Well, unlike the previous dream, this one almost had a story to it. Granted, it was extremely vague and it didn’t exactly hold to it much what with it jumping all over the place and never really seeming to go anywhere, but it was there.
I want to say that perhaps a parallel can be drawn between the holes in the plot and the holes in the cheese, but I strongly suspect that a lot of people out there would want to slap me for such dire wordplay, and rightfully so.
Or maybe the cheese being an imitation of Emmental was tied to my dream being an imitation of Star Wars…
No, seriously, that’s enough.
An interesting quality of this dream is that it went from humorous and bizarre to dark and dismal pretty quickly. We go from bounty hunters forgetting how to use their weapons and property disputes with Robert De Niro to a bleak, dead landscape, ravaged by the power of evil, where I become a victim of betrayal and murder.
Granted, none of this really felt depressing in the dream itself. I barely paid any heed to the area having been destroyed, and when I got stabbed by the lightsab…er, the humming red energy beam thing, my reaction largely consisted of “Um, what?” before the Game Over screen showed up. However, from an objective viewpoint, it’s a pretty big downer.
Expect the next update in a few days. In the meantime, I’m going to get myself some tight-fitting, black clothes and write awful poetry.
Until then, may your cheese be plentiful.
Friday, 18 April 2008
Leerdammer: The Dream
I know, I know. “A late update already? He only started the damn thing a week ago!” Shock, outrage, death threats, etc.
I’m sure I could give any and all manner of excuses…I was too tired, I had to work on something else, my parrot ate all my crackers, nobody loves me…but really, you’re not interested in excuses. The update is here now and you’re either going to be placated by it and enjoy it or hate me forever and ever for being a lazy bum and depriving you of Internet entertainment. Not that I’d blame you for the latter, because this is blog is SOLID GOLD and I can see why the wait for new content would make you bad-tempered.
Anyway, on to the important matter; the dream.
It seems that the Star Wars reference I made in my last update stuck in my head, because this dream was a full-blown George Lucas-influenced geek fest. Of course, I suppose it could really have been any generic sci-fi setting, but I’m assuming it was Star Wars because an epic orchestral score accompanied everything (EVERYTHING) that happened, and because the last three hours of the dream were a lot worse than the first three. Or…maybe it was the first three hours that were worse than the last three. I'm not really sure.
The interesting thing is that here, the villain isn’t Darth Vader or Darth Sidious or Darth Anyone (what‘s the idea with that naming convention anyway? Is “Darth” a form of address, or do the dark Jedi give everyone the same name to promote a family atmosphere? And if it‘s supposed to be a title then how come everyone still calls him Lord Vader? Obviously the Darth club is seeeecreet, and no girls are allowed.)
It’s a dragon.
That’s right. In a bit of genre-mixing fun, we have an honest-to-god, magic powered, fire breathing, far-too-big-to-have-any-business-flying dragon, referred to by the general populace as the “Viper Drake”, as the big bad boss.
I don’t know how I knew this from the beginning. I hadn’t seen it, and nobody made any mention of it for a good while. Presumably I was sensitive to the Force and, as we all know, one of the major perks of being a Force-user is knowing certain elements of the plot in advance.
But in any case, that’s all set-up. The dream actually starts, as I recall, on a space ship, from which I am currently preparing to disembark. However, when I turn around, there’s a bounty hunter with a blaster pistol pointed at me. I’m tempted to say it was Boba Fett, but really, I don’t remember what he looked like at all. For all I know it could have been Ghyslain Raza.
He kindly points out that there is, indeed, a bounty on my head, even though I knew already, (Jedi plot knowledge again) and then tells me that he is here to collect upon it. (Which I managed to work out without any kind of advance plot knowledge at all.)
Then he does something so devious, so insidiously elegant that I would have given him a gold star if I had one to hand.
He peers at his blaster for a moment, turns it sideways, then looks at me and asks, “How do you use these things again?”
In spite of being all but overwhelmed by his dazzling display of genius, I retain enough presence of mind to draw my own blaster and gun him down. Since his snazzy-looking armour seems to offer as much protection from blaster fire as that of an Imperial Stormtrooper, (i.e. none) he drops after only a couple of shots.
I should point out that my blaster is a fairly nifty piece of work. It has (presumably) been extensively modified to look like an old, ornately designed flintlock pistol, but despite this, it still fires those distinctive, red laser bolts and makes the PEW PEW sound with which we should all be familiar. The anachronisms just keep piling up.
A transition occurs, and now I’m outside in some kind of park with a group of people, none of whom I remember clearly. It is here that I “learn” about the existence of the Viper Drake when one of these people brings it up. Naturally, as protagonists, it falls to us to find a way to kill the thing. I’m not particularly happy about this since all I have is a blaster, and blasters are useless against important characters.
Another transition and…suddenly I’m discussing ownership of a space ship with Robert De Niro.
I’m serious.
ANOTHER transition (seriously, this dream had ADHD or something) and I’m back in the park again, only this time the whole area has been scorched by the dark flames of the Viper Drake, leaving it more than a bit of a mess. The few structures that are still standing are blackened and smouldering, and everything looks grey and desolate, even the sky.
