I had a dream last night in which I was in a romantic relationship with a human woman, and it was kind of nice. Was that the point of the dream? I don't know. Do dreams have points? In any event, it made me consider whether I should look into being in a romantic relationship again.

Of course, any potential candidates would have to meet a few basic qualifications first. Obviously she'd have to like dogs, laugh at my good jokes, and at least tolerate football and video games. I'd prefer a girl better looking and smarter than I am, but I'll settle for average looks and significantly-better-than-average intelligence. Brightly-colored dyed hair is a plus.

If I found someone like that, before we went on a date, she'd have to answer the following brief questionnaire:

1. When is the right time of year to wear open-toed shoes?
2. Which of Alfred Hitchcock's movies is the best?
3. How early is too early for stores to start selling Halloween decorations in advance of Halloween?
4. Marvel or DC?
5. What's the proper response to "We don't have Coke. Is Pepsi Okay?"

If there is a woman alive who can pass those criteria, honestly, she probably deserves better than me. Live long and prosper, awesome lady!

For the record, correct answers are 1. Never; 2. My personal preference is Rope but I'll accept anything but Vertigo; 3. September 23; 4. DC; and 5. Burn the place down and salt the ashes.

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The following is based on actual events:

My friends and I sat, talked, laughed, and otherwise enjoyed the convivial environment engendered by the rustic treehouse lounge Keith had constructed in his backyard in suburban Cumming, Georgia. Despite the good company, I knew the neighborhood had problems. I had a passed a bright red demon on the streets leading to Keith's house. Fortunately for me, it was preoccupied enjoying its meal of unwary domestic cat. Still, I felt safe up in the treehouse — until we were startled by the sudden appearance of a bright green dragon.

Keith saw my fear and laughed. "Relax. It can't get to us here. I've wrapped the whole tree in a dragon-proof net."

He spoke the truth. Although the dragon bit and bit, it was unable to chew its way through the protective wire. We soon ignored it and went back to having a good time.

When I woke up, I realized the treehouse and dragon had all been part of a very vivid dream. Amazed by how realistic it had all seemed, I decided to drive over to Keith's to tell him about it. I passed no demons on the way, and as expected, there was no treehouse in Keith's yard.

Keith met me in his driveway. You cannot be too cautious these days, so I was careful to wear a mask and stand a socially-accepted distance away from him in the cold December weather as I told him of my dream.

Keith enjoyed my story and laughed. "That's ridiculous. There's no such thing as a dragon-proof net."

Naturally, that's when the dragon swooped down upon us.

I woke up a second time and am now typing this story. But I'm still keeping one eye out. I can't shake the feeling that there's a dragon out there somewhere.

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I've been sick for the past few days (the first time I've been ill in 2014 — it had been a good run!), and I can tell I must have a fever because last night I dreamed that I attended comedian Seth Meyers' wedding.

I was in charge of the coat check, which was strange because 1) it was a summer wedding and 2) even in my dream I didn't personally know Seth Meyers. Of course, I was probably the logical choice for the position, seeing as how the wedding was being held in my grandmother's house.

I have to say that Dream-Seth isn't quite the fun-loving jokester you see on TV, but in his defense he was very stressed out by his wedding. He was particularly concerned that the caterers had screwed up the reception desert, something he called "crown cakes," which looked and tasted like Moon Pies. (Also in Seth's defense, I've been to more than one wedding that served Moon Pies at the reception.)

The weirdest part of all of this was that I never saw the bride's face. Perhaps this is because although Meyers mentions her frequently, he has never had her on his show. In my dream, she kept her wedding veil down. I should say that even without a face, she was much nicer than Seth.

I do hope that I feel better soon. I don't enjoy weddings in real life. I don't want to be dreaming about them anymore, even if the groom promises to make me a guest on his late night talk show if I'll just hurry up and retrieve the car keys he left in his coat.

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I had a dream last night that I was working with Dick Schwartz and Jim Groff in the Comic Company again. The personalities were spot on: Dick seems affable but is really so deaf he has no idea what you're saying, and Jim is polite and professional but completely disinterested in comics. How did I end up enjoying a job so much where no one ever listened to me?

This dream isn't too uncommon for me. I dream quite frequently about old jobs. My co-workers are usually as I remember them. Or, more accurately, how I remember their personalities. (Although I have a mind for trivia, I was never good at remembering faces or names.) What always changes are the locations. Maybe it's my mind's way of preventing me from guessing what's coming next, just like how The Magnificent Seven is really the Seven Samurai but hopes you won't notice for all the sand.

While I dream occasionally about working at the comic book store, I more often dream about being a waiter again. That dream is always the same. I'll be enjoying palling around with my nameless co-workers for awhile before the dinner rush starts. For a time, I'll be on top of the game. But inevitably, too many people ask me to do too many things at once, and I become a stressed-out basket case. I got fired from every job I ever had as a waiter. If my dreams are any indication, I wasn't very good at it.

