Finally got to this page on herbal remedies, buried several pages deep in the Google results. Basil and Garlic look like my best bets as expectorants. OK, so I'm not a horse, it still ought to work.
I think this is the first time I'm mentioning this recurring dream, because until this morning it just seemed so realistic based on the stupidity of the typical American that up to now I just figured I'd seen it on TV or something. And these dreams were otherwise "normal", that is, nobody flying or morphing. But when I woke a little while ago I realized how surreal and Orwellian this is, and just had to write it down. Too bad I've forgotten most of the details, but instead of just putting question marks, I'll make up something that seems to fit into the following descriptions...
Over morning coffee, the familiar Public Service ad comes over the TV: "Do you know where your next Secured Point is?". A birds-eye view of a three-by-two block area appears on the screen, showing curious color-coded square posts at various points along each sidewalk, about 8 feet high and in groups of 4 in a 3-foot-square square pattern at each placement. Then connecting lines are drawn in by computer-generated overlay, from doorway to destination, parallel right-angled line segments joining the color-coded areas at the top of each post, showing a safe path which a briefcase-carrying businessman now obediently walks.For the first few weeks of implementation, employees at businesses across the U.S. are using substantial parts of their workdays oohing and aahing over the relative dangers of each others' walking routes, downloading and printing computer-generated Secure Maps from the Department of Homeland Security website for their own daily forays to and from the mass transit stops between home, work, and shopping, and employers not only don't care, they encourage it. These maps have the Secured Route, as generated by the TV ad, already overlayed onto the street diagram. People are supposed to stay within the parallel lines at all times, and most do. Secured Crossing Points are well-marked, and scofflaws who jaywalk are whispered about by the Good People and routinely ticketed by cops, who are, of course, "only doing this for your own protection, sir".
Areas such as Miami-Dade's South Beach and San Diego's Gaslamp District are, naturally, Secured Areas where the wealthy can feel safe from the vaguely-hinted-at-but-still-unspecified terrorist activities that most certainly will happen someday soon in an area with a lower Security Code. The glasses clink, the fajitas sizzle, and life and laughter go on for those with jobs or inherited wealth; meanwhile the poorer parts of town (terrorists want to target the poor areas, of course! right?) are increasingly empty, and the mom-and-pop businesses are gradually being shuttered up as cops capriciously declare "curfews" at various times of night whenever they see someone walking along streets with no (or coded-low) Secured Point posts.
That pretty much sums up the overall idea, although I've probably spent many dream-hours already in this radical New World observing the details of how these changes are absorbed into the American lifestyle. I can't imagine many of my friends at City of the Sun ever falling for this crap if it ever hits the fan in reality, but I always associate the dream with people like my old neighbor in Florida, the musclebound fool who sang "Heeeeere Kiiiiitty!" in a falsetto voice every morning at about 6, just as I was trying to get to sleep. Yes, I'm talking behind his back in a sense, but he knows pretty well what I think of him by now anyway. Don't you, R__?
So, anybody else having these dreams? Or did I really see this in a movie or such at some point?
last updated 2013-01-10 20:37:15. served from tektonic.jcomeau.com