Suddenly, I look down and there’s a bright, red, laser-like beam poking through my chest, emitting a low-pitched hum. I’m not going to say it was a lightsaber, but…
In any event, I’m now looking at what I can only describe as a “Game Over screen”, stating that one of my companions has betrayed me and joined the Viper Drake in its bid for galactic domination, damn them. This is accompanied by two still pictures, the first of which is of the Viper Drake itself. It looks pretty much exactly how you’d expect an evil dragon to look; spiky crest, big teeth, elongated and serpentine, dark grey in colour. The other is of my traitorous companion with a facial expression suggesting maniacal laughter. Her skin has turned a similar grey to that of the dragon, her face is covered in sinister tattoos, her eyes are red and there’s blood trickling from the corner of her lower lip.
Well, I’m guessing it was blood. It’s not like it was explicitly stated anywhere. It could well have been cranberry juice, but that wouldn’t really have gone with the overall tone.
And that’s it. As you can tell, my dream recollection is still quite fuzzy, but hopefully that’ll improve as I continue to focus on remembering and recording them.
I’m sure I could give any and all manner of excuses…I was too tired, I had to work on something else, my parrot ate all my crackers, nobody loves me…but really, you’re not interested in excuses. The update is here now and you’re either going to be placated by it and enjoy it or hate me forever and ever for being a lazy bum and depriving you of Internet entertainment. Not that I’d blame you for the latter, because this is blog is SOLID GOLD and I can see why the wait for new content would make you bad-tempered.
Anyway, on to the important matter; the dream.
It seems that the Star Wars reference I made in my last update stuck in my head, because this dream was a full-blown George Lucas-influenced geek fest. Of course, I suppose it could really have been any generic sci-fi setting, but I’m assuming it was Star Wars because an epic orchestral score accompanied everything (EVERYTHING) that happened, and because the last three hours of the dream were a lot worse than the first three. Or…maybe it was the first three hours that were worse than the last three. I'm not really sure.
The interesting thing is that here, the villain isn’t Darth Vader or Darth Sidious or Darth Anyone (what‘s the idea with that naming convention anyway? Is “Darth” a form of address, or do the dark Jedi give everyone the same name to promote a family atmosphere? And if it‘s supposed to be a title then how come everyone still calls him Lord Vader? Obviously the Darth club is seeeecreet, and no girls are allowed.)
It’s a dragon.
That’s right. In a bit of genre-mixing fun, we have an honest-to-god, magic powered, fire breathing, far-too-big-to-have-any-business-flying dragon, referred to by the general populace as the “Viper Drake”, as the big bad boss.
I don’t know how I knew this from the beginning. I hadn’t seen it, and nobody made any mention of it for a good while. Presumably I was sensitive to the Force and, as we all know, one of the major perks of being a Force-user is knowing certain elements of the plot in advance.
But in any case, that’s all set-up. The dream actually starts, as I recall, on a space ship, from which I am currently preparing to disembark. However, when I turn around, there’s a bounty hunter with a blaster pistol pointed at me. I’m tempted to say it was Boba Fett, but really, I don’t remember what he looked like at all. For all I know it could have been Ghyslain Raza.
He kindly points out that there is, indeed, a bounty on my head, even though I knew already, (Jedi plot knowledge again) and then tells me that he is here to collect upon it. (Which I managed to work out without any kind of advance plot knowledge at all.)
Then he does something so devious, so insidiously elegant that I would have given him a gold star if I had one to hand.
He peers at his blaster for a moment, turns it sideways, then looks at me and asks, “How do you use these things again?”
In spite of being all but overwhelmed by his dazzling display of genius, I retain enough presence of mind to draw my own blaster and gun him down. Since his snazzy-looking armour seems to offer as much protection from blaster fire as that of an Imperial Stormtrooper, (i.e. none) he drops after only a couple of shots.
I should point out that my blaster is a fairly nifty piece of work. It has (presumably) been extensively modified to look like an old, ornately designed flintlock pistol, but despite this, it still fires those distinctive, red laser bolts and makes the PEW PEW sound with which we should all be familiar. The anachronisms just keep piling up.
A transition occurs, and now I’m outside in some kind of park with a group of people, none of whom I remember clearly. It is here that I “learn” about the existence of the Viper Drake when one of these people brings it up. Naturally, as protagonists, it falls to us to find a way to kill the thing. I’m not particularly happy about this since all I have is a blaster, and blasters are useless against important characters.
Another transition and…suddenly I’m discussing ownership of a space ship with Robert De Niro.
I’m serious.
ANOTHER transition (seriously, this dream had ADHD or something) and I’m back in the park again, only this time the whole area has been scorched by the dark flames of the Viper Drake, leaving it more than a bit of a mess. The few structures that are still standing are blackened and smouldering, and everything looks grey and desolate, even the sky.
Suddenly, I look down and there’s a bright, red, laser-like beam poking through my chest, emitting a low-pitched hum. I’m not going to say it was a lightsaber, but…
In any event, I’m now looking at what I can only describe as a “Game Over screen”, stating that one of my companions has betrayed me and joined the Viper Drake in its bid for galactic domination, damn them. This is accompanied by two still pictures, the first of which is of the Viper Drake itself. It looks pretty much exactly how you’d expect an evil dragon to look; spiky crest, big teeth, elongated and serpentine, dark grey in colour. The other is of my traitorous companion with a facial expression suggesting maniacal laughter. Her skin has turned a similar grey to that of the dragon, her face is covered in sinister tattoos, her eyes are red and there’s blood trickling from the corner of her lower lip.
Well, I’m guessing it was blood. It’s not like it was explicitly stated anywhere. It could well have been cranberry juice, but that wouldn’t really have gone with the overall tone.
And that’s it. As you can tell, my dream recollection is still quite fuzzy, but hopefully that’ll improve as I continue to focus on remembering and recording them.
