I had a wretched night’s sleep, and was up multiple times. I figure this was because I’m in the middle of putting the latest issue of SCI FI magazine to bed, and so I kept finding myself awake thinking, “Can I really afford to sleep?” But then I’d force myself to drop off again, because I knew I’d be no good if I attacked the mound of work while fatigued. A side effect of these frequent bouts of consciousness was a plethora of dreams, and each time I woke, I scribbled one down.

In the first dream, I was at a Readercon. I bumped into Texas Triffid Ranch there, whom I haven’t seen in a decade, not since an earlier Readercon at which he shaved his head mid-con. I couldn’t stop for as long as I wanted to so we could catch up, though, because I was late for a panel. I don’t know about you guys, but it’s been a long time since I’ve had the cliched dreams of being at school and realizing I didn’t study for a test, or that I’d forgotten to do my homework. For me, anxiety now turns into dream by me being at conventions and unable to find my panels. And so it was this time, symbolizing, I assume, my real-life rush to meet my waking deadline. So I wandered the hotel, unable to find the correct room. Even though I never made it to the panel, my worries faded when I ran into Barack Obama. I sat with him for awhile in the lobby of the hotel, and everything then seemed all right. Wow, that guy can do anything!

In the next dream, I was at an exterior level of the Empire State Building with my boss, Craig Engler. For some reason I cannot now comprehend, I was clambering along a parapet in order to get better angles for snapshots of him. I vaguely recall this having something to do with a company newsletter, though even in dream this didn’t seem like something worth risking my life for.

In another dream I was with Carol Emshwiller, arriving at a museum show devoted to her. The walls were arrayed with books covers and manuscripts. For some reason, she was having people who visited autograph the front page of a copy of the New York Times. I signed by drawing a word balloon coming out of George Bush’s mouth and having him comment on her exhibition. Once I’d done that, we were suddenly no longer in the museum, but rather in an apartment in Manhattan. I looked out the window to see that the buildings across the way were covered with murals of comic-book characters. I climbed out to see them better and to snap pictures, but once I was on the street, they were gone. This was quite confusing, and I woke while walking the city searching for them, as if they could have somehow moved.

In the final dream of the morning (the final dream that I remember, that is), I was sitting with my father and going through a stack of copies of FOOM magazine, some issues of which I’d edited. As we flipped through them, however, the pile was disorganized, because there were random comic books mixed in, all of them copies which bore classic covers by Neal Adams. I would pull them out and make a separate stack. I can understand me wanting to show off copies of FOOM, which is the first magazine I was ever given the opportunity to edit, but I’m not sure how Neal Adams got into my dream!

But that was enough dreaming—and enough blogging about dreaming—and now, even though it’s Saturday, it’s time to get back to work!