# the same darn sucking-cold nightmare i must of experienced this dream three broody times by now; tonight however i have its number and have definitely clocked its horrible little garme and i will no longer be fooled or perplexed it always starts the same - stuck in the utterly miserable and thoroughly depressing crypt-cold overpriced rented shoebox flat i've been stuck in for over two years now i go to bed stone cold under a thick blanket with a tshirt a jumper two synthetic fleeces on and recently a fleece hat i have to pull the blanket right up over my lower chin to avoid the horrible draft from the window above me blowing over my face and making me cough there's a unique kind of cold in this flat - the sort which actively drains one essential life-energy out of one's body a psychic vampire it's what sleeping atop giant slabs of solid marble in a mausoleum feels like; pretty soon one would be sick to one's stomach from the clinging sucking clammy cold wrapping one's body like a damp bed sheet with a constant slow horrible breeze from under the door - or is that the nearby coffins (leading to a dark alternative cthuluesque dimension consisting of infinite caves impossibly deep underground of inescapable forever) one always has one's 'best' nightmares when its sucking cold; any which happen during the height of runaway corpomil-made climatic disaster are the kind when one is sweaty and gets wrapped in one's sheets and bedclothes this particular sucking-cold nightmare takes place in some kind of truly cosy architecturally incredible rich and sophisticated student housing a way off campus; as soon as one arrives at the party the first thing one is painfully aware of is the degree of unfair contrast between the house these obviously rich students are living in and the tepid tawdry squalor of one's own pathetic room-cube back on campus the place is full of music and cool design there are metal cubes built into the walls set at oblique angles - these are full of succulent vines goldfish in large tanks cool modern art and great sculpture the first student i happen to meet first is perfectly cute smart and we immediately hit it off - i can't stop smiling as i watch them show me around the huge house dancing as they go ir entire place covered in colourful streamers party hats balloons and all kinds of delicious food set out on the tables this student and i dig each other with intensity from the outset and there's almost certainly some kind of charged sensual field pulsing between us as we talk (this happened to me several times at upin university of the-post industrial north - one night was at an otherwise generic and wasty student party i me the saxy friend of a (so-called) mate who they'd secretly liked for years but had got nowhere with; we immediately hit it off however and then quickly got-off on each other around my place - it was utterly fantastic hoo-wee what a rush - for more details refer to 'the boredom factory') ir sister appears and i realise they're twins; this one observes me with cool detachment - is perfectly friendly but one gets the impression they're self-important incredibly intelligent and far too wrapped up in the complex social atmosphere of the party to directly engage with someone like me as though they're the genial host of the party and for that reason (and others) can't stay too focused on any one guest - fair enough as soon as i happen to pass near the bedroom of the first twin they invite me in - i almost immediately sit down on the luxury unmade bed but then feel self-consciously embarrassed this would be seen as a little too forward; the twin however smiles and keeps on being nice and friendly toward me they aren't flirting but being cool playful positive confident effortlessly intelligent and beautiful - they're actually interested and me and while keeping ir physical and emotional distance are actively engaged in conversation - an immediate mutual fascination i find incredibly exciting and while i'm not thinking about hot scientific sax with this super cute creature it's definitely there crackling in the air between us we don't get to talk that much as by now many guests and friends have arrived and the party is well under way; during the small amount of time i'm there we keep on randomly meeting - sharing looks and smiles always smiling - gosh darn am i in actually into this personable person and they in fact dig me i can't believe it at some point soon after however the party's over and it's time to go home; one of the parents of the twins even offers me a lift back onto campus and i thank them for the generous offer what happens though (of course) is that i somehow manage to miss them among the endless sprawling crowds; the super cute twin who likes me tells me out of nowhere to 'pick them up this friday at 9pm' which i immediately agree to at no point in the dream do i even think it odd that i don't know anyone's name i shortly find myself outside in the darkness of night trying to get back home onto campus - but (as usual) get progressively more lost and lost; people around me get more hostile and sinister by slow strangled increments - i'm never actually attacked as such but as i wander alone and confused through the town and surrounding industrial estates with ir razor wire and low clumps of thorny bushes one definitely gets the impression one is in a 'dodgy' part of town and it would certainly be prudent to get the flock outa here with due haste i meanwhile am stone cold in my actual bed and utterly freezing and totally alone in my desperate dumb dream without a single way of knowing where i am - and that is the final stage of the nightmare just before i wake up shivering i've a mortal fear of being on my own; of being left all alone to fend for myself in some vast unknown and forever increasingly sinister and creepy landscape full of apathetic possibly dangerous strangers - of having nobody to take care of me give me hugs and tell me it's all going to be alright this stems from fear of being abandoned by my parents - what literally happened one day when the baskets suddenly kicked me out of ir house-not-a-home with a single suitcase under my arm at the time i happened to be at my most vulnerable they simply didn't give a shit the inhumane cold-shoulder they showed me directly maps onto the sucking coldness of my existential plight; the miserable vampiric cold of this lousy flat appears to directly map onto the dark grey and horribly unfamiliar atmosphere and awful urban landscape of reoccurring nightmares zero warm houses no sophisticated parties impressive internal architecture no excellence in design no friendly people - and certainly no gracious hosts cool intelligent students remotely impressed by my charming idiot personality and itching to get to know me (i must be out of my tiny mind) only black barely-lit streets at night in an unknown town without any sense of where home base actually is and absolutely no way to get back there one starts to run as things get forever more frightening and one feels more and more desperate; horribly and utterly alone - outside with the vast infinite urban sprawling nothingness and no map money or hope and absolutely nobody to call or help after all that you wake up alone in the dark with a start and frozen tears of fear in your heart - bones aching with the sucking cold // republic of bob