Wednesday, 16 April 2008
Leerdammer: Introduction
Also known as Maasdam, a name that I believe was given to the cheese after one too many people thought it was some kind of death metal band.
Leerdammer cheese is the Dutch’s answer to Emmental, which is what most people mean when they say “Swiss Cheese.” In fact, I wouldn’t even call it an “answer” so much as a blatant rip-off. It’s the same colour, it’s got the same distinctive holes through it, (a cunning Swiss ploy to cheat people out of cheese) it smells the same, it tastes the same (almost) and it has the same texture.
It rather makes one wonder exactly how far you have to go in the cheese industry before you get accused of plagiarism. I mean, if I took the process for making Gouda (another Dutch cheese) and modified one of the steps very slightly, could I then market this as an entirely new brand of cheese that I’d come up with myself? Yeah, how would *you* like it, Netherlanders? Bunch of copycats.
At first I wasn’t even going to do this cheese. I almost felt as though I shouldn’t eat it, like I’d be supporting their underhanded machinations somehow. However, upon a consultation with the Cheese Sprites, I was assured that cheese is cheese, and should be accepted as it is without regard to whatever shady origins it might possess.
In any event, if you’ve ever had Swiss cheese then you basically know what Leerdammer is like. It has a fairly mild flavour, sweet and nutty, with a creamy consistency. It’s good in sandwiches because the flavour doesn’t overpower everything else you’ve chosen to put in there, and also because it just looks nice. I can only guess at what deep-rooted aspect of the human psyche causes food with holes in it to be aesthetically pleasing, but there you go.
It also occurs to me that I should really have done Emmental first. I mean, now that I’ve written about this shameless imitation of Emmental, I’ll be pretty strapped for things to say when I actually come to write about Emmental. Of course, the same thing would have happened had I done it the other way around, but at least then the real deal would have been the one getting the first-class treatment.
Sorry, Switzerland.
Anyway, here’s the photographic proof:
You can probably tell that the cheese I’m using has been pre-sliced, but don’t worry; it is actual Maasdam cheese, rather than some artificial imitation slop. Wouldn’t that make it a copy of a copy? I don’t think I could push myself to that. Trust me, it’s real. My sanity demands it.
Once again, I will later prepare my Jacob’s crackers for sanctification and consume the cheese. Dream update tomorrow, all being well.
Leerdammer cheese is the Dutch’s answer to Emmental, which is what most people mean when they say “Swiss Cheese.” In fact, I wouldn’t even call it an “answer” so much as a blatant rip-off. It’s the same colour, it’s got the same distinctive holes through it, (a cunning Swiss ploy to cheat people out of cheese) it smells the same, it tastes the same (almost) and it has the same texture.
It rather makes one wonder exactly how far you have to go in the cheese industry before you get accused of plagiarism. I mean, if I took the process for making Gouda (another Dutch cheese) and modified one of the steps very slightly, could I then market this as an entirely new brand of cheese that I’d come up with myself? Yeah, how would *you* like it, Netherlanders? Bunch of copycats.
At first I wasn’t even going to do this cheese. I almost felt as though I shouldn’t eat it, like I’d be supporting their underhanded machinations somehow. However, upon a consultation with the Cheese Sprites, I was assured that cheese is cheese, and should be accepted as it is without regard to whatever shady origins it might possess.
In any event, if you’ve ever had Swiss cheese then you basically know what Leerdammer is like. It has a fairly mild flavour, sweet and nutty, with a creamy consistency. It’s good in sandwiches because the flavour doesn’t overpower everything else you’ve chosen to put in there, and also because it just looks nice. I can only guess at what deep-rooted aspect of the human psyche causes food with holes in it to be aesthetically pleasing, but there you go.
It also occurs to me that I should really have done Emmental first. I mean, now that I’ve written about this shameless imitation of Emmental, I’ll be pretty strapped for things to say when I actually come to write about Emmental. Of course, the same thing would have happened had I done it the other way around, but at least then the real deal would have been the one getting the first-class treatment.
Sorry, Switzerland.
Anyway, here’s the photographic proof:
You can probably tell that the cheese I’m using has been pre-sliced, but don’t worry; it is actual Maasdam cheese, rather than some artificial imitation slop. Wouldn’t that make it a copy of a copy? I don’t think I could push myself to that. Trust me, it’s real. My sanity demands it.
Once again, I will later prepare my Jacob’s crackers for sanctification and consume the cheese. Dream update tomorrow, all being well.
Saturday, 12 April 2008
Extra Mature Cheddar: Conclusion
All in all, a rather pleasant one to start things off. I’ve had the dream of suddenly being able to fly or hover or something similar many times before, and each time it always feels as exciting and pleasantly surprising as I imagine such an occurrence would in real life…or at least, it is when I don’t realise what’s happening and say “Wait…this is a dream, isn’t it? Crap.” That happens a lot.
Even the shooter part was strangely mellow, if that makes any sense. It didn’t feel like I was in a dangerous and tense situation in which I might die at any moment. I was perfectly calm and composed throughout, as if the whole thing was just another day at the office (so to speak) and when someone got shot they just crumpled over quietly and disappeared rather than screaming and gurgling and bleeding for a while before expiring. Presumably my brain was trying to be kid-friendly.
I didn’t experience an adrenaline rush, or really any kind of rush when I found myself in combat. Even when we were getting swarmed by the barrel robots I mostly just screamed for the dramatic effect rather than out of any sense of desperation or rage. If you’re going to wave a gun back and forth while emptying the clip with wild abandon, you just have to scream while you’re doing it, you know? I think there’s a law somewhere.
