The Ghostly Children of Prayer

I am sitting on the upper level of a double-decker train, headed home. As the train chugs along its tracks, there is no wind against my face, despite that the upper level is completely open and has no walls or ceiling. I am sitting with Fernanda and two nondescript girls. We must remain on this train to get home, or else we will forever be stuck in this strange dream world. Our fate rests in the functionality of this one-car train and its tracks being undamaged and clear of obstructions.

That is why I am greatly alarmed when off in the distance, a second train appears, headed towards us. I observe that there is only one set of tracks, so it is on the same track as our train. A head-on collision is imminent. The only way to survive this is by jumping off the train before the collision. I am hesitant to jump off the train, because it is my only hope for getting home. Just before the trains collide, I finally decide to jump off -- much too late.

Had the train been real, I would not have survived the impact (I had waited too long before deciding to jump). However, the train was but a hallucination. I run to catch up with our train again, jump up very high and land back in my original seat on the double-decker train, with Fernanda and the two other girls. I apologize to them and explain that I had suffered from a hallucination.

Over the course of the journey we encounter several close calls that are not hallucinations. Once, a truck was headed for us on the tracks but the driver kindly pushed it aside, off the tracks, allowing us to pass. Another time, there were cars and trucks parked across the train tracks, and we were just barely able to pass under them (they were very enormous cars and trucks, with big wheels and lots of space underneath). Multiple times, an obstruction that appeared unpassable was avoided by a fork in the railroad directing us in the other direction.

We finally reach our destination. This is not home, but simply a transfer station in which we have to wait for another train. The train station resembles one end of a ski lift, enclosed in a large stone building. All of a sudden the train has turned into a ski lift. Employees standing on the ground below us tell me to jump from the lift chair; it is the only way to exit the train. I jump on their command, falling 10 feet before hitting the ground. They help me to my feet and say "you now have all your possessions" (This is a standard protocol statement they are supposed to say when I have retrieved all my carry-on baggage. Since I didn't bring any carry-on baggage, I already had all of my possessions).

Everyone jumps from the ski lift in a similar manner and lands safely on the station. Then we all jump across a 10-foot long chasm, and slide down a couple of ramps before finally reaching the main hall of the station (a large empty hall made of stone). I am the last one to arrive at the main hall because I had to make sure Fernanda and the others could make the jump across the chasm (Fernanda did it in flip-flops but still bridged the gap because she is Fernanda).

On arriving at the main hall I discover that Fernanda and the two girls had either gone too far ahead of me or simply disappeared. Walking alone the stone hall are the Children of Prayer (about 50 of them), making eerie sounds together. It sounds like something played backwards. I remark to myself, "I've heard this somewhere before..." and realize that I once heard these ghostly voices while in a train, going through an empty tunnel.

I begin looking for Fernanda and the two girls, walking around and yelling, "Fernanda, Sarah, ___!" (I forget the third name) to no avail. I reach for my cellphone but discover that I have neither my cellphone nor my wallet; I only have my room keys. Had the employees stolen them, or did I simply forget to bring them? The Children of Prayer are completely devoid of emotion, indifferent to my situation. They continue to sing their eerie, ghostly sounds.

Among the Children of Prayer, I spot Valentina, Fernanda sister. She is about 12 years old (but not in real life). I ask her, "Do you know where your sister is?" Although she is an unemotional Child of Prayer, her eyes light up as she remembers, deep in her repressed memory, that she has a sister named Fernanda. Realizing that Fernanda is lost, she frantically runs up the stairs to look for her.

I too run up the stairs from the main hall (which is kind of like a basement), which lead to the outdoors. When I finally emerge in sunlight, I see the Children of Prayer playing in a large playground. One of the features of the playground is a large watchtower. I climb the watchtower and ask one of the boys if he's seen an older girl. He responds coldly, "I don't care." As he brushes my arm with his, I feel cold shivers. He asks for the name of the girl I'm looking for. I fear the boy's intentions so I give a fake name, "Vyys." I climb back down the watchtower.

The scary boy tosses me a basketball down from the tower. I catch the ball, dribble it, and try to shoot it in a nearby hoop (I miss). I throw the ball back up to him, and he catches it. The boy seems a lot nicer now than before, content with the mild entertainment of playing catch with basketball. We do this a couple more times. The end.

Asians suck at English

Last night I was chilling with some Asian friends. Adam made a remark about how someone's fingers are very "dexterious" (placing emphasis on "TER" as in dexterity). I told him that the correct word is "dexterous" (also spelled dextrous, emphasis on DEX). He did not believe me and maintained that the correct word was "dexterious." Jason, another Asian, sided with Adam's logic, saying "yeah, since the noun is dexterity, the adjective is probably dexterious."

