The Diner Before Callahan's

It's now a dental office, but once upon a time this building just north of the High Level Bridge housed a restaurant I used to frequent with my friends in the University of Alberta Star Trek Club. No, the restaurant wasn't Callahan's - at least not at first - but the one that preceded it. (I shot this photo sometime after leaving university, I'm sure.) Despite all my fond memories of the restaurant that was here before Callahan's, I can't remember its name. Can anyone help me out? 

Tarnished Buckle

Today Sylvia and I spent some time going through my closet to set aside clothes I'm finally forced to admit I'll never wear again. Among those items was the movie-era Star Trek costume made for me by one of the member of the Edmonton Star Trek Society. I kept the belt buckle (pictured), and the rank insignia. The uniform itself will, I hope, find a better home. 

Superman vs. Apollo

Many years ago, Jeff and Susan and Ron and Tony came over to make some silly stop-action movies with me. Here's a screenshot from one of them, "Superman Gets Drunk:" Superman assaults an innocent Command/Service Module (CSM) from the Apollo program. I really need to digitize the video and post it on YouTube. 

2 Questions

When 15 members of the University of Alberta Star Trek Club and the University of Alberta Scuba Club crammed ourselves into a 15-person van for a road trip from Edmonton to Los Angeles, we had to find ways to amuse ourselves during the 27-hour drive. Some suggested 20 Questions, and when my turn came to ask the questions, sometime during deepest midnight, I started with the obvious:

"Is it bigger than a breadbox?" I asked Allan, who harboured the answer in his mind.

"Yes," he said.

A sudden flash of intuition hit me.

"Is if the pyramids?"

Allan's eyes bulged in shock, and he reared back in his seat.

"WHAT..how...but...yes. It's the pyramids."

Of course I'm not suggesting a paranormal explanation; it was just a moment of whimsy on my part that, against all odds, happened to be correct. But the look on Allan's face was spectacular. 

Pizza in a Glass

Yesterday's post about bad movie nights in the early 1990s reminded me of the time the same group of friends went to Pizza Hut for their incredibly cheap all-you-can-eat pizza night. I don't remember which of us this happened to--was it me?--but while the waitress was making her rounds, the grease-laden pepperoni pizza she was doling out skated across the surface of her platter and landed, point first, in a full glass of Coke, rendering both inedible and messing up someone's shirt. We all got a good laugh out of it, though. 

The Wrong Turn

Many years ago--sometime during the early-to-mid 1990s--I was out with my friends Jeff, Susan, Tony, Steven and Ron. Carrie and Allan may have been there too. We were out searching for films to play for our semi-regular bad movie night. Back in those halcyon days, we would visit video rental stores and pore over racks and racks of VHS cassettes. Sometimes the trip itself was as fun or more than the movies themselves.

In this particular instance, we spotted a video store in the Oliver district of Edmonton, in the strip mall that hosts a Brit's Fish & Chips now. We sauntered in and started browsing, and within a few minutes we all realized that the entire store consisted only of the porn section...it was, in fact, an adult video store, a fact that all of us somehow missed. We skittered out, tittering nervously, faces flushed with embarrassed laughter. We were all close, but not so close that we had any interest in perusing pornography together; we were not nearly so hip.

I don't recall if we regrouped to find another video store or if we wound up playing board games or something. It's funny how some memories stick, while others flutter off into invisibility. 

Clobbearl's Revenge

Regaling Frequencies Open

Last night I was surprised by a FaceTime call from my old friend Steven Neumann, who dialed me in to briefly join a celebration of our mutual friend Jeff's 50th birthday. I was quite touched to be included in the celebrations at a distance, and watched as Susan lit Jeff's big 50-shaped sparklers. It was quite a festive conflagration!

Inspired by the call, early this morning I celebrated Jeff's birthday in my own way, with a silly email based on some shared in-jokes that go back over a quarter century...which means that Jeff and I have known each other for longer than we hadn't known each other--rather a sobering thought.

