I haven’t had the frustrating buffet dream (yet). It would be interesting to see if we are indeed “infecting” each other with our recurring dreams. 
I have this EXACT dream all the time (down to checking the schedule and “realizing” I haven’t gone to my other classes).
SO creepy. I hate it every time.
We had a thread about the most common bad dreams on the Dope some time back. I tallied most of the dreams reported, and the top three were:
- Unprepared for exam
- Teeth loose/falling out
- Naked/inappropriately dressed
I’d say most of you are in good company. (Not mine, though–I’ve never had any of those three. My bad dreams tend to be rather more Lovecraftian. If I dream of being unprepared at school, it’s because I didn’t bring a shotgun, a machete, and/or an Elder Sign).
Never had a buffet one, but one time I did dream that I was buying some Mountain Dew, and for some reason went away from it to talk to someone, then went back and there was Coke there instead with no Mountain Dew to be found. Then I realized it must be a dream so I woke up. Most of the other times I wake up from a realization is when I dream I am playing a computer or board game and the rules radically change on me in impossible ways.
I also have dreams about extra rooms in the house. My favorite one was where I discovered that there was an extra room that I could only reach by turning left as I walked through the bedroom doorway.
Those aren’t usually scary dreams though. The rooms are usually abandoned, but there’s often cool stuff in them. The worst part of those dreams is waking up and being disappointed that in real life you don’t have a barn full of WWII vintage fighter planes and a bowling alley that you can only get to by climbing out the bathroom window.
I’ve had some weird car dreams. Sometimes I’ll be in a moving car with my sister, and we’re tweens again. And we’re sitting in the backseat, but nobody is driving. So I’ll try to crawl up into the driver’s seat, except something stops me from getting there, and the car just keeps going and eventually falls off a cliff with us in it. Then I wake up.
Even worse are the dreams where I’m in control of the car, but the road is CRAZY–like roller-coaster-steep and full of ledges and hairpin turns without guard rails. Somehow I manage to keep the car on the road for a while (which contains family members I care about) as the road gets progressively crazier–impossible corners, dead ends that pop up suddenly, and areas of road where I have to roll the car onto 2 wheels to make it through. Eventually we fall off a cliff, and I wake up.
I hate car dreams! >:[
Recurring back-to-College dream - check. Often I’m setting up my dorm room or going to the cafeteria. If classes are involved - I’ve missed my Psychology (and it’s almost ALWAYS Psych - how funny is that?) class for the past few weeks; but it’s not exam time.
Crumbing teeth dream - check. Ye gods - I hate this one - the crumbles fill my mouth & I have to spit them out into my hand - YUK!
Extra rooms in house - check. I figured this was spurred by moving into a new, bigger house where we actually do have a couple of rooms we don’t go into often (dining room & spare bedroom) - tho in the dream they were huge portions of the house & disused, like you guys described above.
Flying - check! Usually after I realize I’m dreaming, I either choose this or really great sex (tho the latter is achievable IRL) - I occasionally start flying in the house, but usually wait til I go outside, then push off, until I’m hovering just above the treetops. One time, I managed a barrel roll, but usually just soar around.
In another recent dream thread, I mentioned the “can’t dial a phone” and “difficulty reading” issues - tho the other night I dreamed about browsing a thrift store and finding a “College Pogo” paperback that I immediately bought. I could read the cover clearly, but don’t remember looking inside.
Here’s another weird recurring topic for me - stairs & elevators. Elevators often drop multiple floors in my dreams - occasionally tumbling, so we have to scramble from floor to wall to ceiling to stay upright. Stairs turn into really weird ways to get from one floor to another - like a series of shelves along a wall, or climbing down a metal bookcase from a balcony to the main level. Anyone else have stairs/elevator issues?
I had the “extra rooms in my home that weren’t there before” dream last night, and remembered this thread, but somehow didn’t make the connection that I was therefore dreaming. 
Ah, that’s another one for me, too. I had one a couple weeks ago when I just needed to dial 911 on my cell phone, and, after many failed attempts of doing so, finally managed to do it, only to get an “all lines are busy, please try your call again later” type of message.
Yep, algebra exam dream…
Naked dream…
Teeth: my teeth dream is a little bit different. In it, I’ve somehow managed to move my lower jaw sideways enough to catch my molars together. Like, the top ones have wedged themselves off to the side of the bottom ones and my jaw is stuck.
