This entry is part 2 of 2 in the series Best of Trek
One Sentence Synopsis
Spock’s first command (after 12 years of service) ends with a near mutiny, bodies and deeply offended natives on a distant planet. while Kirk goes passive aggressive on a bureaucrat (TROPE ALERT).
Scene setup
Poor Spock.
He tried the only tool at his disposal and it failed miserably.
Two crew from the shuttlecraft dead, the survey team under constant attack from “huge, furry creatures” and out of fuel. If it weren’t for Scotty’s Miracle Worktm there would be no hope at all.
Everyone hates on Spock: from the angry black guy who should have been court martial-ed for insubordination to McCoy to pretty young Yeoman of the Week.
And Spock’s confusion is heartbreaking and somewhat funny. I am totally onboard with his protest that he can’t be held responsible for the Huge, Furry Creatures’ unpredictability.
Bonus Scenes!
While Spock is wondering why his crew has turned on him, Kirk’s got problems of his own an overly officious jerk of a bureaucrat who’s happy to sacrifice Kirk’s crew to make a delivery. Granted, the delivery is relief to plague victims but this guy’s practically gloating:
But since High Commissioner Farris has never been in the military, he has yet to learn that the greatest aggression is passive aggression. He learns here.
Should you watch it?
Oh yeah. Yeoman Hottie, Spock struggling with illogical monsters both outside and inside the shuttlecraft and Kirk dealing with a bureaucrat and his prerogativesmakes for a tense hour of drama. Commonly thought of as a classic in TOS.
Vital Statistics
What Happened?
This adventure
All time
Notes
HR Incident
3
14
One each for McCoy, Boma and Yeoman of the Week.
Shirtless Kirk
0
5
Hookups?
0
6
Encounters with exes?
0
3
Redshirt Kills?
0
0
Non Redshirt Kills?
2
5
Spock logically sent two gold shirts off to die.
Offscreen Federation Kills?
1
10
That guy took a spear before he knew what hit him.
This entry is part 12 of 12 in the series Minireviews
One Sentence Synopsis
Kirk creeps on a slightly post-pubescent girl to stop a genocidal dictator from killing the witnesses to mass murder.
Scene setup
Kirk is one of two surviving witnesses to the horrors wrought by Kodos The Executioner who made the logical decision to kill half an Earth colony’s population in order that the other half may survive. The survivors revolted against this genius plan and Kodos was presumed killed in the chaos.
Oh, and by a coinkydink both witnesses are assigned to the USS Enterprise!
Kirk grows to suspect that the head of a traveling Shakespeare company may be Kodos traveling incognito. But how to ensnare the dastard?
C’mon, People. This is Captain James T. Kirk.
There’s only one answer:
Hunt down the man’s slightly-older-than-street-legal daughter and Keep. On. Macking.
This girl knows her Kirks and she still jumped in the boat. Grab that paddle and start whacking, Jimbo!
Should you watch it?
Yes! Between Trek being a product of the 1960’s and the Shakespearean framing this episode features so much over the top acting that in comparison Shatner delivers a flat out understated performance- witness the clip above. That’s quite a stylized performance from our guest actress, Barbara Anderson.
Vital Statistics
What Happened?
This adventure
All time
Notes
HR Incident
0
11
Shirtless Kirk
0
5
Hookups?
1
6
Bitches be cray cray.
Encounters with exes?
0
3
Redshirt Kills?
0
0
Non Redshirt Kills?
0
3
Offscreen Federation Kills?
0
9
Non Federation Kills?
1
3
Poor Thomas Leighton. Not a good second half of life.
This entry is part 11 of 12 in the series Minireviews
One Sentence Synopsis
Kirk creeps on a pubescent girl to win a race against time (and a virus) on parallel Earth.
Scene setup
Oh boy. Kirk and company beam down to an exact copy of mid 1960s Earth (TROPE ALERT) then contract a virus that causes post-pubescents to rapidly age- only the children survived and they are hundreds of years old. The kids left on Planet Lord of the Flies steal the landing party’s communicators and hot blonde yeoman which forces Kirk to creep on a teenage girl- the titular Miri- who then takes the unsuspecting Captain to a hilariously perilous rendezvous.
NO BLAHBLAHBLAH! Ladies and Gentlemen, your Emmy winner for best writing in a drama.
Should you watch it?
No. It’s an hour where little of substance happens unless willful suspension of disbelief is a hobby of yours. For instance: were there really centuries of food and water available? Was this the only city on Earth II? Why does Jahn (see above) look like he is in his mid twenties? And so on.
Vital Statistics
What Happened?
This adventure
All time
Notes
HR Incident
0
11
As distasteful as pedophilia is, still not against Starfleet policy.
This entry is part 3 of 3 in the series Coming of Age
The sporting press has been very quick to declare the Kansas City Chiefs a budding dynasty, and with good reason. This is a team that has a lot going for it: Head Coach Andy Reid is one of the more brilliant offensive minds in NFL history whose offense is led by Patrick Mahomes, who is not only the most dynamic quarterback the league has seen since Michael Vick he is a quarterback blessed with a goodie bag of offensive weapons: WR Tyreek Hill and TE Travis Kelce stretch the field both horizontally and vertically, making the Chiefs offense damned near unstoppable. That alone should make the Chiefs a perennial Super Bowl contender.
