I was somewhere like a spring break beach-party type of thing, and I was outside, and there was something like an event or presentation happening.  I didn’t really tune into the show because I was stumbling around drunk, I suppose a bit tipsy after several hours of day-drinking.  I recall passing by the audience, which was to my right, and the stage area was on my left, as I was on a narrow path between the two.  I was somewhat conscientious of being a distraction for the viewers; there was that worry of ‘Down in front” as I passed by, so I didn’t want to do anything to bring any unnecessary attention to myself, or focus on anything other than simply moving through expeditiously.  It felt like it would have been rude to even turn my head to observe the crowd as I passed by.

Then suddenly I was hanging out with a girl who gave me a plastic cup full of orange juice.  It was a great bit of refreshment, which felt like a good choice since I’d probably had nothing but alcoholic drinks all day.  The day turned to evening, and I wanted to go to the beach bar to get a smoothie or something like that, with orange and pineapple, and without any more booze.  I got there and the guy working acknowledged me; we spoke about what I wanted to order. I felt like he was clear about what I wanted, so I was confused when he appeared to just delay in making the drink, for no apparent reason.  There weren’t any other customers there, and he wasn’t busy doing anything else which may have been a priority, like chopping fruit or cleaning up.  Instead he just stood there for several minutes and looked bored.  I’m not one to get fussy with service people, since I know how much shit they get from easily-outraged, irate and entitled customers, so I just remained patient.  But as more time elapsed, I guess it must have seemed like I was glaring at him, as in my mind I was thinking Are we going to fucking do this? Did I not say the magic word?

Finally he switched ‘on’ like Ok now let’s get this going.  He was first focused on what cup to put the drink into.  He opened a lower cupboard and pointed to a wider, more squarely proportioned red-colored cup, then decided that it probably wasn’t the best one for me.  Based on what– I don’t know–  I was still holding the empty cup from before. I guess he wanted the new cup to have some contrast or seem like an upgrade from what I already had.  So then he presented a more vertically shaped white cup.  At first I thought it may have been smaller than my existing cup, but then I put them side-by-side and realized this new white one he was proposing actually did have more volume, so I was OK with it.

Then there was a transition, and suddenly I arrived in an office space where at least two different business entities were operating, each across the hall from the other.  One was run by a couple of ‘bro’ type of guys who were probably partners in a law firm, and they were moaning about the ethical issues they had with the solo-practitioner running his own office across the hall.  I didn’t really know what they all actually did, so I asked the guy across the hall about it.  He said he essentially provided services in the form of satisfying bureaucratic ‘hoops’ that a business entity might have to jump through in order to start operating legally, such as required permitting and licensing, so that the team could be very swift and effective, which enabled them to fly under their competitor’s radar.  This obviously gave them a competitive advantage, which meant the existing guys would be caught off guard and not have as much time to adjust or react.  The guy was short, and had that ex-military, crew-cut hair style and wore aviator style frames.

From there I was in my car and parked on the right side of a street that was on a downslope, and it seemed like a place I’d been before.  I was there to see a particular guy.  Suddenly I was in an upper area, hanging out with a blond woman wearing white.  I had some coloring books, and someone discovered that this blond woman had written a message to me in one of the books which was something about how cute I was, or something indicating she fancied me for something relationship-wise beyond typical friendship.  The message in the book appeared to be printed very professionally, either by a very skilled hand or else a machine, so it made me wonder whether this woman was perhaps a ‘working girl’ who was trying to lure me into a situation where she hoped I was inside an illusion of a real relationship but in reality was just a profit-opportunity for herself.  

Before anything more came of that, I headed out through a doorway and went  through a narrow corridor that had some switch-backs, going down a hill.  The area had a ‘ghetto’ inner-city feel, where dudes were just hanging out on the sidewalk, throwing dice.  I had no alternative way through, so I said “Excuse me” as I passed through, but then one of the guys shoved me in the back, essentially trying to intimidate or bully me, like “Watch where you’re walking, asshole!”  Then I passed by another couple guys, one of whom also tried to act tough and intimidate me; he pretended to be provoked by my presence.  This was basically a five-foot tall teenage black kid. I stopped, sized him up, then he put his fist up to my face and paused. My patience was running low, so I considered just decking him for being a punk.  His buddy tried to make light of the situation, saying something like “Oh ok, ok, he’s not just another scared white guy,” like my decision to not put up with that shit was enough for them to rethink their intimidation tactics.

I kept going.  Then an even younger kid wearing a beanie and a blue and white puff jacket popped up and also started giving me shit.  At first he made a funny sound like “ckkhh” which I thought may have been a signal for the others in his crew to gang up on me.  So I thought I was about to get jumped by a bunch of guys, so I called out for help, hoping that some good neighbor might step up to help out a fellow good guy.  Then the kid called out for help as well, trying to make it seem like I was the aggressor in the situation, but no one showed up for him either.  I picked the kid up by his collar– he was only like four feet tall.  I noticed then as I walked out of the yard that he was either an extremely short dwarf, or else an adult with some strange condition where they mature in appearance without ever growing.  His feet were dangling over the ground so he was kicking and squirming, but still tried to taunt me and talk shit.  I just patted his chubby cheek with my left hand as I carried him down the street with my right; it reminded me of a butt-cheek.  Then suddenly the police showed up and put the kid in handcuffs with his hands behind his back.  I trusted they would take it from there.  I suppose I felt like he’d get served with some kind of justice.

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