Fever Dreams

The other morning I broke a tooth eating a bagel. As things turned out Laura had to go to the dentist, and since I was giving her a ride (so I could use the car to take the cat to the vet) I was able to make an appointment for the next morning. So at 4:00 AM on Thursday morning I woke up shivering and couldn't stop. It was warm in the house, so it could only mean that I was sick. Since I had the dentist appointment, I ignored it. I got myself bathed and dressed and into the car.

I got to the dentist and after about a half an hour got x-rayed and inspected. I was hoping it would be something simple, but it turns out I'll need a root canal, a rod put in and a crown. Since none of that is in the budget, I had them patch it as best they can until I can get in next month which means I'll only be eating soft food for a month.

I walked the two miles home in the 20 degree weather and wasn't feeling so good. I thought it was because I hadn't eaten much since I broke the tooth, so I ate some oatmeal. I had trouble finishing the bowl and my head began to hurt. It turned out I was running a fever of 101.6. I took an aspirin, got some juice and laid down on the couch and spent the day in various states of consciousness. Luck was with me as the fever broke rather quickly and my appetite started to return. I watched a video, Sean Connery as 007 in Goldfinger, one of my favorite movies when I was about 12 years old (and yes I would still love to own an Austin Martin DB-5). It's still entertaining after all of these years, but I've watched too much Mystery Science Theater 3000 to not crack wise at certain things.

I also question things. Like, Goldfinger has a stud farm in Kentucky. Wouldn't the locals question the employment of a hundred Red Chinese or North Korean guys in matching blue coveralls? "Hey, Bubba. Did you see that rich Kraut hired a bunch of Kor-e-ans out at his horse ranch?" Did they run errands in town? ("You fill gas tank now, Yankee Imperialist running dog lackey!" "Now hold on there young fellow. We are not Yankees!") And there's all of these people working horses and stuff that have nothing to do with the fiendish plot. Aren't they going to notice something? "Gee, Mr. Goldfinger has invited the biggest mob bosses in the country for some kind of orientation. I wonder if I should tell the FBI or something?" He'd have to bribe a lot of people to keep them loyal.

But it's still fun. Bond saves the day, defeats the bad guys and ends up with Pussy Galore.

After that Laura came home and made noodles with broccoli and onions with a peanut coconut sauce she got at the Winter Market last weekend. Yum! She was doing pretty well and in spite of my having a fever and her running on four or five hours of sleep managed to have coherent conversation. She only said, "What did you really say?" four or five times. Then I ended up back on the couch until four in the morning, falling in and out of sleep having strange thoughts and dreams.

Which brings us back to today's topic, fever dreams. What is it about being sick that makes us dig into long forgotten memories and strange dreams? And as people who know me know, I have some pretty strange ass dreams all the time already. I can't remember details other then one dream. In it I was going to play guitar for a crowd of people and an old friend, Dave Firestine, showed up. So we went into the room to play and sat our stools at the rear of the hall and asked the audience to pick up their chairs and turn around. You'd think that someone might have noticed that the stage was set up in the rear of the room, but that would be logical.

But it was pretty continuous that I'd dream, wake from it and go over it in my mind and then go back to sleep repeating the process. Or I'd be in that state of not awake, but not quite asleep and things were popping up from thirty plus years ago. Little details of things long forgotten. Like an image of looking out of a car window while on vacation with my parents. What the hell does that have to do with anything now? I don't know.

There's no real point to all of this. I'm still a bit out of it. I need to heal up for tomorrow night's Solstice Celebration at the Mercury Cafe in Denver where Tuatha will be playing. I'm looking forward to it. We played last year and it was a good gathering. Our local priestess is doing the ritual between our sets so that'll be good. Time to shake off the old and bring in the new.

Happy Holidays to you and yours!