But my dreams of working at the comic book store are never negative. That should probably be expected. I loved that job. I never would have commuted 120 miles round-trip to work at a restaurant as I did when working at the Comic Company. Heck, these days you have to pay me $100 just to take the trash out to the curb.

Thanks for the opportunity at my dream job, Dick and Jim.

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For reasons I can't explain, I wound up at a picnic for some of the greatest retired NFL quarterbacks. Dan Marino is there, naturally, but so is Elway, Cunningham, Moon, and more, all dressed like they had just stepped out of a Land's End catalog.

After a brief introduction, we walk to the stadium. We move in slow motion, as though underwater. Dodging their wrinkle-free khaki legs, I realize that these giants of football are literally giants as I gaze up at them from the viewpoint of a child. Occasionally golden rays of sunlight pierce the space between them, back-lighting their smiling faces and making them look like bronze statues of gods.

The weather changes abruptly, and the Minnesota Vikings fans wait beside stacked snowdrifts to enter their domed stadium. The fans are mostly dressed in puffy pink snowsuits, giving them the appearance of cotton-candy Michelen Men.

Inside, the stadium seems far too small to host a football game. I'm seated in the upper deck facing a solid white wall with a bank of glowing windows. The field far to our right isn't even visible from our seats. Some of the fans seated near me titter excitedly when our bank of seats begins to rotate towards the field. Gradually, the field comes into view, a flat, lifeless artificial turf. No one, neither coaches, players, or stadium personnel, is on the field.

Our seats continue rotating. Despite the hopeful noise around me, I know that we're just going to rotate 360° and face the window again. Of course I'm right, and I smile smugly to myself.

I get up from my seat and begin walking downstairs towards the lower level when I trip and stumble over the railing running vertically up the middle of the white concrete stairs. Desperate not to fall and make a fool of myself in front of a full house of fans, I lithely roll horizontally around the handrail like an Olympic gymnast and land on my feet. The nearby crowd thinks I've done this on purpose and cheers its appreciation.

Someone from the Vikings organization has seen my performance and rushes me down the stairs into a wood-paneled backroom where the team is waiting. The players are all wearing their pink Vikings uniforms, milling around nervously in the too-small space. Some are talking, some are tossing a football, some are playing cards or listening to music; they are behaving like extras in the background of a Hollywood locker-room scene. I'm at least a foot shorter and 100 pounds lighter than everyone else in the room.

Someone -- the coach? the general manager? -- grabs my arm and tells me that they saw my "moves" in the stadium and they need me to replace their quarterback who has just broken his leg. On cue the quarterback, fully dressed for the game in his bright pink uniform and shoulder pads, rolls his wheelchair in from another room, his outstretched left leg encased in a white plaster cast. For someone with a broken leg, he looks indecently happy.

I try to explain that what they saw was an accident, merely an attempt to keep from making an idiot of myself. The man talking to me doesn't believe me. Chomping on his cigar, he orders the lame quarterback to throw me a pass. The football comes at me like a bullet aimed just above my head. Without time to think, reflexes born of self-preservation motivate me into a leaping backflip. In the process, my flailing arms snatch the ball from the air lest it hit and harm me. When I land, the entire team applauds, and I know I've lost the argument.

Moments later I'm running onto the field in my new pink Vikings uniform. The crowd goes wild, but I know this can't end well.

And that is why I have to stop eating pepperoni pizza and watching NFL Live just before bed.

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Last night, I was so tired, I dragged my feet as I brushed my teeth and dragged myself through my preparations for bed. Finally I got under the sheets and gently rested my head on my pillow with a contented sigh. As I drifted off to sleep, I woke up.

I really have to do something about these vivid dreams I've had as of late. The memory of a whole dream about getting ready for the same sweet, blessed sleep of which I am suddenly, cruelly being deprived is a horrible thing to wake up to. Why can't I just have sex dreams like everyone else does.

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A couple of nights ago, I had this dream:

I was hanging out with my good friend, the actor who played the title role in Robert Altman's movie Popeye. No, not Robin Williams, the guy who actually looked like Popeye. (This is a dream, remember. It all made sense at the time.)

Anyway, me and my friend who looked like Popeye had joined the cast of a reality television show similar to VH1's Surreal Life. There were about a dozen minor celebrities present, including an unidentified comic book artist and some mixed martial artists who I didn't know. I don't watch that stuff. I don't know why these guys were, but they seemed to think that I should know them. I was polite to them even though they were really stupid and boorish, because I didn't want them to kick my ass.

After shooting the breeze for some time in the den, all the while surrounded by television cameras, we were escorted to dinner in the expansive kitchen/dining room. This room had a tiki theme, which made perfect sense because we were on an island. The kitchen was open, separated from the large table only by space, allowing the production crew -- which was at least as numerous as the guests -- plenty of room for movement. This is when things got weird.