There were eight Asians total in our group. I asked around, certain that someone would know the correct answer and side with me that "dexterious" isn't even a word. But to my surprise, NOT A SINGLE PERSON KNEW. And Jason and Adam still believed I was wrong. So I had to google the word later just to prove Adam wrong.

If there were just a single WHITE PERSON there he/she would have known the answer and sided with me. To give you an idea of what I mean, let me just say that the FIRST WHITE PERSON I asked about this (after the incident) knew that the correct word is "dexterous," but EIGHT ASIANS did NOT have ANY IDEA. Bottom line is Asians are all FOBs, despite what you might think, and they fucking suck at English.

Tropicana Scam

Today I went to Walgreens and saw a "Tropicana 50" that boasted 50% less sugar and calories than their regular orange juice. Being the non-sweet-tooth type of guy, I stupidly bought it, thinking that less-sweet orange juice sounded appealing. I thought they used high-tech reverse osmosis to take out sugar from real orange juice.

What Tropicana failed to mention was that "Tropicana 50" also has 58% less ORANGE JUICE. All they did was DILUTE IT WITH WATER and even ADD ARTIFICIAL SWEETENER. And it cost the same price. Tropicana are fucking scammers.

I was naturally suspicious at first, so I examined the nutrition facts, and even the ingredients. But I didn't read the FINE PRINT of the ingredients. Tropicana had deviously RE-ADDED vitamins and minerals that were lost, thus allowing the nutrition facts to remain IDENTICAL to the 100% orange juice. SUCH BASTARDS

It tasted worse.

Rediscovered IM Conversation

Me recounting a dream to a friend over instant messaging. All following lines are said by me...



an open field with hills

something about killing people

did i shoot someone?

hm...

no

did i get shot??

nope

then wtf happened in the dream fuck

maybe it wasnt about assassins

maybe it was about warcraft 3

was circle in my dream?

don't remember

CATS

CATS

CATS

CATS

CATS WERE IN MY DREAM

AND MICE

OH

RATATOUILLE

dude cats were in my dream i swear.

ahaha

an internet shock site of a guy trying to have his dog give him a blowjob!!!

that was in my dream

i dont know if such a shocksite exists

it probaly does

i had a cat.

but i didn't try to make it give me a blowjob

the cat was loving

Evil Spirits in Stanford

This dream occurs on the same night as "deep-throating locker room girl" but much later.

I am biking with my family. The bikes have a motor with an adjustable speed, so the user can choose to use the motor, pedal with the feet, or both. I pass a building and hear a couple of little 8-year-olds exclaiming in awe, "Oh, look, Stanford!"

We approach the edge of a steep cliff. Below where we stand, there are buildings with roofs of varying height that just might allow for safe passage to the floor via ninja-jumping. Alternatively, we could simply enter a building at our level to our left, take the elevator downwards, and exit the building at the ground floor.

Remembering that there are "evil spirits" in this aforementioned building, I lift my heavy motor bike and consider ninja-jumping all the way down. Then I realize it's not feasible while holding a heavy bike, so I relent and enter the building.

Inside, we say hi to the "children" of the manager of this Stanford building. One of them looks like a little-kid version of my friend Kristen. They are baking deserts for the Amador Valley Marching Band. One of the deserts is a brownie with ice cream on top, and looks very yummy.

I feel the approach of the evil spirits. Come to think of it, this entire dream I've been feeling the approach of the evil spirits. Maybe even since the "deep-throat girl" scene. But now, they have finally caught up to me in this unholy Stanford building, which is their home.

A colorful man wearing a colorful exotic oriental hat strolls very slowly towards me from the adjacent room. He is one of them, I realize. "He's here, he's here!" I wail to no one in particular. Everyone in the room thinks I'm crazy, because only I can see the spirit. I try to explain that I am about to be killed, but that only confuses people further.

I quickly search for a weapon that might help me defeat the evil spirits. I quickly find one of these popsicle holders lying around (without the popsicle, so that the tip facing outwards is a popsicle stick) and attempt to slit the colorful man's throat with it.

It works. His eyes bulge. He gags, "We are trying to protect you!"

The actual evil spirit bursts from the adjacent room and runs towards me. It is skinny, has four legs, and is much more evil-looking. It looks somewhat like my friend Poom. As the evil spirit runs towards me, I attempt to slash it with my popsicle stick. It passes right through the monster. I yell to the Kristen kid in dismay, "My weapon works on my allies but passes right through the evil spirit!" The kid is bewildered by my apparent insanity, because she cannot see the spirits.

