Last night I had the strangest dream...

♪♫ I sailed away to China, in a little row boat to find ya... ♪♫

Ho, ho. I didn't really dream that I sailed away to China, that's merely a small thing that popped into my head when I wrote the title of this post. (For your information those lines come from an old 80's song called "Break my stride" by Matthew Wilder.)

Nope, my dream was way stranger than that...

I was sitting on an old dry stane dyke next to an elderly man with a drunkards nose as he told me of his love for a Dover Sole that sat on the wall between us. The grey sea behind the old man was angry looking and every once in a while he turned to look at it with melancholy in his eyes.

Ocassionally he'd swing his head in the opposite direction and stare at an elderly woman, whom I assumed was his wife, and stared at her with a barely disguised contempt in his eyes. The woman was hanging over the top of a hinged door of a thatched roofed cottage that looked as weatherbeaten and dry as the rest of the wind blown surroundings.

The old man stood talking about how the Dover Sole had been his lover for many years. He'd steal out of the house during the night and he and the Dover sole would spend time frollicking in the surf. His passion for the Dover sole seemed to me to be heartfelt and I recall feeling sorry for him that his love now lay dead. (Though to be honest it looked great as it sat suggestively in garlic butter sprinkled with parsley.)

The old woman would occasionally sing "Isn't she lovely" by Stevie Wonder in a voice that sounded like it drank turpentine, smoked full strength Marlboro and ate brillo pads for breakfast. Whenever the old woman took to song, the old man would jump up and down, flash his dick at the old woman and yell "Look here at what you will never receive again woman! My love lies fried in garlic butter like some fancy french whore!"

A figure popped into existence behind the old man. To my surprise the figure that appeared was that of the Godfather of soul, Mr James Brown. "It's too funky in here!" He said. "Take it to the bridge!" He continued, as he danced and spun.

He began descending into James Brownian motion. (A method of singing and dancing that the version of James Brown I hold in my head does.)

"Can I count it off? Haaauugh, Good Gawd, Aaooow, Siddytang! Ahh one, ahh two, ahh won too tree fo! I! I! I! Git own the Siddytang, Siddytang!" The figure of James Brown sang, as the old man danced around flashing his dick at the old lady in the doorway. I looked down into the eyes of the Dover sole that sat in slowly congealing garlic butter and its mouth moved.

"Don't look at me." The Dover sole said, "I'm just a bit part in this little drama... And to think I've worked with Brando! I've taken direction from Hitchcock!" It continued, its voice rising as it made its feelings known to me.

Weird huh?