Show host Jeff Probst announced that we would now have our first challenge, and the loser would be kicked off the show. A male, grass-skirted handler was brought in to show off the island's native insect, a large centipede. Except that this centipede looked not like the familiar exotic insect, but more like the centipede from the arcade game Centipede: it was made primarily of 6-12 large brightly colored circles strung together. This species of centipede came in two colors: maraschino red and radioactive green. The 24-inch centipede was dangled wiggling in front of the camera. The challenge would be to eat these insects.

Most of the cast objected instantly and vehemently, but the chef, a large, tattooed Samoan, merely chuckled as he quickly and effortlessly cut the exoskeleton off the centipedes with with 6 swipes of his very large knife. The centipedes were served raw, stacked high on silver platters delivered to the assembled diners. Probst gave the signal, and the game started.

I distinctly remember holding one of the green centipedes up to get a good look at it and seeing the overhead light through it's moist, translucent body. The creature had no innards, but looked like a candied cucumber. The only organ visible was about the size of a gum-ball located in the head. Rationally, this must have been the creature's surprisingly large brain. It looked, however, more like a cell nucleus. Or a Tootsie Roll Pop.

The rest of the table was already chowing down on the centipedes with very little complaint. So I put it in my mouth and bit down. I was instantly revolted. It tasted like... fruit. I hate fruit! I tried to chew, but each bite was more and more like eating a sweet, juicy apple. Finally I could take no more, and I spit out the masticated fruit centipede. I was told that I would lose the contest if I quit, to which I replied that I didn't want any part of their contest anyway. And I woke up.

I learned a valuable lesson that night: I'd rather eat insects than fruit. Fruit is gross.

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I heard today that Billy Ray Cyrus is going to be on the upcoming season of Dancing With The Stars. Billy Ray Cyrus is an extra on his daughter's show now. Does he qualify as a "Star"? Should the show be renamed Dancing With The Recurring Supporting Characters?

I had a dream once where I met Billy Ray Cyrus at a rural county fair. No lie: in the dream, he was begging people to accept his autograph while the very untalented lady at the table across from him was selling her book like Enron stock. I really felt sorry for him. I mean, I'm a big fan of his work on Doc. But I wouldn't take his autograph, either. Hey, it's a cruel dream world out there. (My dreams are frequently specifically bizarre. Last night, I dreamed that I worked in a bookstore in a law school and someone was trying to steal my computer monitor during a riot. The downside was that to save my monitor from theft, I threw it out of a two-story window. The upside was that I was mistakenly graduated from law school.)

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I don't normally talk about my dreams, but the last week of visions has produced such an odd assortment of images, I'm documenting them here for future reference.

Tuesday: I was leaving dinner in a small Mediterranean cafe (think Rick's from Casablanca) decorated in earth tones, especially tints of green. A Jeep CJ pulls up to the door as I am leaving; it's roll-bar mounted lights practically blinding me in the doorway of the cafe. To my surprise, behind the wheel of the dusty vehicle is an ex-girlfriend of mine. She casually (and gracefully) leaps from the vehicle, her shoulder-length hair streaming behind her in the sudden breeze. She is wearing a loose white blouse, tan jodhpurs, and brown riding boots. (Of course, she doesn't look quite so... equestrian in real life. And she's not so tall or well-endowed as she was in the dream. You know how dreams are.) As she enters the cafe, throwing suggestive glances at me, I notice that she is accompanied by a friend of mine from high school. (I barely notice him, focusing my attention on her instead.) The three of us sit and enjoy a long conversation about "the good old days."

Wednesday: Shawn Spencer from USA Network's Psyche and two other popular television detectives (I can't for the life of me remember who they were now. One was male and one a female; I should have written it down when I woke up) are meeting for a cocktail party at my anti-bellum mansion. Shawn decides that there has been a murder in my living room and sets out to solve it. The other detectives refuse to believe that a crime has been committed (there is no body and no clear evidence of a crime) and set about insulting Shawn while he investigates. The dream cut to a commercial break, and I don't remember how the episode ended.

Thursday: I've returned to high school. (This is a recurring dream of mine. I usually return to high school for no reason: even in my dreams I've already graduated from college.) Because I've already gotten my degree, I'm a total jerk to the faculty and students whenever they try to make me do anything. The teacher of my literature class is a grandmotherly lady made entirely out of silver. As she lectures me, I begin to fall asleep in class. I fight to stay awake, but to no avail. When I finally pass out in my dream, I woke up in real life.

Friday: I was working as a secretary in a small college. I'm a total jerk to everyone, and I complain about the small size of my office. I usually have to take elevators to other buildings, including the gigantic parking garage. The elevators frequently break down or force me to switch elevator cars in dangerous positions: narrow outdoor ledges at high elevation, etc. The head office of the school is in the center of a glass building. Since the elevator is the primary means of travel, I usually take my office chair with me on trips around campus. One day I notice that there is no one else around the building. When I investigate, I find that all of the classrooms have been taken over by Orcs, who have burrowed into the school and turned it into their underground headquarters. I decide to fight them with a broomstick. I don't remember anything about the dream after I head into the Orc caves with a broomstick.

Whatever I'm doing before bed, I clearly need to stop doing it.

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