The Witching Hour

I've been waking up lately at 3am and wind up entering this partially awake, partially still dreaming hallucinatory state where lying in bed becomes this pseudo game, a complex one that doesn't make any sense and I can't fall asleep until I figure out the game. What's spooky is that this lines up with what is known as the witching hour. So I wonder what ghosts and ghouls are whispering taunts into my ear inducing such head games.


The neighbors below moved out. I wouldn't put it past them to put a curse on us to keep waking us up in the night without music. Will be looking for sage to burn. And Nyquil liquid gels. Sleeeep is a seven letter word.

Fat Fever

I'm probably one of the only people I know without the Air Conditioning. Maybe it's because I'm rugged and tough. Or fairly poor. Last night the humidity in Chicago got vicious, a little build up of moisture of the approaching storm we had this morning. I could hardly sleep last night, I even turned a faced the other edge of the bed as to get some more of the box fan in my face to dry the gushing sweat. I sweat like a fat sliver of bacon pan frying and sloshing up skin oil. I don't think I really slept, but I did have some half dreams where I was cognizant of lying in my bed, sweating, but hallucinated people coming in and out of my apartment. They were un-phased by the humidity, and they chalked it up to the fact that they were of a higher class and could afford not to sweat. Maybe there is a spiritual hierarchy, like the Hindu castes, and the energy centers affect DNA's ability to withstand temperatures. But these fancy people did flaunt their dry pits and didn't want to get too close to me as they believed the fat that was oozing out of my pores would stain their dresses and slacks. I must have some humiliation hovering in my subconscious that I can't quite put my finger on. But I did shed many toxins through the exit of my skin pores last night and need to do laundry to get that fresh sheet smell.

From my office window this morning, within seconds of arriving at my desk, I saw the dark clouds roll in, intense winds lash down the trees, funneled down the train tracks. Looked like a hurricane. That is probably how my sweating looked in the judgment of my dream figments who watched me try to sleep.

Tube Image

Sometimes I'm a sucker for those self help deep relaxation tapes. Cheesy as it may be, I have a tape that really does the trick for me after long day, and especially if my mind is still active when I crawl into bed. So I was listening to it last night and it got me to a good point where I was slightly hallucinating behind my eye lids, which I enjoy, and a good relaxation listen will do this for me. I started to see myself from a third person omniscient, cartoon-like! I was wearing some colourful, frilly, Beatles-esque band uniform. My hair was parted a bit like the flat top character from Dick Tracy. So the cartoon me jumped into a big tube from a platform high in the sky. The tube networked with other tubes, and down I slid like a wacky water park rider. Yet I got deep into this network and the tube took me not to an opening at the end where I'd slide back out to fresh air, but to a dead end where my feet stopped me with a thud.

A tingle of claustrophobia. To shimmy back up the long, long, long tube was to be my escape.

I said to "hell with that." I took a deep breath, and exhaled away the cartoon imagery, and rolled over to welcome restful slumber.

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Sometimes I get ideas or images in my head that I feel compelled to write down, and if for whatever reason I'm not able to write it down right away, and I wind up forgetting it, I get really frustrated and upset with myself. I had a realization late last night, a sort of zen to put myself at peace for the fizzling of a "gem" idea. I began to look at the formation of ideas not only from a materialistic, put em down onto paper approach...but the experience of the idea is just as important, and that if it doesn't stick as hoped, well, it was probably a little wave.