The garage sale/thrift store dream: I stumble across an amazing garage sale. I find lots of cool stuff to buy and the prices are dirt cheap. I excitedly load up my car with all my booty and then wake up. Argh!
Teeth crumbling dream: Check. Though it’s odd that I haven’t had the dream at all since my teeth actually started going all to hell for real.
Extra rooms in the house: Yup. Only occasionally it’s been based on where I was actually living at the time, other times it was a dream-house that I apparently lived in. In the dream, my usual thought is how cool it is that I have all this new stuff now, and I really, really want to look through it all for the good loot. I can remember having this one as a kid too - I’d find a secret panel or some such thing in the basement, which led to a hidden basement room under the garage (which has no basement under it since it was an later addition to the house, never mind that a basement under a garage is probably a bad idea anyway.)
Back to high school dream: My variation is that I can’t even find the room the class is supposed to be in. Usually the rooms are numbered or arranged in some random, haphazard fashion that makes no sense to me. The interesting real-life bit about this is that the year after I graduated is when the new school building was built (construction started my senior year) and the old one renovated, so if I was back there now, I actually would have no idea where anything is. Sometimes I’m older, usually trying to find my dorm room, and the buildings and floors are just as twisted. We’re talking a building setup that would make M.C. Escher scream in frustration. Usually I need to climb the stairs, walk through another floor, get back on the stairs. walk a certain hall, etc, in some particular order to get to where my room is. When I finally get there, I haven’t been there in a long time and I wonder something along the lines of “why the fuck am I staying here? I have my own house!”
Driving dreams: Whatever car I’m in (which in general has changed to the car that I actually have in real life) has something going wrong with it. There are a ridiculous number of warning lights on the dashboard that say things that aren’t even really car-related, but I know are Bad News. Sometimes they change what they say as if they were all mini display screens rather than lights. Sometimes I can continue to drive this way, other times the car will automatically shut down for a bad enough problem.
Phone dialing: It’s always a really important call that must be made RIGHT NOW. Either I can’t get a dial tone at all (these dreams usually happen trying to use a pay phone) or I keep fat-fingering the keypad. When/if I manage to dial the number correctly, it doesn’t go through. I’ve had the "Calling 911 only to repeatedly get ‘all circuits are busy’ "one too.
My “calling 911” dream involved an agonizingly slow recorded voice saying “If… this… is… a… robbery… press… … …1. …If… this… is… a… drive… by… shooting… press… … …2…”
“You’ve selected “Regicide”. If you know the name of the king or queen being murdered, press 1.”
I’ve had variations of this one too from time to time. For the most part I’m unaware I’m dreaming. But when I begin to wake up I look at my loot and begin to worry “What if this is a dream?” I convince myself, “No, if it was a dream…(insert rationalization)” then feel relieved. Then I wake up disappointed.
Like the “extra rooms” dream, except for the disappointment on waking these dreams are way cool!
Yes to the exam dream, the teeth dream, the naked dream, the car that just. won’t. stop dream, and the houseful of extra rooms (often made up with old but clean bed linen), and I’d like to add the horrible toilet dream, although often when I’m looking for a toilet I just flat-out can’t find one.
The other night I dreamed my ex-fiancee had been murdered. :eek:
Oh, I have that one all the time, just before I wake up because I have to pee. I can’t find a toilet and consider various inappropriate places to urinate before I finally wake up to go.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. Having a dream where you desperately need to pee but you can’t find a toilet is bad, but it beats the alternative.
On occasion, I pee in that inappropriate place in the dream, and I feel the urine flow. Then I wake up, I don’t have to pee and my bed is NOT wet. I have no idea how that works, but I can assure you that I have never found any odd spot that I have peed in, so I’m not sleep walking around my apartment and urinating in random locations. Unless somehow I am making it to the toilet, peeing and flushing without waking up, and to my knowledge, I have never sleep walked in my life.
Oh yeah, the “have to pee, but can’t find a proper toilet” dream. I have that when I have to pee in real life, too - I’ve started getting up and going to the bathroom whenever I feel the urge even a little just so I don’t have that stupid dream.
Relevent Comic:
I don’t believe I’ve actually had this one, though…