As a Chicago Bears fan coming up in the 1970s and 80’s I sure know that feeling.
After demolishing the New England Patriots in Super Bowl XX it seemed for all the world that the Bears were on the cusp of a dynasty. The 1985 season was a victory lap: the Bears rolled through their schedule posting a 15-1 record with no team in the NFC playing anywhere close to them. Even the defending champion 49ers offered little resistance in an early season matchup and by the end of the NFC Championship Game it appeared as though the Bears were in a position to dominate the Conference- and by extension the NFL – for years to come.
And why not? The offense literally ran through Walter Payton, the most productive running back in NFL history who finally had the support he needed: an outstanding and young offensive line to run behind, dynamic 26 year old QB Jim McMahon and Olympic speedster Willie Gault to stretch the field and open up lanes for Payton.
Even scarier was the thought that the offense was the weak link on the 1985 Bears: the famed 46 defense had youth, speed and an insane scheme wreaking havoc on opposing offenses. This video is from 1984 (the year before the Super Bowl run) and gives you an idea of just how dominant the 46 was.
The NFL was awesomely brutal.
It was all there for the Bears. But they only made a single NFC Title Game after the 1985 season (a 28-0 whitewashing by the 49ers in Chicago) and by trhe early 1990’s The Monsters of the Midway had descended into mediocrity:
W
L
1984
Conference Runnerup
10
6
1985
Super Bowl Champion
15
1
1986
Division Title
14
2
1987*
Division Title
11
4
1988
Conference Runnerup
12
4
1989
Out of Playoffs
6
10
1990
Division Title
11
5
1991
Wildcard
11
5
The Bears’ run. Not too impressive.
Here’s how the Chiefs match up at the start of their run:
W
L
2018
Conference Runnerup
12
4
2019
Super Bowl Champion
12
4
2020
Super Bowl Runnerup
14
2
2021
Conference Runnerup
12
5
2022
Super Bowl Champion
14
3
A promising start…
To make things worse after the 2020 season, the defense is aging at the linebacker and safety positions and the offensive line resembles a MASH unit going into the offseason. That’s a ton of uncertainty for a potential dynasty.
I’m not making any dire predictions. And there’s a slight chance that I’m a battered sports fan. But I do know better than to start believing the Chiefs will win another Super Bowl much less three, four or five more. Too much can go wrong in a sport where almost everything has to go right.
UPDATE: A second Super Bowl title- this on a 38-35 win over Philadelphia- has taken some of the bite out of the past two seasons. Defeating the Bengals (a recent nemesis) along the way has reestablished the pecking order in the AFC at least for the short term and wither a reasonable roster structure the Chiefs are poised for a few more deep playoff runs as long as Mahomes, Kelce and Chris Jones are healthy and productive.
As always, uneasy is the head that wears the crown
2020 wasn’t all strippers and burritos for the Bartons.
Not only did we lose a cat and three bunnies, we all realized that dog Bingo (14), cat Fudge (17) and daughter (17) are up there in years- it was time to get some young blood in the house.
My wife and I were largely in agreement so I left it to her to select the cat. She brought an owl-eyed calico hone. We call her Momo.
I know Momo is more afraid of Fudge (in background) than me.
Momo is sweet and well-behaved but extremely skittish which largely negates the point of having a pet. I have a teenager; I do not need another mammal to eat my food and offer little companionship in return.
Fudge had become used to running the house and is becoming more crotchety in her elderhood which is more grist for the nightmare mill that is Momo’s existence here.
This gave us teh sadz. With Momo running about avoiding human contact and not having a kitty friend I began to wonder what we actually gave her. I suppose it is a marginally better existence than a foster home or shelter but not significantly so.
And it is clear to all that I am becoming Crazy Cat Guy.
After a few weeks I pulled the trigger sending The Wife out on an errand to get Momo a friend. One each feline type. And rather than leave it up to chance I told her i expected a gray tabby. She returned with this guy:
He quickly acclimated to the new situation.
It didn’t take long for our newest family member to get around to know everyone and by the end of his third day with us, I landed on a name: Buddy. That’s what he is. He plays with me like I’m one of his pack (I have scars in evidence) but he also sleeps on me in the most relaxed poses and suckles on my non mammary fingers or nipples.
But most importantly, he is Momo’s little brother- they enjoy each other’s company which is playing, the two little shits playing me by Buddy begs me for food while Momo hangs back looking innocent and snuggling on the cat condo.
Sweet babies.
Momo is a good big sister. I hope Buddy can teach her to trust us. But if not, she has Buddy which is good enough.
This marvel of sleep technology is a blanket made from bamboo fibers. Starving pandas is just a bonus- the real magic is the blanket’s otherworldly trait of cooling the sleeper off- from anywhere in the stack. I layer the top sheet, bamboo blanket and waffle weave blanket for the most comfortable sleep imaginable. I cannot recommend this miracle highly enough.
