I know, I know, I haven’t described any of my dreams for a long time. It’s just they’re all about fucking McDonald’s, and I’m tired of it. But this one absolutely seemed worth documenting.

We were having a family reunion for Christmas (mom’s side of the family). The nerdiest of my uncles had started this business (video creation with advertising) where he and my other uncles and cousins and once-removeds and so on would make very silly versions of popular stories. Mostly what made them silly was that the “acting” was all in-family, the editing deliberately sloppy, and the closed captions more satirical commentary than anything.

Sister M and I had never visited since they’d started this, so we hadn’t had a chance to participate. But this time we were both cast in uncle’s film rendition of The Witcher Saga.

Now, I hear you thinking, Oh, on the scale of accuracy in adaptation, a dream must rank just a little higher than the Netflix version. (No, I know nobody is thinking that but me XD) But, you see, in my dream, uncle’s movie was actually based on an older movie that had attempted to tell a Witcher story in two hours (like, good luck with that; actually I have subsequently learned that such a movie really did exist at the turn of the millennium). So that was my brain very neatly twisting out of having to remember finer points of the long-stretching Witcher books XD

Anyway. Guess who was playing Geralt I was playing Geralt. (Sister was disappointed because she only had a couple of minutes of screentime as one of the rowers in a boat not relevant to the story.) But just to remind y’all, I am 5’4½” tall, and #220. In the dream I didn’t seem to be handicapped beyond the usual dream handicaps I consistently have, but that doesn’t mean I was limber or athletic.

So here I am doing “fighting moves” with a decorative sword, delivering lines like I’m made of wood with the bark still on, wearing a white wig and some kind of tunic the dream wasn’t really specific about and these tall boots and a CAPE. Every time we filmed a scene that came next in the movie timeline, uncle would edit it in and we’d all watch the whole thing again. And this shit was so funny that I’m pretty sure it was what woke me up.

There was this one part where I was trying to get myself (as Geralt) and this little girl away from some faction led or assisted by a sorceress (guess my subconscious remembers at least that much of the Witcher storyline XD), and this sorceress had me wounded and exhausted and unable to use any Witcher badassedry. So I’m holding this little girl in my arms while the sorceress makes some dire and pretentious speech. And while the camera is focused on the sorceress, I’m whispering to the girl (a cousin, though in life I don’t think I have any cousins of that age anymore), “What’s your character’s name? I need to say it in a minute, and I’ve forgotten it.” Then she had to pull a piece of paper out of her clothing to look it up herself, because she’d forgotten.

Then they took the child from me and blasted me out the window behind in a scene reminiscent of the Cowboy Bebop one — except that, as I fell backward, (I ad-libbed this) I was screaming the kid’s name super dramatically. When uncle edited the scene in, he didn’t cut it at the end quite soon enough not to hear my heartbroken cry turn into laughter.

At one point, sister and I and an uncle or two were sitting around talking about the books, the movie, and the Netflix series. Jokes were shared about introducing 13,000,000 characters the reader doesn’t care about who then have politics the reader doesn’t care about, which apparently was a major inclusion in the movie version my dream invented. There was also some complaint about the strong language in this movie that featured young cousins. But then we had to get back to filming while it was the appropriate time of day out. I couldn’t get my drama boots on, though in my heart I never took them off.

I cannot emphasize enough how hilarious the final product was. I asked my uncle whether I got a copy of the file when it was entirely finished, and he seemed leery about that, since he made his living off of advertising attached to these things and didn’t want me just throwing it around freely. I protested that I simply had to show this to my friends on Discord — like just drop it on them without context and see the reaction. He grudgingly agreed. So my friends on Discord almost had the pleasure of watching my little fat self chew on the scenery as Geralt of Rivia XD XD XD XD XD

Then the dream went off on some tangent about me (as myself) comforting a horse with hands after she had to euthanize her dog. So obviously the funny part of the dream had ended, and the creepy body-horror part had begun. So I won’t get into that.