I know that very few people are interested in other people’s dreams – I’m rarely that bothered about them myself – but the other night I had the most intense and clear dream I’ve had in years, and so I’m sticking it up here mainly for my own records…
We were staying in a hotel: me, my wife, and my mum. At first it was a little poky, we were staying in a room with ancient decor off a landing half way up the stairs. Next door, out the back exit, was one of my favourite pubs, The Washington – except they had a wooden hut in the garden where they served, I dunno, southern US food, and pizzas. I popped in, bumped into a few friends, said hi, and told them I’d be coming back for a proper night out later on.
In the basement of the hotel itself there was some kind of a fascist disco going on. I gave that a wide berth.
And so to the hotel lobby, where most of the action happened, as I waited for Gill and mum to get ready, and for it to be late enough for them to contemplate going to the pub. The lobby was HUGE – perhaps a 300m and 100 deep. Lots of marble, gold handrails and glass panels alongside the frequent ramps up and down. The smooth, smooth floor was perfect for sliding on – in fact, I spent most of the dream on my knees, doing high-speed laps of the lobby – it was so frictionless that a quick push would keep you travelling for miles.
Dominic Cummings was in there, on the phone, looking very important and busy. I suspect that he had a stake in the hotel, or at least was heavily involved in its running. I would have liked to have spoken to him – douchebag that he is, I have a fascination with the man, and wanted to satisfy it. But he was always on the phone.
Also in the lobby were various hot and cold buffets. Near one side were fish and meat ones, which I didn’t try – I had a feeling that they were for some private event to which I wasn’t a party. At the back of the lobby closer to the middle was a vegetarian buffet, to which I kept returning. Opposite it, at the front of the lobby in the middle of a series of ramps up and down, an employee was sat on a chair with cans of beer scattered on a table next to him and the floor behind him. He was handing them out for free, and I felt a little guilty grabbing a fresh one every time I sped past on my knees, whilst other folks (the lobby was not crowded, but there were people milling around) just took one bottle or can each. The beers soon ran out – my fault, I guess, but I was skidding around to fast to apologise to the employee. I have a feeling they were his own personal beers that he’d been giving away, nothing to do with the hotel.
At some point I needed the toilet – at several points, in fact. This was where things seemed most weird to me. I often need the toilet in dreams, but every toilet I’ve ever visited in my sleep has been a nightmare of dirt and shit and decay and things falling apart and public humiliation and embarrassment. This toilet was stunning. Darker than the lobby, but with a similar anonymous gloss and style, it went back almost as deep as the lobby. It was unisex, the entrance was via some sort of antechamber where female scientists sat around the distant edges on computers. That briefly embarrassed me every time – women! In the toilet! Until I remembered that this was only the anteroom and the toilets themselves were way, way further back, very quiet and private (I don’t think I encountered another soul in there, or if I did then it was very cordial), and anyway the women were deep into their research, monitoring their monitors. Into the toilet itself, there was every type of toilet furniture I’m aware of, and many that I’m not. It just seemed ridiculously well equipped, and packed with gadgets while not being crowded. I was always moving too quickly to take in what any of them were, apart from the basics that I needed to use, but it was such a quiet and comfortable and relaxed and grand place, 10/10, best toilet experience ever.
Back out of the toilets and skidding around the lobby. Dom’s still busy, so I find some kind of public Internet terminal and try it out. In fact, I’ve been repeatedly trying to tweet on my phone, but I’m moving to fast, and every time I look down at the tiny screen I miss things around me, there’s so much going on (despite still not feeling too busy or crowded), and my phone takes me painfully out of the moment.
Perhaps I’d hoped to find a moment’s peace at the terminal, perhaps somewhere I could tweet more quickly using a keyboard. Instead though I found a video left by a previous resident (I think this was some kind of video terminal for recording guest testimonies?) She was desperate. She was trapped. Dominic Cummings had tricked and abused her. I looked around cautiously – how was I going to get her story out to the world, to help her and to reveal Cummings as the bastard he is? I tried to tweet the video directly from the terminal, but it was blocked from being sent on the internet, so I recorded video of it using my phone – fearful that at any moment I would be caught doing so. And again, I tried to tweet it – it was around this point when Gill and my mum turned up and started talking to me, and again I hadn’t a moment in which to send my tweet.
We walked together towards the other end of the lobby, but halfway across there was some commotion, and it turned out the royal family were emerging from somewhere deep in the hotel on their way out to waiting limousines. We almost collided with them, at which point Gill spotted some prince and princess, him around 8 and her around 3 – (I thought they must be Charles & Diana’s kids, but of course they’d be a generation younger). Gill shouted out “PRINCIES” at which point they turned and saw her and rushed into her arms crying “GIIIIIIIIILL!” I was a bit like “WTF, you never told me you’d been babysitting for the royal family”, but it was not a huge surprise – the kind of thing Gill would, of course, be brilliant at, and how natural that for those young kids Gill would be more of a hero than any member of their own family.
We found a long table to sit at – me, Gill, and mum – and chatted while we waited for it to be late enough to go to the pub. While we were doing so, and old (65-70ish) woman came to say hello to my mum – she looked like your nan, big plastic-framed specs and a fading yellow pullover. When mum asked her name she replied “Patsy Kensit” and I was gobsmacked. “Patsy… you grew up around Richmond, right?” I questioned her about many things – turns out I know a *lot* about Patsy Kensit, and I think mum thought I fancied her, I acted so interested, but instead I was just trying to make very polite and attentive conversation – plus I think I was also a bit proud of having netted a D-list celebrity. I know, right?
And it’s around that point, when I was still feigning massive interest in Patsy’s life, that I woke up and started to scribble all of this down.
SO… definitely some issues here around twitter addiction and my phone! But what the hell else was going on?
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