A Unusual Day

(Translated from the Chinese version with the help of Claude.)

Today was a special day. I had arranged for a group of my middle school classmates to visit me at school, and there was also a lecture by Hofstadter that I wanted to attend.

I arrived at the school gate at the agreed time, welcomed my classmates into the school, and then went to the lecture. The lecture was fascinating; Hofstadter used various Goldberg-style strange and complex mechanical devices to demonstrate his concept of “strange loops.” An hour flew by quickly. After the intermission, Hofstadter was late returning, and the audience began to speculate about what might have happened. Someone said there was a protest demonstration outside, and for Hofstadter’s safety, he had left early, bringing the lecture to a premature end. While everyone was expressing disappointment, I said, “Don’t worry, isn’t this lecture about ‘strange loops’? Hofstadter must just be taking a loop around campus and will surely return.”

After a while, he did indeed return, though after a brief stay he left again. I started to worry about my friends, since I had let them in but wasn’t accompanying them — if anything went wrong, wouldn’t I be responsible? At that moment, for some unknown reason, I felt my phone becoming lighter in my hand, with a noticeable upward buoyancy! I felt myself becoming lighter too, almost about to fly! I floated toward the exit at the back upper part of the lecture hall and discovered that my boss from Google was actually there too! I pointed at my phone and told him, “Look, my phone is floating and I don’t know why!” He asked me to look at my phone screen. When I checked, it showed Bitcoin surging! Finally, I met up with my friends and apologized for not being able to accompany them, and then I woke up.

This was truly a bizarre dream worth recording. It’s probably related to many recent events, listed below:

• I finished reading Hofstadter’s “I Am a Strange Loop” - deeply impressed, recommending it everywhere
• Frequent protests and demonstrations in New York City, office buildings now require ID checks
• HBO documentary revealing the true identity of Bitcoin founder Satoshi Nakamoto
• China’s A-shares market surging
• Google office visitor policy: guests must be accompanied by employees at all times