Now, can any of this be tied into some property of cheddar? I don’t know. It’s far too early to say at this point, and I’ll need to experiment with a much wider variety of cheeses before I can start making connections.
But don’t worry, ladies and gentlemen. I fully intend to.
Since I don’t need to worry about finishing the cheddar, (it was already down to half a block before I started) I should be ready to go with cheese #2 within a few days, so stay tuned.
No really, stay tuned. Do not move from where you are sitting, do not navigate away from this page, and hit the refresh button on your browser every few minutes. You do want to see the next update as soon as possible once it’s up, right? Of course you do.
Until then, may your cheese be plentiful.
Even the shooter part was strangely mellow, if that makes any sense. It didn’t feel like I was in a dangerous and tense situation in which I might die at any moment. I was perfectly calm and composed throughout, as if the whole thing was just another day at the office (so to speak) and when someone got shot they just crumpled over quietly and disappeared rather than screaming and gurgling and bleeding for a while before expiring. Presumably my brain was trying to be kid-friendly.
I didn’t experience an adrenaline rush, or really any kind of rush when I found myself in combat. Even when we were getting swarmed by the barrel robots I mostly just screamed for the dramatic effect rather than out of any sense of desperation or rage. If you’re going to wave a gun back and forth while emptying the clip with wild abandon, you just have to scream while you’re doing it, you know? I think there’s a law somewhere.
Now, can any of this be tied into some property of cheddar? I don’t know. It’s far too early to say at this point, and I’ll need to experiment with a much wider variety of cheeses before I can start making connections.
But don’t worry, ladies and gentlemen. I fully intend to.
Since I don’t need to worry about finishing the cheddar, (it was already down to half a block before I started) I should be ready to go with cheese #2 within a few days, so stay tuned.
No really, stay tuned. Do not move from where you are sitting, do not navigate away from this page, and hit the refresh button on your browser every few minutes. You do want to see the next update as soon as possible once it’s up, right? Of course you do.
Until then, may your cheese be plentiful.
Extra Mature Cheddar: The Dream
Good day to the world.
If you’ve read the preface in which I explained the concept and format of this blog, you’ll know that what I’m doing here is eating cheese before bedtime, an act that causes nightmares according to folklore, and recording the dreams that I experience as a result. This is the second part of the update for extra mature cheddar, and the one in which I detail the dream itself.
If you hadn’t, then you know now, and are no doubt utterly captivated and will be checking for updates regularly from this point onwards.
The results tonight were as expected, which is a promising start to the proceedings. I experienced quite a long and winding dream, only some of which I can clearly remember. I will describe it as best as I can manage.
At first, I’m simply dreaming of a perfectly ordinary day. Morning has just broken, and I’m taking my sweet time in slithering out of bed and getting something to eat. (Admittedly, getting out of bed in the early morning doesn’t exactly constitute an “ordinary day” for me, as I usually prefer late afternoon, but nevertheless.)
After a while I decide to take a shower, but when I enter, I misstep and end up slipping on the wet floor. By reacting quickly, I am able to stop myself from falling over, but not in the way that one might expect.
I discover that by holding my breath, tensing my muscles and “pulling” myself upwards, I am able to float in mid-air. When I slipped, I did this on reflex, but after only a couple of tries I find that I am able to control it easily and naturally.
So I spend a while just hovering around, getting the hang of it, seeing how high I can go…the same kind of things I expect almost anyone would do upon suddenly discovering that they can defy gravity, at least before they try to devise a way to make money off it and use it to pick up women.
Once I’ve finished experimenting, I go outside to attend to whatever it was I had to do, using my ability to hover as my means of locomotion. Can you blame me? However, for some reason, nobody at all seems to find this in the least bit unusual. I’m floating over everyone’s heads in the middle of a crowded street and not a single person so much as bats an eyelid.
As odd as this is, I don’t bother trying to call attention to myself. Perhaps it’s for the best. After all, if the X-Men series has taught us anything, it is that anyone who displays any even remotely superhuman ability will immediately get all but disowned by everyone they care about and forevermore be treated as though they were the bane of human society.
At this point there’s a transition. I’ll be using this term a lot to refer to a significant and abrupt change of circumstance that I can’t explain. It’s possible that there were some intervening events leading up to it that I don’t remember, or perhaps it just suddenly happened. With dreams, you never really know.
Regardless, I am now in some kind of underground facility, leading a small, elite squad of troops into enemy territory. The whole thing feels a lot like a first-person shooter; I can even see a little red crosshair floating in front of me.
We come to this huge room, about the size of a football stadium and completely bare apart from two staircases leading to the door we came in through and one on the opposite wall, with two long ledges leading off in the other direction.
Suddenly, an alarm goes off, and a group of “enemies” (I don’t know who they’re supposed to be; they look like generic soldiers from any World War II-based game you’d care to come up with, so I’ll assume Nazis) bursts through the door. We’re able to gun them down fairly quickly, and here I discover that shooting is remarkably easy. I mean, there’s really nothing to it at all as long as your gun is as light as air, has no recoil, and you’ve got a perfectly-aligned crosshair in your field of vision telling you exactly where to aim.
However, almost as soon as we’ve dealt with this group, another comes storming through, larger than the first. The process repeats itself over and over again, with the enemies becoming tougher and more numerous, until eventually the whole room is filled with a horde of nigh-indestructible robots that look a lot like AT-ST walkers, except they have wine casks for the body. And more guns.
