I was in Colorado, so I decided to go visit Phil, an engineer at a Big Company in Broomfield (northwest of Denver, on the way to Boulder). At reception I asked to see him, and after a few minutes he showed me to his cube, and we started discussing things. He showed me an updated version of one of the products I like. However, he was apparently expecting me to apply for a job there, and was somewhat annoyed when I told him that I had just dropped in to visit. Apparently he had left an important meeting to see me.
On the way out I encountered a former coworker, Charles, whom I had not realized had gone to work at B.C. I asked him if he’d like to meet for dinner, and he said to have Linda, his administrative assistant, set it up. Apparently he held a fairly high-ranking position.
Linda said that we would have dinner at some particular steak house at 7 PM, and asked if I’d like a ride. I told her I would, as I didn’t have a rental car and had taken public transportation to get there.
At the restaurant, Charles started trying to convince me to join B.C., pointing out that the company had a great tuition reimbursement program, and that I could attend the University of Colorado at Boulder. He tried to sell me on the various other benefits of the job, and that I’d get a lot of responsibility for an interesting project. However, as time went by, he seemed to be getting ill in a strange way. He was apparently having trouble concentrating, and even sitting upright. He wasn’t drinking, so it’s not clear what was causing it. He eventually slipped under the table.
I looked under the table, and there was an opening to the floor below, and Charles was sitting at a table there. So I climbed down and resumed our discussion. This happened several times.
Finally Linda arrived to pick up Charles and take him to a meeting. She asked if I needed a ride or whether I could take the public transportation, and seemed irritated that I asked for a ride. We got in the car, she took Charles to his meeting, then started driving toward my destination.
On the way, we were talking, and she seemed to go through violent mood swings and personality changes. At one point we stopped somewhere; I’m not sure why as it wasn’t my destination. As I looked at her I realized that I could see the problem, which in fact was caused by multiple personalities, which appeared to me like a mass of very long tangled-up worms of various colors. I started removing these from her, though I’m not sure how, and soon had a big ball of tangled multicolored worm in my hand. At last I was able to have a reasonable discussion with her.
However, she felt incomplete, and selected a few of the personalities to take back. With just a few things were OK, but then she wanted more of them, and pretty soon she had taken all of them back.