Here's the story, which will make little sense to anyone except for Jeff, his wife Susan, her brother Steven, and my wife, Sylvia, who you may spot in this story as thinly-disguised analogues of themselves. And after you read the story, be sure to visit Jeff's blog and buy some art!

*  *  *

Captain Wolverine's knuckles, white with fury, clung to the jewel-encrusted arms of his command throne. No other hint of turmoil crossed his Saturnine features. Coolly, he swiveled the throne to face his elegant yet disdainful - one would almost say insubordinate - communications officer, red-skirted, blonde-beehived, Lieutenant Feral.

"Repeat that last, Lieutenant!" barked Wolverine. It came out as a dare. Feral rolled her eyes.

"There's an incoming transmission from the U.S.S. Encounter," she said. "Admiral Woods has a message for you."

Resigning himself, Captain Wolverine turned his throne to face the bridge's main viewer.

"Put him on," he sighed.

The screen flickered from a starfield to the rakish, dashing visage of Admiral Woods himself, who was currently leaning forward in his own command chair, one eyebrow raised, his slash of a mouth forming an insouciant grin.

"Captain Wolverine," he said. "I hear congratulations are in order."

"Yes," Wolverine replied casually, leaning back in his chair, crossing his legs insolently. "You speak of course of our successful first contact with the Sequential Analog Loving Intellect Validator mark 8 machine culture. Really, the credit goes to my Chief Medical Officer, Commander Steadfast, and her brother, our Science Officer, Commander Ice. They're the ones who..."

"I wasn't actually talking about the SALIV-8 matter, though of course it was quite an accomplishment. No, I brought you something. Transporter room, beam over the package."

In the space just above Captain Wolverine's lap, a swirl of matter suddenly coalesced into a small paperback book, which plopped gently onto his crossed legs.

"What's this?" Wolverine wondered, opening the book to a random page. "'There no doubt existed computer dossiers in half a dozen capitals on the sexual tastes and proclivities of Jonathan Emeric Anderson. Whoever had selected Charla Boyd knew exactly what they were doing; she looked as if she had been literally materialized out of Jack's own sexual fantasies...'"

Wolverine put the book down and looked askance at the Admiral. "Message, Woods?"

The Admiral shrugged innocently. "None that I am aware of, except of course...happy birthday."

Wolverine grimaced. "How did you find out?"

"Well, I could be mysterious and say something like 'It's my business to know," but to be honest your wife and brother-in-law ratted you out."

Wolverine threw an annoyed glare at Steadfast and Ice. Steadfast responded by leaning in behind the command throne and gnawing on Wolverine's throat, while Ice chuckled dryly (his nickname was, in fact, "Dry Ice.").

"You run a tight ship, Captain Wolverine," Woods mocked gently and somewhat hypocritically, being no paragon of discipline himself. "Report to Starbase 50 immediately for R&R, and by the way, I'm poaching Lieutenant Feral from you; her transfer to my command will take effect as soon as you dock."

Feral rolled her eyes again. "It's not real, Earl."

Woods shook his fists over his head theatrically. "I'm doing a bit, Monkey! Also, down with metanarrative."

"I hate when you do this," Wolverine said.

"I wonder," Woods replied. "Anyway, happy birthday, and may you enjoy many more to come."

"Channel closed," Feral reported. "Can we wrap up this story so I can put on some real clothes and get out of these dumb pajamas?"

"Set course for Starbase 50," Wolverine said, making finger-guns at the viewscreen. Alexander Courage's trumpet fanfare rolled across the bow as the ship banked to port, credits superimposed over the VFX before the image faded to black. 

This restaurant - seen here sometime in the mid-1990s - sits at the south end of the High Level Bridge, near the University of Alberta campus. Sometime in 1990 or 1991, I went for supper there, along with Carrie Humphrey and perhaps some combination of Paul Allen, Tony Longworth, Ron Briscoe, Steven Neumann, Susan Neumann, Andrea MacLeod, Jeff Shyluk, Allan Sampson and Jim Sandercock: the core, in other words, of the University of Alberta Star Trek club, as it was in the all too brief months before I earned my degree.