I can only conclude that this means the Nazis are somehow linked to the Empire, and that the true agenda of the Sith was...aggressive vinification or something.
For some reason, though, none of them fire, and we end up wasting most of our ammunition on them in what was supposed to be a screaming, kamikaze frenzy before realising that we could just squeeze between them and walk to the other side of the room unimpeded, albeit feeling a little stupid.
I have to admit that had I been in that situation in reality, I’d have been sorely tempted to come back with a very long rope, stretch it along the length of the room and have two people hold on to the ends and charge forward simultaneously, thereby tripping all the robots up and causing them to explode violently in true Star Wars fashion, presumably showering a wide radius with vintage wine in the process and making connoisseurs everywhere cringe. Alas, it was not to be.
Although I’m fairly sure I didn’t wake up at this point, I remember everything that happened afterwards too vaguely to commit it to writing, so this is where my recollections must end.
If you’ve read the preface in which I explained the concept and format of this blog, you’ll know that what I’m doing here is eating cheese before bedtime, an act that causes nightmares according to folklore, and recording the dreams that I experience as a result. This is the second part of the update for extra mature cheddar, and the one in which I detail the dream itself.
If you hadn’t, then you know now, and are no doubt utterly captivated and will be checking for updates regularly from this point onwards.
The results tonight were as expected, which is a promising start to the proceedings. I experienced quite a long and winding dream, only some of which I can clearly remember. I will describe it as best as I can manage.
At first, I’m simply dreaming of a perfectly ordinary day. Morning has just broken, and I’m taking my sweet time in slithering out of bed and getting something to eat. (Admittedly, getting out of bed in the early morning doesn’t exactly constitute an “ordinary day” for me, as I usually prefer late afternoon, but nevertheless.)
After a while I decide to take a shower, but when I enter, I misstep and end up slipping on the wet floor. By reacting quickly, I am able to stop myself from falling over, but not in the way that one might expect.
I discover that by holding my breath, tensing my muscles and “pulling” myself upwards, I am able to float in mid-air. When I slipped, I did this on reflex, but after only a couple of tries I find that I am able to control it easily and naturally.
So I spend a while just hovering around, getting the hang of it, seeing how high I can go…the same kind of things I expect almost anyone would do upon suddenly discovering that they can defy gravity, at least before they try to devise a way to make money off it and use it to pick up women.
Once I’ve finished experimenting, I go outside to attend to whatever it was I had to do, using my ability to hover as my means of locomotion. Can you blame me? However, for some reason, nobody at all seems to find this in the least bit unusual. I’m floating over everyone’s heads in the middle of a crowded street and not a single person so much as bats an eyelid.
As odd as this is, I don’t bother trying to call attention to myself. Perhaps it’s for the best. After all, if the X-Men series has taught us anything, it is that anyone who displays any even remotely superhuman ability will immediately get all but disowned by everyone they care about and forevermore be treated as though they were the bane of human society.
At this point there’s a transition. I’ll be using this term a lot to refer to a significant and abrupt change of circumstance that I can’t explain. It’s possible that there were some intervening events leading up to it that I don’t remember, or perhaps it just suddenly happened. With dreams, you never really know.
Regardless, I am now in some kind of underground facility, leading a small, elite squad of troops into enemy territory. The whole thing feels a lot like a first-person shooter; I can even see a little red crosshair floating in front of me.
We come to this huge room, about the size of a football stadium and completely bare apart from two staircases leading to the door we came in through and one on the opposite wall, with two long ledges leading off in the other direction.
Suddenly, an alarm goes off, and a group of “enemies” (I don’t know who they’re supposed to be; they look like generic soldiers from any World War II-based game you’d care to come up with, so I’ll assume Nazis) bursts through the door. We’re able to gun them down fairly quickly, and here I discover that shooting is remarkably easy. I mean, there’s really nothing to it at all as long as your gun is as light as air, has no recoil, and you’ve got a perfectly-aligned crosshair in your field of vision telling you exactly where to aim.
However, almost as soon as we’ve dealt with this group, another comes storming through, larger than the first. The process repeats itself over and over again, with the enemies becoming tougher and more numerous, until eventually the whole room is filled with a horde of nigh-indestructible robots that look a lot like AT-ST walkers, except they have wine casks for the body. And more guns.
I can only conclude that this means the Nazis are somehow linked to the Empire, and that the true agenda of the Sith was...aggressive vinification or something.
For some reason, though, none of them fire, and we end up wasting most of our ammunition on them in what was supposed to be a screaming, kamikaze frenzy before realising that we could just squeeze between them and walk to the other side of the room unimpeded, albeit feeling a little stupid.
I have to admit that had I been in that situation in reality, I’d have been sorely tempted to come back with a very long rope, stretch it along the length of the room and have two people hold on to the ends and charge forward simultaneously, thereby tripping all the robots up and causing them to explode violently in true Star Wars fashion, presumably showering a wide radius with vintage wine in the process and making connoisseurs everywhere cringe. Alas, it was not to be.
Although I’m fairly sure I didn’t wake up at this point, I remember everything that happened afterwards too vaguely to commit it to writing, so this is where my recollections must end.
Friday, 11 April 2008
Extra Mature Cheddar: Introduction
Let’s start this off with an old favourite of mine.
