When Dreaming Feels Like Dying
not metaphorically
Happy Monday one and all. I’m sorry to come to you later on today, I’ve spent the day on job boards, endlessly scrolling, reading, scrolling, skipping, scrolling, applying, scrolling. It feels never ending, there are so many jobs in this world and yet I don’t have one. It has completely fried my mind to the point that I am unable to form sentences to Inês. I am Too Locked In. I need to lock out, I need to lock out and lose the keys. Note to self for the day is to write before I do anything else on this screen lest my eyes fall out. They’re in for now. I’m coming off 5 hours of disturbed sleep because I simply cannot stop coughing. I woke up after struggling for so long to fall asleep gasping for breath, I was dreaming that I couldn’t breathe. I am usually a very good sleeper, I’m still and calm (as far as I’m aware). This is the first time I’ve ‘awoken with a fright’, coughing my lungs up trachea, oesophagus and so on. I occasionally experience sleep paralysis, or a form of it at least, but only in specific conditions. The conditions are usually an early morning which has been highly caffeinated with little to no breakfast, a late lunch, a caffeine crash and then finally, a nap. These naps tend to be unintentional, I will lay to rest my eyes and body, become aware of falling asleep and set a timer, usually for an hour. Trying so hard as I am to cling on to reality around me, I ease in to a state of half sleep, dreaming but as if my eyes are open, performing tasks at the laptop or phone beside me in bed (get technology out of the bedroom!). Then comes the attempts to wake up, which are successful but only in my dream. I wake up from the dream in the dream still dreaming. I gain knowledge of this, somehow, and try again. This will continue a few times until it actually happens, or the alarm goes off, and I wake for real, feeling like I’ve been clenching my jaw and driving my head deep in to the down of my pillow. Waking up as if I couldn’t breathe was worse, but at least was over quickly, ripping off the plaster by breathing in sweet sweet air.
I’ve just realised that I’ve basically spent 2 minutes telling you all about a dream I had which I realise is quite dull. A cursory google (I’m always researching when I’m writing) doesn’t feature dreams on any lists of Top 10 Most Snooze-worthy Conversation Topics but there is a rebuttal to it - People Say It's Boring to Talk About a Dream You Had. Here's Why You Should Do It Anyway - thank you for the affirmation, Alice Robb from Yahoo.
This weekend I was still trying to get over my illness so didn’t get up to much, apart from a nice walk around the locality in the picking up some groceries yesterday morning, my usual activities. I ended up going for a roast chicken, classic French Sunday fare, and another bread and butter pudding with all the stale ends of bread from the Deux Traditions we buy almost every day. One of my Deux Tradition from Boulangerie du Sentier looked so incredible that I had to capture it in my favourite light catching spot, out the window.
Is this not simply the baguette emoji? Incroyable ! Later on I stuffed the chicken with lemon and garlic and thyme, on this occasion going for 220C for 20 mins and 40 mins at 180C on account of it being a small bird of only 1.25kg. Somehow, when I poked in with my meat thermometer at 55 total minutes, the middle of the breast and thighs were between 80-83C, 20 degrees over where I wanted it to be before resting. I don’t understand how this can be possible, other than potentially the carryover temperature when turning it down. I’m at a loss - maybe next time I’ll go for a 30 minute cook and see how we do. Still, it wasn’t overly dry and the flavour was pleasant. I roasted the potatoes with it, fried off some chunky courgette rounds and reduced the cooking juices with some stock and onions for a sauce. No picture because you’ve seen it before!
To end the day, despite swearing off sweet treats 5 days ago, bread and butter pudding. Sunday is my sweet treat day was my new excuse. Anyway, this was great as usual. I didn’t have as much bread as I would’ve liked so it was a little custardy, but I used Lindt dark chocolate this time and you could Taste The Difference.
As delicious as it was I’ve now encountered the issue that this is of course too much for two, maybe too much for four, probably around 6 portions. According to my last excuse, this should be dessert for the following 2 Sundays, unless I gift it to our elderly neighbour or the woman in the window opposite, or her cat. Who am I kidding, does anyone have any new excuses?
à demain !