I can do nothing but hang back and wait my turn-

Noxas

I am travelling (at what feels like night) on a bus, sitting on an aisle seat on the left hand side, about half way up the coach. It seems we are bound for Greenock and I am worried that I will miss my stop (as I am not at all familiar with the route). Having come to a halt I am unsure if I should get off here or at the next stop (for what it transpires is a connecting ferry service). Is it too early to get off? I ask the driver at the last minute and he advises me to disembark. The man seated across from me (who just so happens to look like the actor John Saxon) on the aisle is displeased and shouts down to the driver that he's not satisfied and will be making a formal complaint-

In my dash (across a stony beach) from the bus to the waiting ferry I scrabble across the rough surface. Stopping to take stock for a moment I realise I have lost everything from my scabby, useless wallet. In a panic I scramble back towards the bus where the driver (who now also resembles the film actor John Saxon) points out that my I.D. / Season ticket are in fact scattered on the stones. I quickly gather these up, equal parts reassured/troubled that I have £15 secreted in a pocket somewhere-

I am indoors and I am hoovering. A young girl (with learning difficulties) is in charge of the vacuum's hose attachment while I monitor some sort of filter flap at the rear of the body near the floor. This filter keeps jamming and whining as there are trailing threads(?) within the hoover which keep catching. The main body of the hoover itself is a large, bulky washing machine-esque object. The actress Kristen Scott Thomas is also present and she gives occasional instructions. At first the going is quite good but becomes steadily worse and worse, the floor (that we've already hoovered) somehow again covered in straw, stones and paper clips. I ask the young girl to start picking up the larger objects as I take over the directing of the hose-

Suriv

I am working in a bookstore in the United States. It has either just reopened or finished reorganising after (a wave of) a deadly virus. We are restocking books on to racks – I clearly remember the spot on the floor where a sanitiser-cum-sink stood, housed in a tall, square cross-sectioned natural finish timber upstand-

One of the (two) tall windows to the front of the shop, to the right, has been replaced with an opaque red pane – apparently this has been newly installed to provide some protection from a forthcoming storm. A young Bruce Dern-alike is making a good point about how come the other window, the one that happens to overlook his section of the store floor, has not been similarly upgraded. Another member of staff quips that it is because he is expendable-

I then make the mistake of pumping a hand sanitiser, the long tube/spout of which seems to stretch over the top of the till/computer station. There is an immediate fuss and we all cluster around the screen to the front – I pumped from the back – to see if it is still working. It is! Then it isn't... the screen striped with white vertical lines before suddenly cutting out. I then attempt to fill the till, which has a tiny cash drawer (full of paperclips and wire ties). What I assume to be money is much the same, packs of paperclips and fat wire ties about an inch long. I suggest, given the risk of spreading the virus, we only accept 'contactless' payments and the inter-staff debate that ensues means that my “can I help you” towards a waiting female customer, who has been roundly ignored, is too late. I then turn to my right and ask the same of a young mother with a pram-

Snoobab

https://www.livescience.com/

Kay Emm and I are staying at her sister's family house (in America). The (dreamescape) house has a very cheap and flimsy feel about it – the construction seems to be quite piecemeal and the finish throughout is faded magnolia gloss, almost being used as an extra adhesive, on top of the thin timber chipboard that seems to have been employed everywhere-

We are sleeping in the upstairs bed(room) and I awaken and, getting up, I notice a keen-eyed baboon sitting on the small felted flat roof outside our window. The internal/external wall beneath the window seems to be insubstantial/almost opaque and as much as I try to duck out of sight I cannot avoid being caught in the baboon's blue piercing glare. I get a shock as the window switches from a brown, near opaque, surface to clear glass in an instant, revealing two more baboons are sitting on the small cill (several more visible beyond them, descending the surrounding garden walls – they are amassing!)-

The second of the two baboons has a (Planet of the Apes' Koba-like) scar/disfigurement to one eye which gives him an evil, malicious look, his mouth seemingly twisted into a permanent aggressive snarl as a result-

Some of the baboons have invaded the house and we quickly head down the cramped internal staircase as they crawl down the wall in pursuit and dash into the family kitchen where everyone is having breakfast-

I explain the situation to Bee Haitch, my brother-in-law, and he and I venture out into the garden. (I think) Bee has some sort of metal tube for protection and I grab up (from somewhere inside) a sawn-off broom handle and another, longer piece of timber. I rejoin Bee outside where, as the (lead) baboon stalks him, he laments having locked the back door – it might have been to safeguard his (young) family – but we realise we're trapped on the wrong side. I (too easily) flick approaching baboons aside with my hooked(?) timber as Bee thumps on the door with the ball of his fist – we want in now!-

Caampetraiicna

The Hollywood actor Chris Evans is dressed as Captain America (the stubbly non-helmet wearing version). We are in my house together with my parents and older brother. For some reason things are taking far too long so my brother, myself and our son(?) don't have time to go and visit our gran. We eat a meal of frustratingly bony fish-

Chris is going to play golf (“incognito!?” I jest). He and I stand face-to-face. He doesn't seem that tall, being about my height, but he is super fit, build almost like a slender action figure with obligatory exaggerated (but somehow still proportional) musculature. I ask him if he is still undertaking a training program – indeed, the whole dreamescape is almost like an interview in a sense. I think, but don't actually ask, about the complex technical versus physical process of actually making a MARVEL movie-