A question that may be on your mind right now is “How will I be eating the cheese?” Well, although it may vary with certain particularly exotic or unusual varieties, I will generally be serving up any and all cheese I eat with Jacob’s Cream Crackers:
Plain, unsalted crackers have the Cheese Sprites’ complete approval as one of the most pure and simple means of cheese consumption, and Jacob‘s brand are of a consistently high quality; which as just as well, as cheese deserves nothing but the best. Although “cheese and crackers” comes second to eating the cheese straight with no accompaniment at all, I am only human, so I’m allowed some leeway here.
Now, about the cheese itself. If you've never had it, (in which case you should be ashamed) extra mature cheddar is a strong, somewhat salty cheese with a sharp flavour. It tends to be quite crumbly in texture, which makes it difficult to use for some purposes, (in sandwiches, for example) but with a good knife and a bit of practice, you should be able to cut it without it going to pieces on you.
Like most (possibly all) British cheeses, cheddar is named after its place of origin, that being the village of Cheddar. This might not have been the wisest of moves, because with cheddar being as popular as it is, most people now immediately associate the word "Cheddar" with the cheese itself rather than the geographical location. Of course, being famous for the production of a certain item will inevitably cause you to be known as "Those guys who make (insert item here)", but when it actually reaches the point at which you're living so much in the shadow of your cheese that people don't even know that you exist...
Wow. That can't be good for a person's self-esteem.
There are a lot of things to like about extra mature cheddar. For one thing, it’s a good “eating cheese”. Although, of course, all cheese (with perhaps a few exceptions) is meant to be consumed in a general sense, the term “eating cheese” refers to cheese that is good to simply eat on its own and as it is, without further preparation or being added to another dish.
That said, however, cheddar can fulfil the latter two roles quite well. Although many simple recipes (such as the cheese omelette) may call for a certain type of cheese that is “best” for the dish, cheddar often makes for a good substitute. The flavour will, of course, be different, but the result will still taste good. You can also (I’m going to get attacked for this) shred it over pizza. Mind you, a good, freshly made pizza won’t need it, but if you happen to be stuck with one of the cheap, frozen variety, a little bit of grated cheddar can really spruce it up.
However, the one, true reason that mature cheddar has forever earned a place among my cheese hall of fame is much more simple:
Cheese on toast.
That’s grilled cheese to our American audience. Yes, a simple melting of cheese slices on to lightly crisped bread, in which cheddar performs like a champion. In terms of the ratio of the tastiness of a dish to the effort required to prepare and cook it, cheese on toast is probably in first-place by a considerable amount, and given that cheddar happens to be the best cheese for it, I’m pretty sure that means that cheddar is the best food in the world. I can only feel sorry for the lactose intolerant.
In fact, on second thought, no I don’t. Digestive difficulties aren’t a sufficiently good excuse not to try this. Unless you’re 100% positive that eating melted cheddar on toast will cause you to DIE, get up and make some right now. RIGHT now. Why are you still here? I include all of you in this. Do not read beyond the end of this paragraph until you make yourself some grilled vintage cheddar. I’m serious.
Now that we’ve got that out of the way, let’s take a look at what I promised you all in my introductory post; a photo of myself, in the Vestments of the Eldritch Curd, holding the cheese in question.
Yes, not even cheese is safe from XTREMENESS.
From where I’m standing, it feels silly to have to prove that I’ve got some cheddar. Not only is it a fairly common cheese to begin with, but I am never without a block of it in my fridge and I eat it on a regular basis, so it’s not as if the idea of me having some before bed is in any way outlandish. Nevertheless, consistency is important.
I should note that the packaging warns that this cheese is “For Adults Only.”
I can only say that I'm lucky that I qualify, because if I had to seek parental permission then my dear mother would discover what I’m doing here, and she would never approve. I’m sorry, mother, but it must be done.
That’s it for now. Later tonight I will ritualistically sanctify my crackers, give thanks to the Cheese Sprites and begin the consumption process. Expect the dream update tomorrow.
A question that may be on your mind right now is “How will I be eating the cheese?” Well, although it may vary with certain particularly exotic or unusual varieties, I will generally be serving up any and all cheese I eat with Jacob’s Cream Crackers:
Plain, unsalted crackers have the Cheese Sprites’ complete approval as one of the most pure and simple means of cheese consumption, and Jacob‘s brand are of a consistently high quality; which as just as well, as cheese deserves nothing but the best. Although “cheese and crackers” comes second to eating the cheese straight with no accompaniment at all, I am only human, so I’m allowed some leeway here.
Now, about the cheese itself. If you've never had it, (in which case you should be ashamed) extra mature cheddar is a strong, somewhat salty cheese with a sharp flavour. It tends to be quite crumbly in texture, which makes it difficult to use for some purposes, (in sandwiches, for example) but with a good knife and a bit of practice, you should be able to cut it without it going to pieces on you.
Like most (possibly all) British cheeses, cheddar is named after its place of origin, that being the village of Cheddar. This might not have been the wisest of moves, because with cheddar being as popular as it is, most people now immediately associate the word "Cheddar" with the cheese itself rather than the geographical location. Of course, being famous for the production of a certain item will inevitably cause you to be known as "Those guys who make (insert item here)", but when it actually reaches the point at which you're living so much in the shadow of your cheese that people don't even know that you exist...
Wow. That can't be good for a person's self-esteem.
There are a lot of things to like about extra mature cheddar. For one thing, it’s a good “eating cheese”. Although, of course, all cheese (with perhaps a few exceptions) is meant to be consumed in a general sense, the term “eating cheese” refers to cheese that is good to simply eat on its own and as it is, without further preparation or being added to another dish.
