birthday foo

I had a good birthday :)

D. brought home a chocolate (oh, so very dark and sinful!) cake, which we've both been nibbling at for 2 days now. I also got some nice gifts - mostly books, with which one can almost never go wrong. Top this of with slatherings of Chef! during dinner (don't miss the "salt" episode) and it was just about perfect :)

For today I'd toyed with finally going up to see Body Worlds, but distance, cost, and the fact that I've got a test on Wednesday that I need to study for conspired against this being a good/workable idea :/ So I hauled out of bed this morning to go to tutors/study hall on campus, and I've set the new shiny books aside in favor of homework, at least for the time being. If I feel "caught up" by tomorrow I might hit this or this closer to home.

fun in bed

There, that got your attention :P

I found this article about lucid dreaming at Sleephacks.com. Some of the material here is good, some is questionable, some is rather overwrought - lucid dreaming is fun but I'd hesitate to recommend it over reality :P I'm also not completely convinced that it can be induced at will, though I admit that what they're calling the NILD technique has coincided with most of my lucid dreaming in the past.

I've always been able to remember at least some of my dreams, including lucid dreams. Most are less interesting for their content than for the rich sensory overload, the "you are there" feeling that is so strong sometimes I'm up for a couple of hours before I realize I'm remembering a dream, not something that actually happened: I'm talking smell, touch, surround sound, full Technicolor in addition to being aware that I'm dreaming. This came in very useful during a nightmare once, when I decided that things were getting out of hand and made everything melt. I've never been able to control what I dream about, but it's nice to be able to control whatever my subconcious throws at me :P

For me lucid dreaming is usually precluded by sleep paralysis an interesting little trip of it's own) - don't know why that is so, but it's been my experience. It doesn't happen often, but the trigger seems to be following a week or more of not enough sleep (5-6 hours a night) with a nice weekend morning where I have time to wake up, read a bit, and drift back off. I'm aware I'm going back to sleep, I feel my limbs stiffen, but my mind remains alert, and then it starts to invent things....

I find this subject interesting because I'm constantly amazed at the inventiveness of the human mind, even at rest, and at the confusion between reality and fantasy that can happen in dream states. And while I don't subscribe to much of the standard "new age" dream symbol interpretations, I do think dreaming is our mind's way of "doing overtime" and sorting things out while our constantly vigilant concious self is resting. IMHO if you're remembering your dreams, it's because you need to for some reason, even if it's only to inject some novelty.

So, anyway.. interesting article, make of it what you will. If you have lucid dreams, have fun with 'em, and if you actually get anything in this FAQ to work, let me know! I'd like to work in some virtual fencing practice :P