One caveat: the blanket is delicate and needs to be hung dry indoors. A small price to pay, but something to bear in mind.
This entry is part 3 of 12 in the series Minireviews
One Sentence Synopsis
Space Pimp Teaches Us About The Love Between a Man and a Woman.
Scene setup
Kirk and the crew of the U.S.S. Enterprise rescue a scout ship from an asteroid belt, crippling the Enterprise in the attempt. Said scout ship is captained by one Harry Mudd, a roguish chap transporting three mail-order brides who generate hormonal imbalances in men thanks to a plot device or feminine confidence.
The Enterprise is damaged saving Mudd’s ship so Kirk orders a course change to a planet with lithium mines because we are waiting on the dilithium crystal upgrade. Will dilithium be twice as nice or only half as sucky?
But the miners want Mudd’s Women in payment. This is clearly a violation of all that is decent. So Kirk arranges the galaxy’s worst mixer thereby proving that his managerial incompetence is matched only by his failures as an event planner.
Is this guy good at anything?
Wow, this could have turned out better…
Should you watch it?
If you don’t watch this episode you will miss the context of 15 minutes of dialog in season 2’s I, Mudd. Beyond that, I’d say it is completely skippable.
Vital Statistics (This episode / series to date)
What Happened?
This adventure
All time
Notes
HR Incident
1
4
Every man on the Enterprise is a raging heterosexual fountain of sexual harassment. They must take after the Captain.
I’ve been playing with computers since the days of the Apple ][ running one of two operating systems: Disk Operating System (aka DOS) and Windows.
First, Some Background
Back in the day, you loaded the operating system into the PC on floppy discs.
This is a floppy disc.
Of course, the technology of the day didn’t affords luxuries such as multitasking, the ability to store multiple programs in memory or even a graphical user interface for the operating system. A user loaded the Operating system then loaded the disc(s) for whichever program they wished to run at the time.
By the 1990’s the cost of memory, storage and and graphics cards dropped far enough for a new type of operating system: a graphical user interface or GUI (pronounced “gooey”). Thanks to some poor decision making at Xerox and legal corporate espionage by Microsoft and Apple, the computer industry marched lockstep into the world of the desktop paradigm as shown below:
“They laugh alike, they walk alike, At times they even talk alike -:
As we all know, Microsoft dominates the PC OS market (76% of the market) with Mac OS (19%) in a distant second per The Encyclopedia of Record. And that roughly tallies with my own usage of the competing operating systems. I’ve had some flirtations with Mac OS but most lived with Windows since the release of Windows 95.
Windows and Mac OS have an effective monopoly on the desktop OS market because software developers want to write applications for operating systems backed by multi-billion dollar corporations. You can’t make big bucks catering to a niche market. And for the most part, Windows and Mac OS work.
Wanting Something Different
But as a computer hobbyist I was missing out: much like gearheads who now have cars that are virtually impossible to work on in a meaningful sense I can’t really tweak Windows or Mac OS to suit my workflow and if an application fails, I’m on my own: the software is proprietary so I have to wait on paid developers to resolve the issue- and who’s to say that they would even be motivated to fix a bug that only impacts a few people?
Enter Linux
Linux is open source and community-led. Anyone with interest and ability can contribute to the codebase. One upside of this approach is a large number of distributions or versions of Linux. Though all operated the same under the hood, each Linux distribution offers its own look and feel.
In fact, Linux can be run entirely from a terminal windows like DOS if one was so inclined…
Terminal apps are not pretty… though the terminal would open windowed applications.
or Linux can be made to look like Windows
Zorin OS
or Mac OS
Elementary OS
for newbies who need a familiar computing environment.
No Start Menu. No Dock. No Icons.
The distribution I am using is called Mabox and doesn’t have the typical start menu or dock familiar to other PC users. When the computer starts up, I see this:
No start menu, dock or icons required.
Hitting the Windows key or right clicking gets me a menu for applications and settings:
And when I run programs I can easily organize them using various easy to remember key combinations:
I added a dock at the top so I can start applications when windows are tiled over the entire desktop.
Multiple Desktops
Despite having this much workflow organization at my fingertips, I still find times when I need to use multiple desktops. Linux makes that easy too.
Clean interface…
I can easily switch between desktops here- see how the taskbar shows the Desktops ‘main’ and ‘comms’ with their programs to the right.
Total Customization
Linux gives the power back to the user: if I want, I can have the typical desktop with shortcuts to my files and programs or live widgets to display system information, news and weather. The OS and almost all applications are free- I open up a program called Package Manager and download any program I want- the Package Manager installs all the files and dependencies that are needed without any input from me. Updates work the same way, too: I decide when to update my PC and Package Manger handles it all with one click.
Computing is both powerful and easy- once you take control back.
Final Thoughts
And that’s the quick tour- I’ve been using Linux for a little over a month. For ease of use, customization and responsiveness I can’t imagine going back to Windows other than in some rare instances when I need to use Adobe or Office products.