That said, however, cheddar can fulfil the latter two roles quite well. Although many simple recipes (such as the cheese omelette) may call for a certain type of cheese that is “best” for the dish, cheddar often makes for a good substitute. The flavour will, of course, be different, but the result will still taste good. You can also (I’m going to get attacked for this) shred it over pizza. Mind you, a good, freshly made pizza won’t need it, but if you happen to be stuck with one of the cheap, frozen variety, a little bit of grated cheddar can really spruce it up.
However, the one, true reason that mature cheddar has forever earned a place among my cheese hall of fame is much more simple:
Cheese on toast.
That’s grilled cheese to our American audience. Yes, a simple melting of cheese slices on to lightly crisped bread, in which cheddar performs like a champion. In terms of the ratio of the tastiness of a dish to the effort required to prepare and cook it, cheese on toast is probably in first-place by a considerable amount, and given that cheddar happens to be the best cheese for it, I’m pretty sure that means that cheddar is the best food in the world. I can only feel sorry for the lactose intolerant.
In fact, on second thought, no I don’t. Digestive difficulties aren’t a sufficiently good excuse not to try this. Unless you’re 100% positive that eating melted cheddar on toast will cause you to DIE, get up and make some right now. RIGHT now. Why are you still here? I include all of you in this. Do not read beyond the end of this paragraph until you make yourself some grilled vintage cheddar. I’m serious.
Now that we’ve got that out of the way, let’s take a look at what I promised you all in my introductory post; a photo of myself, in the Vestments of the Eldritch Curd, holding the cheese in question.
Yes, not even cheese is safe from XTREMENESS.
From where I’m standing, it feels silly to have to prove that I’ve got some cheddar. Not only is it a fairly common cheese to begin with, but I am never without a block of it in my fridge and I eat it on a regular basis, so it’s not as if the idea of me having some before bed is in any way outlandish. Nevertheless, consistency is important.
I should note that the packaging warns that this cheese is “For Adults Only.”
I can only say that I'm lucky that I qualify, because if I had to seek parental permission then my dear mother would discover what I’m doing here, and she would never approve. I’m sorry, mother, but it must be done.
That’s it for now. Later tonight I will ritualistically sanctify my crackers, give thanks to the Cheese Sprites and begin the consumption process. Expect the dream update tomorrow.
Thursday, 10 April 2008
Preface to a Dream, Part III
But that’s quite enough of my personal story. Let me get down to business and tell you what this is all about.
This is essentially a dream diary with the added factor of cheese. Updates will come in two parts. The first will consist of the type of cheese I intend to consume and a description of its flavour, its uses, how much I like it, and (if I can be bothered to bore you) its history, place of origin and so on. In order to prove (or at least to go towards convincing you) that I’m not just picking out the names of random cheeses, pretending I’ve eaten them and then making some dream up to write about, I will also post a photograph of myself, wearing the Vestments of the Eldritch Curd and holding whatever cheese it is I intend to eat, like so:
The second part will consist of a recounting of the dream I had the night after eating the cheese, if any, along with my thoughts on it and any correlations I may be able to draw between the type of cheese and the type of dream.
The updates will not be daily, as by and large it is difficult for me to buy cheese in small portions. If I go out and buy a big wedge every day then I’m not going to be able to eat it all and it’ll just go to waste, which will greatly displease the Cheese Sprites, and may incite them to strip me of my enchanted clothing. And then I’ll be naked. We cannot have that.
Therefore, new content will come as and when I can acquire the cheese I need, although I will aim for a once-a-week schedule. This will also give previous cheeses plenty of time to work their way out of my system, thereby preventing any lingering effects from interfering with the results.
I fully intend to get this kicked off as soon as possible, so watch this space. I hope to see you return soon. Until then, ladies and gentlemen, may your cheese be plentiful.
(Note: This is not intended to be a rip-off of the study I referenced earlier. I actually had this idea before said study was ever published, not that I have any means of proving it. Nevertheless, this will be a more in-depth and much less serious look into the effects of cheese on dreams, so no, I'm not just playing copycat. Really.)
This is essentially a dream diary with the added factor of cheese. Updates will come in two parts. The first will consist of the type of cheese I intend to consume and a description of its flavour, its uses, how much I like it, and (if I can be bothered to bore you) its history, place of origin and so on. In order to prove (or at least to go towards convincing you) that I’m not just picking out the names of random cheeses, pretending I’ve eaten them and then making some dream up to write about, I will also post a photograph of myself, wearing the Vestments of the Eldritch Curd and holding whatever cheese it is I intend to eat, like so:
The second part will consist of a recounting of the dream I had the night after eating the cheese, if any, along with my thoughts on it and any correlations I may be able to draw between the type of cheese and the type of dream.
The updates will not be daily, as by and large it is difficult for me to buy cheese in small portions. If I go out and buy a big wedge every day then I’m not going to be able to eat it all and it’ll just go to waste, which will greatly displease the Cheese Sprites, and may incite them to strip me of my enchanted clothing. And then I’ll be naked. We cannot have that.
Therefore, new content will come as and when I can acquire the cheese I need, although I will aim for a once-a-week schedule. This will also give previous cheeses plenty of time to work their way out of my system, thereby preventing any lingering effects from interfering with the results.
I fully intend to get this kicked off as soon as possible, so watch this space. I hope to see you return soon. Until then, ladies and gentlemen, may your cheese be plentiful.