Fortunately, the monster is intercepted by another benevolent protector spirit, the son of the colorful man. At this point, name labels appear above the spirits' heads, much like in a computer game. I learn that the colorful man's actual name is "Innkeeper," and he has been keeping peace and order within this Stanford Inn for years, defending against every evil spirit that happened to wander here. The boy is the "son of the Innkeeper."

The boy and the monster are engaged in battle. He yells for assistance, but the Innkeeper is still recovering from a slit neck, due to my folly. Again, I try to slash the evil spirit with my popsicle stick while he is distracted by the boy. Again, the popsicle stick passes right through the monster. I become hysterical and beg to the normal humans around me to realize that I am about to die, but they have no idea what is going on.

Finally, the monster has killed both the Innkeeper and his son. The monster now turns towards me and pinches a tendon on my right shoulder. I am dying, but I also acknowledge the chance that this might be a dream and I might not die.

I feel my heart slow down dramatically.

I wake up.


Inspiration for the creature must have come from House of the Dead, the arcade game

The deep-throating locker room girl (non-sexual)

I enter a locker room, in search of my regular clothes (I am wearing work-out clothes). I realize that I cannot remember which locker I put my clothes in, or even the whereabouts of the locker, because I always use a different locker every time.

In one section of the locker room, there is an aisle of pens, pencils, paper, and other such school necessities on sale. It seems that the locker room is slowly being transformed into a store. The only explanation is that the school year is almost over; they are cleaning out the lockers, replacing lockers with school supplies, and temporarily using the building as a student store.

I ask a nearby girl, "Have they cleaned out the lockers already? Can I still get my clothes back?"

She responds, "Yes, they've cleaned out the lockers, but you can still get your items back from the box in that room."

She leads me to the "box," which is actually a girl kneeling on the floor. She demonstrates how to use the box by sticking her hand deep inside the girl's throat and retrieving an apple from the girl's stomach. Deep-throat girl tells me that she has a gift for identifying people based solely on the contour of their arm, as they reach into her esophagus. Her super-human throat sensors can always correctly identify the individual and allow access to only the items that belong to that individual. This is a neat and secure way to allow everyone to retrieve the items that they left behind in the locker room, as opposed to simply throwing it all away.

Green Dot Scam

Winning the $100 prize at the talent show has given me the opportunity to add one more thing to the long list of things that I hate: The Green Dot Visa Prepaid Card. I don't even have the card yet, because I am supposed to "activate" it before they mail me my debit card (in 7-10 business days).

The instructions state that I can activate online OR by calling 1-866-443-6227. However, after completing the long, tedious activation process online (they even made me give me social security number!), the website informed me that I have to call 1-866-443-6227 to "complete" my activation. So I called this number and the automated voice-recognition computer answered me and told me my name was "Ooh!" even though I said my last name is L-O-H. I hung up when I realized that it was just asking me the same exact questions as the online activation, forcing me to do the entire process all over again.

So if the instructions said activate online OR by phone, why did the website want me to call the phone number even after I finished online activation? Why does the process of claiming my money take longer than it's worth? I am beginning to think that this is all a big scam. I have temporarily given up on redeeming my troublesome $100 prize.

As expected, google yielded some satisfying results of others who hate Green Dot:
http://www.lockergnome.com/tuxedojericho/2007/11/04/greendot-more-like-scamdot/
http://www.howardforums.com/archive/topic/1048788-1.html

On a lighter note, the shirt that I won, which says "Most Talented Berkelean in Unit 1," is quite awesome.



Edit: I finally received the card. But today I found out that someone had secretly signed me up for "premiere membership." I have not used the card at all but my balance is now down to $70.10, from the original 100 dollars. This "premiere membership" is nothing that any sane person would ever purchase, so obviously the workers there are instructed to sign every customer up for it, even though I decidedly refused EVERY special offer.

Consider this: Someone put 100 dollars onto a card as a gift for me, for winning the talent show. Now, only 70 dollars remain. 30 dollars have already been STOLEN by the company.

I believe that the company is made of highly sophisticated scammers. It offers services identical to most debit cards, but they slowly steal your money with secret fees. I do not believe they are affiliated with VISA, although they stamp their cards with the VISA logo. It is impossible to sue them because they are a rogue company with no known location (only a P.O. box).

I will be contacting customer service soon and hopefully resolve this problem. I doubt it will work, though, since their primary objective is probably to steal social security numbers and money.