There are four enormous furry spiders in the den. Augh! I get them in a cage. They're trying to kill each other, or mate. In one pair, it's hard to ever tell. In the larger, fuzzier pair, it becomes disturbingly obvious, as huge hairy spider phalluses come in to play. Ew, ew, ew. For some reason, I let two out of the cage. They're not as scary as normal spiders, but I'm still very nervous. They move instantly. For a moment they look like small black and white kittens and don't seem so bad, even cute, but then they're spiders again. For one horrifying moment after I spook them there are two fuzzy spiders on my neck. AUGH! I tear them off and run to the living room to ask mom and dad if I can release four enormous spiders in to their garden. Mom is reluctant - ack, giant spiders! But finally decides better the garden than the house. I go back, but I can't get them all in their cages again. Augh I don't like it.

I'm going to meet a friend I haven't seen in years, Doctor X, for coffee. We decide on a picnic in the dark. I suggest the good ol' cross-country running meet at some high school. It's dark the whole time, but big races are there. My boyfriend and I enter the races and run, run, run! At one point we're in 8th place, hurray. For most races we don't place in the top 100, but that's okay. We run race after race, which is more than most people do. There are small chinese children who are incredibly fast and everyone has colourful slightly luminescent ribbons. I head to the hill and curl up in Doctor X's lap. Something seems wrong. I realize: Doctor X isn't my Boyfriend! Joe is my boyfriend. How did I get so mixed up? Where did Joe go after the races? I thought he was where Doctor X is somehow. I walk away, confused. I run in to a young woman and a strange old man. They have jumping/flying bikes. Joe is here! At first we think they are just good jumpers, and the bikes fly up 20 feet under their own power. Heck, Joe demonstrates how to do that. But then the woman shows us how they can hover, and it's true, they're magic bikes. Joe and I apparently have an aptitude for it, which is why Joe could make his bike jump up 20 feet - he isn't really that strong. We bounce around on bikes in the covered area of the school.

Rowan (p_i)has a cake! He's had it for years - I remember it when it was new - but now the silver wire surrounding it is broken. Aw. I try to fix it. The metal thing is coming undone and is sharp in places. I tsk tsk. We are backstage in the kitsilano high school auditorium. While I try to mend his cake, we discuss knives. I suggest a swiss army knife. "But the trick is to get one that isn't like, huge." Rowan nods. Currently he has the biggest swiss army knife ever, and it's very inconvenient. Plus, he'll so never use the corkscrew. "The glass-breaker will never screw back in to the corkscrew - piece of junk!" I try to thread it back on, but it's true, it's bent permanently. "Get one with two blades, and scissors. That's all most people ever use. Add anything you'll use regularly, but no gidgety crap!" I go back to the cake. I manage to get the wire fixed! But now the cake is very flat for some reason. It's a third as tall as it once was - each layer is so flat! Oh well. At least the guardrail is there - it'll be safe to keep in his backpack now. I wander off. Rowan warns me "be careful of your diction - the ambassadors are very sensitive of their english!" I get to the airline check-in counter, and sure enough, the friendly ambassadors (now normal looking human men) have a strange accent, very hollow and lots of "gw" sounds. I stoicly avoid adopting their accent, though it seems natural to. We go to the gymnasium. They are now aliens that look like the whatsit silicon creature in that old Star Trek show that Spock mind melded with. The horta? Anyhow. I wear a uniform and jump around, lighting things up. They're pleased. The klingon pair comes in to try to take me out for tea, but they are kindly rebuffed.