(Note: This is not intended to be a rip-off of the study I referenced earlier. I actually had this idea before said study was ever published, not that I have any means of proving it. Nevertheless, this will be a more in-depth and much less serious look into the effects of cheese on dreams, so no, I'm not just playing copycat. Really.)
Preface to a Dream, Part II
Allow me to cease my rambling for a moment and introduce myself. I go by the name of “Rennet Sheikh,” and if you hadn’t already made the connection, I love cheese, both for its taste and for the merry havoc it has wrought upon my once drab, dreamless nights. Hello, Interwebs.
Recently, I was given a gift. My fondness for delicious, curdled dairy products did not go unnoticed by certain otherworldly entities; the Cheese Sprites. These fairy-like creatures were responsible for cheese’s introduction to mankind. It was not, as some would have you believe, discovered either by accident, experimentation, or any combination of the two. The Cheese Sprites brought it into our world by means of an ancient magical ritual, and have seen to it that it continues to thrive and be enjoyed by humans everywhere.
As luck would have it, the Cheese Sprites took a shine to me and saw fit to bestow upon me a magical set of clothing, known as “The Vestments of the Eldritch Curd.” While wearing this outfit, my sense of taste becomes acutely attuned to the flavour of cheese, allowing me to appreciate it even more than I already did. It also grants me extra-sensory perception, through which I can sense the exact location and type of any and all cheese within a 100-mile radius, and the ability to transform myself wholly into whey, whereupon I become nigh-indestructible.
This was a major turning point in my life, and it inspired me to create what you see before you.
Recently, I was given a gift. My fondness for delicious, curdled dairy products did not go unnoticed by certain otherworldly entities; the Cheese Sprites. These fairy-like creatures were responsible for cheese’s introduction to mankind. It was not, as some would have you believe, discovered either by accident, experimentation, or any combination of the two. The Cheese Sprites brought it into our world by means of an ancient magical ritual, and have seen to it that it continues to thrive and be enjoyed by humans everywhere.
As luck would have it, the Cheese Sprites took a shine to me and saw fit to bestow upon me a magical set of clothing, known as “The Vestments of the Eldritch Curd.” While wearing this outfit, my sense of taste becomes acutely attuned to the flavour of cheese, allowing me to appreciate it even more than I already did. It also grants me extra-sensory perception, through which I can sense the exact location and type of any and all cheese within a 100-mile radius, and the ability to transform myself wholly into whey, whereupon I become nigh-indestructible.
This was a major turning point in my life, and it inspired me to create what you see before you.
Preface to a Dream
Sleep. Although many dedicated programmers disagree, it is a process vital to our survival. This is unfortunate, because we’d be a great deal more productive if it wasn’t. Just imagine how much more progress could have been made by now in science, the arts and the general betterment of man if it wasn’t necessary for us to lie in a state of inactivity for approximately eight hours a day in order to remain healthy and sane.
Frankly, the whole routine would be extremely dull and tiresome (pardon the pun) if it wasn’t for a certain saving grace; dreams.
Dreams exist to make sleep more interesting, thus making us, being the easily bored species that we are, more inclined to do it. There are some crackpot scientific theories floating around that they are merely the result of your brain processing the events of days gone by, or an interpretive response to external stimuli, but these are quite obviously untrue. We (humans) invented dreams in order to make sleep tolerable, and before you ask why animals supposedly have them too, it’s because we were kind enough to share. So there.
Many things can affect the nature of one’s dreams. If one has been performing the same action repeatedly over the course of the day, it is likely that they’ll find themselves continuing to perform it inside their own head after they’ve gone to sleep. Someone who has experienced a traumatic event may have recurring nightmares about it. Here, however, there is one particular aspect that I intend to focus on:
Cheese.
It is a commonly held myth that the consumption of cheese before bedtime causes nightmares. Although studies have proven this false, they nevertheless indicated that it did seem to result in an increased frequency of dreaming. Even more interestingly, the dreams appeared to show certain themes based on the type of cheese consumed.
Naturally, the study is by no means conclusive, and some or all of it may simply be coincidence. Without further research, we may never be entirely sure. However, based on my own experiences, I believe that the theory of cheese causing one to dream, if not necessarily have nightmares, is entirely true.
Frankly, the whole routine would be extremely dull and tiresome (pardon the pun) if it wasn’t for a certain saving grace; dreams.
Dreams exist to make sleep more interesting, thus making us, being the easily bored species that we are, more inclined to do it. There are some crackpot scientific theories floating around that they are merely the result of your brain processing the events of days gone by, or an interpretive response to external stimuli, but these are quite obviously untrue. We (humans) invented dreams in order to make sleep tolerable, and before you ask why animals supposedly have them too, it’s because we were kind enough to share. So there.
Many things can affect the nature of one’s dreams. If one has been performing the same action repeatedly over the course of the day, it is likely that they’ll find themselves continuing to perform it inside their own head after they’ve gone to sleep. Someone who has experienced a traumatic event may have recurring nightmares about it. Here, however, there is one particular aspect that I intend to focus on:
Cheese.
It is a commonly held myth that the consumption of cheese before bedtime causes nightmares. Although studies have proven this false, they nevertheless indicated that it did seem to result in an increased frequency of dreaming. Even more interestingly, the dreams appeared to show certain themes based on the type of cheese consumed.
Naturally, the study is by no means conclusive, and some or all of it may simply be coincidence. Without further research, we may never be entirely sure. However, based on my own experiences, I believe that the theory of cheese causing one to dream, if not necessarily have nightmares, is entirely true.
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