After school activities

Weird dream last night: I dreamt I was at school at about age fifteen - my friends and I were all in uniform - and we were heading to the main hall after the day's final lesson because The Orb were doing a gig. (Because, obviously, my old school's main hall is a prestigious venue that often attracts big name music groups.) The support acts were some industrial rock band - not Pop Will Eat Itself but someone like that - and, bizarrely, Ant & Dec.

My chums and I turned up to the hall entrance, bought our tickets (that looked like raffle tickets) from a dinnerlady and went in.

The hall was about half full of younger pupils all in uniform, sitting cross-legged and waiting patiently. A few teachers were milling around the edge of the room chatting in pairs while roadies were setting up equipment on stage. It had the pre-show atmosphere of a recital by the school orchestra or, worse, a morning assembly.

"God, I hope it won't be one of those gigs where everybody just sits there not moving," I whispered to my friends (for anything louder than a whisper would have probably resulted in my expulsion from the hall).

After a short wait the lights went down (or, more accurately, the hall curtains were closed) and the first support act, the band like Pop Will Itself but not, came on. I was relieved to see that many of the kids in the audience did stand up and started dancing, albeit in that endearingly uncoordinated way that toddlers do.

It was at this point that I realised that I was not wearing my blazer. I reasoned that I must have left it on the back of a chair in a classroom although I was sure I had it on as I made my way to the hall. Never mind, I could pick it up later.

The band were thrashing out some song or other and a bit of a moshpit was developing in front of the stage. All of a sudden the band stopped and the lead singer began to explain something about how the song they had been playing was structured. He turned on an overhead projector and displayed a series of transparent plastic sheets covered in crudely written notes to illustrate his points. The band would then strike up for a few bars and stop again to allow the singer to make another point. The audience would jump around for the few seconds the band played and then listen attentively while the frontman talked.

It was at about this point that I realised that I was not wearing a shirt and tie but just a t-shirt. I did not recall having changed out of my uniform but... oh well.

The performance continued with bursts of heavy rock music interspersed by discussions of music theory and the physics of audio. The prepubescent mosh pit persisted as best it could but my little gang were beginning to resent the constant interruptions in the music. How dare they try to teach us stuff while we were trying to have fun.

It was at about this point when I realised that I was topless and my t-shirt was being passed over the crowd. I forced my way through the my fellow pupils and retrieved it.

I then woke up feeling frustrated and unsatisfied.