The only thing I really remember about that evening out was that Carrie flung ice cubes at one of us and missed, striking another diner. Sheepish apologies were handed out and the breach was forgiven.

I'm not sure why that memory has stuck with me, when I'd much rather remember what we might have been talking and laughing about. Cruel, cruel entropy.  

Two Months to Go

I still remember discussing the cancellation of Twin Peaks in one of my English or Political Science classes with a fellow student; I can recall his face, but not his name. I remember, too, watching some of the episodes over at Tony Longworth`s place with other members of the University of Alberta Star Trek Club. And I remember watching the entire run of the show all over again on the then-new Bravo! channel shortly after graduation. But after that, the show slowly faded into dreamlike memories, and I lamented its passing.

At the time, it felt like Twin Peaks opened up the true nature of reality: a maelstrom of madness and decency, the uncanny woven into the fabric of the mundane, with good and wondrous people doing their best to lift us away from horror and suffering. I thought it was magical.

But can David Lynch and Mark Frost recapture that magic, over a quarter of a century later? I don't know. But I'll be watching. 

Leggo My Ego

It was
1990 and
We huddled in 620 SUB
Between classes waiting
To grow up
(It still hasn't happened)
And someone said something funny
And I said "Leggo my ego!"
And Jeff howled with laughter like it was
The greatest thing since toaster waffles

Sunday with Steven

It's always nice when old friends come to visit, and this weekend and I Sylvia and I have the pleasure of hosting Steven Neumann, who I met waayyyyy back in 1987 at a University of Alberta Star Trek Club meeting. I wasn't even 20 back then, and now we're closing in our 50s fast. Yikes. 

My (Nearly) 50 Year Mission

By the time I was born, Star Trek's initial broadcast run was almost over; indeed, only "The Cloud Minders," "The Savage Curtain," "All Our Yesterdays," and "Turnabout Intruder" aired in first-run during my lifetime. Barely a month after that last episode ended, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin were exploring the Moon.

I learned to read fairly early, and I read voraciously. I don't regret it, but there were two unfortunate side effects: being a reader made me something of an outcast among my peers, and many of the non-fiction books I devoured filled me with existential dread. I was particularly concerned by the prospect of nuclear war. I was a pretty neurotic, imaginative little boy, and I was bullied for it repeatedly for many years.

But one afternoon, when I was perhaps five or six years old, I tuned in to CBC and saw my first episode of Star Trek: "A Private Little War." At that age I was drawn, of course, to the action/adventure aspect of the show, and to the fearsome mugato that threatened Captain Kirk and Doctor McCoy. But though I may not have consciously realized it at the time, what really grabbed me  was that the crew's adventures took place in the far future, hundreds of years from now. More importantly, people got along - people from a bunch of different countries served on the Enterprise together. They were professional, they were kind, and when they used violence they did so with real reluctance and regret.

I didn't glean all this from that single episode, of course; it was revealed to me as I devotedly tuned in for the repeats. Soon I was playing "Star Trek" with my few friends in the forests of Leaf Rapids; one of us, I don't remember which, had the "Exploration Set" model kit, so we had a plastic phaser, communicator and tricorder to use as props. And the amazing topography of Leaf Rapids, with its dense thickets of trees, the sinkhole, beach sand (!) and outcroppings of massive boulders, served us well as a variety of alien worlds. It didn't stop the bullying or my sense of isolation (in fact, in some ways it made it worse), but the show and the feelings it inspired made it all much easier to bear.

