In my dreams . . .

I meet with my friends in an enormous loft whose main purpose seems to be costume and fabric storage to watch a reading of their TV pilot in which my friend Laura plays a male British soldier with some serious PTSD. I might get to write an episode for the series if the show gets picked up, but I'm worried that I don't know enough about British culture or world politics to pull off this kind of humor.

The funder is an old but stylin' lady, kind of like the talent agent I assisted in LA, and she tells me her secret is that she never eats chicken or dairy or grains. She lives off of legumes. She invites me to pick up a script in a grown-up trapper keeper, but the trapper keeper is full, not of script, but of 200 dollar bills!!! I give them back because I'm honest like that.

I'm enjoying the buffet, munching on some bulbous frozen fruit that is the most delicious thing I've ever tasted (did I mention it is now Deep Winter where I live?) when we get a phone call warning us that renegades are coming to raid the fabric loft!

We run! But as soon as we get outside, it's clear there's something in the air that turns everyone into renegades . . . some are after blood vengeance, some have delusions of persecution, some are forming really cool street gangs.

From this point on, the dream's a dystopian melange of guillotines, apartheid, forgotten children, suicide clothed in martyrdom, Escher-like stairways that fold in on themselves . . .

The survivors gather -- where else? -- in a shopping mall, where we loot for more rugged clothing. As is so often the case in dystopia, the strongest leader is not always the best or the brightest. In this case, he's a charismatic figurehead who looks like Justin Bieber, and he's backed by a ruthless general who's more interested in sadism than survival.

Macaulay Culkin dresses up like a marionette and does a dance in support of the new President.

I try to avoid getting chosen for brainwashing and employment in the killing squads.

Good morning.