On a train we consider Skyping my gran only she has no internet-

I am now driving a car and we pass my friend Jay Dee. He is casually reclining against the wall of a takeaway while his partner wheels their baby daughter in a pram. Jay looks slick, styled and goes into the takeaway as we pass-

Tapo

In a similarly sparse environment that formed my last dreamescape, a sort of airless browny/green coloured shopping centre, wide but with low ceilings to the corridors/circulation. It's all very muted and there are no other people around. I am with my mother-in-law and one other person (my brother?). On our right we pass a shop of sorts, the door also to the right, a long, plain window stretching off to our left. The window is full of 60s & 70s styled artwork, not quite as artistic as psychedelic era gig posters, but very bold, often in black and white, with a single, quite striking central image. Many of them make use of (intriguing) science fiction imagery and I am drawn to several of these A4-ish flyers that shamelessly crib from the (original) The Planet of the Apes. One in particular is a black and white image of a soldier ape's head with some brisk and bold lettering above-

I linger outside this shop, admiring the artwork. I go to venture inside but am told (by one for my companions?) that it is in fact a hairdressing salon and that to do so would be a waste of (everyone's) time. In addition it seems that they only do 70s style haircuts and, as if to prove a point, a tall (Japanese anime-esque) woman emerges and immediately engages with me. She sports a huge silvery afro with pieces of 'L' shaped decorative metallic jewellery stuck to her cheek. She is wearing a green bodysuit with a blue bubbled waistcoat-cum-bodywarmer arrangement on top. She has other sci-fi stylings, including knee pads and high, silver boots. A striking black woman, also with a great afro, follows her before another woman (almost identical to the first) exits too-

Ecliood

I am on a train and (an as old as he is now) Clint Eastwood is there (to be interviewed). He sits semi-side on with his back to me, partially reclined, his legs up and bent. It seems as if random people on the train are asking him random questions. It can't be very interesting for him as Clint falls asleep! The trains stops and several passengers, including Clint, shuffle off into the night time snow to go to the toilet, the scene framed by the open carriage doors. Clint, a tall, identifiable figure in the distance, starts to run back towards the (leaving) train. I remark that, 'it'd be just the thing if he falls', and splat! He tumbles flat onto his face. He stands up and while he makes the rest of his run he makes up a snowball that he throws at me. I manage to elicit a rare, deadpan smile from Clint by commenting that, 'not many people can say they've been hit by a snowball by Clint Eastwood.'-

There is now just a handful of us waiting to change trains on what seems to be a low-level/underground platform. (Also a sense we are wandering a dark-ish main street in some town, looking for a Heston Blumenthal restaurant.) I meet my friend Ay Arr on the steps up from the platform and stress to him how surprised he'll be when he meets... Clint! - who stands a full head taller than Arr. I then meet and bring down my father, again emphasising the surprise. My father approaches Clint from behind and, realising who he is, shakes him warmly by the hand. Clint, however, suddenly arches backwards, a cut (from the fall? now) clearly visible on his right temple. As he falls to the ground he says, 'I don't feel so good.' A crowd starts to gather and I am desperate for someone to dial 999 for an ambulance. I run upstairs to the girl in the ticket booth and ask her if she knows First Aid. She does not but instead directs me to the woman in the William Hill betting shop across the road-

I dash across but it seems to simply be the back rooms of a Chinese restaurant. Until, that is, a kindly old chef, mighty cleaver in hand, tells me, 'downstairs'. The William Hill is painted white throughout with a low ceiling and a thick carpet on the floor. A few men lounge in Jabba's Palace-esque booths of sorts – the place feels more like a private sex club. Indeed, the guy I ask about the WPC(?) seems to have on stockings below the waist. He directs me to the WPC but she is not there, just a bunch of random photos/flyers with a face on them that I leaf through in vain. One seems to have the slogan 'no line' and another reads 'sticky marshmallow end'-

Ruzwa

https://culturedvultures.com/

In New York City? I am in a large, sparsely furnished apartment. It is bright and airy with a rustic timber floor. The Wu Tang Clan – in name only at this point, none of the members being familiar – are present. They inhabit a large IKEA square shelving-esque white unit. Each member is in his own individual square shelf, and any vacant ones contain a variety of lurid green snakes with white bellies and sneaky bulbous eyes. I am scared of these creatures, as I am supposed to be, as I approach the large unit. One snake eyes me suspiciously, gently shifting it's many coils. Are there dogs too?-

I am then confronting the whole Wu Tang group. They are massed in an intimidating throng in front of me, filling my entire field of vision, as I chuck them out of the/my(?) apartment. I keep wanting to berate them - the word 'belligerent' constantly in my mind (and on the tip of my tongue) – but refrain from doing so (out of 'respect'). We finish up outside where the unpleasant staring match finally dissipates and they head off in taxi cabs, leaving me alone (as requested) with the (actual) RZA-

He and I sit on some 'brownstone' front steps and attempt to trade mobile numbers. My phone, somehow reduced to a tiny, slender piece of fold-out kit, will not, to my absolute frustration, behave. I cannot even recall my own number nor seem capable of using the miniature keypad. I key in 07455 but want 07457 and cannot go back. To add to my annoyance some fans have begun congregating around RZA and I lash out, grabbing a Chinese fan and dragging him right up close to me-

I am now in a (Central?) park lined with green railings. I am being attacked by kung-fu experts. Suddenly the dreamescape pulls back, whizzing through the grass overlooking this scene to where Woody Harrelson is dispatching more henchmen in my direction-