I kept watching the repeats even after we moved from Manitoba to Alberta, all the way up to the debut of Star Trek: The Next Generation in 1987. I read the books, I wrote Star Trek stories, I watched the Animated Series, and I even joined the University of Alberta Star Trek club and had a custom uniform made:

It's no exaggeration to say that next to my parents and Superman comics, Star Trek played the greatest role in shaping my values. I fell in love with its lofty aspirations: to peacefully explore the universe, to expand our knowledge, to learn about and genuinely appreciate and love other cultures, to treat every living thing with dignity, compassion and respect. And while it's true that the show was often inconsistent in its efforts to fulfill these aspirations, millions of people around the world got the message: we have a future, it's marvellous and beautiful, and we'll explore it together. No one gets left behind.

Of course I understand it's just a television show. But there's a beautiful moment in the Star Trek parody film Galaxy Quest that perfectly captures my relationship with the series: a fan acknowledges the television show Galaxy Quest isn't real, and then is told that (in a sense) it is real. "I KNEW IT!" he exults.

I wish Star Trek were real, and I know it's not real, but I know it is real, in a sense. Maybe Star Trek itself is just a fantasy, but the ideals that serve as its foundation are real and important and worth pursuing.

To celebrate my love of the show on its 50th anniversary, which just happens to be today, I watched "The Man Trap," the first episode broadcast. While not the best the series has to offer, it still felt as fresh and intriguing to me tonight as it did when I first watched it, sometime back in the 1970s. And even in what feels more like an Outer Limits "monster of the week" episode than the Trek people know and love, those Star Trek values remain very much in evidence. Even after the M-113 creature has killed five people, necessitating a lethal response from the crew, Kirk and company show palpable regret in the coda.

Star Trek's secular testament has informed my character every year I've been conscious, and I expect it will continue to do so for the rest of my remaining years. Maybe I'll never fly on a starship for real, and maybe I'll never live up to the show's ideals, but I think trying has served me well so far. I'm grateful for the journey. Happy Anniversary, Star Trek, and thank you to the hundreds of men and women who gave the world such incredible stories of hope, imagination and possibility.

Alternate Staple Accident

Who would have believed that there are TWO photographs of my bloodied fingers in a stapler. This image was shot (for some reason) in 620 SUB on the University of Alberta campus; it was the office of the University of Alberta Star Trek Club. It is probably no surprise that I served a term as President. 

Stooge Defence Pattern Alpha

Here is a photo of Jeff and Susan from the mid-1990s. In this dramatic image, Jeff uses the only known maneuver that foils the dreaded Stooge form eyeball assault. I'm still amazed that I had the reflexes to get this shot. 

Earl Noir

If it were shot on black and white film instead of colour videotape, I'd almost claim that this screen capture from Generous Nature could serve as a legitimate example of film noir, thanks to its claustrophobic composition. I totally meant to do that! 

I Have a Mouth and I Must Scream

My friend Jeff hates a couple of things with a passion: the Paranoid Productions film Bitter Litter, in which he stars, and Photoshop's lens flare filter. For my own amusement, and because I know this will make Jeff cry "Argh!", I combined Jeff's two antipassions in this image. 

Things I Have Seen Hit Jeff in the Teeth

1) A Frisbee, flung by Susan; shortly after, Ron's arm got friction-burned in a melee involving a Ring-O

2) A heavy white plastic alligator clip, accidentally sprung off a desk and into Jeff's mouth by Earl in 620 SUB

3) A nickel, after bouncing off of desk in 620 SUB - Earl also responsible

Disneyline

In 1992, the University of Alberta Star Trek Club, accompanied by the University of Alberta Scuba Club, packed into a van and drove to Disneyland. Here we are waiting in line for a ride; I don't remember which one. Nor do I remember why I looked unimpressed, because it was an amazing trip. 

Fast & Furious

I don't remember who took this photo back in 1990 - it might have been Ron, it might have been me, it might even have been a proto-selfie shot by Tony himself - but I've always loved the juxtaposition of Tony's Muppet-like wonder over Jeff's annoyed fury in the background. It's possible I'm mixing memories, but I believe we were on the way to shoot off a bunch of fireworks in the vacant lot across from Tony's apartment. The video of that event is pretty amusing...