Mom and the Dinosaur

Mother's Day is a good time to reflect not only how important our mothers are in our lives, but to wonder what their lives must have been like before we came along. I certainly wonder that sometimes, at least, especially when I run across old photos like this one, which depicts Mom in 1966 sitting on the tail of a dinosaur. The slide was pretty degraded, and it's going to take some more work to properly retouch it, but even as it is I find this image a fascinating glimpse into the past. Happy Mother's Day, Mom!

Painting Pyramids

Ear to the Ground

Who Knew NuWho Would Woo Woods?

Way back in 2005 I watched the first episode of the revived Dr. Who, "Rose." At the time the episode didn't leave much of an impression on me, and so I let the new series slide. Since then, of course, the show has earned great critical acclaim and the high opinion of several of my friends, so I've given the show another try. 

I'm a little over midway through the Eccleston season, and I must say I'm already won over. The show is a lot more fun that I remember, and much more ambitious than I anticipated. And perhaps most importantly, it's joyous - an important quality in an era drowning in irony and pessimism. 

From what I've read, apparently the series gets even better as it moves forward in time. I can't believe it took me this long to catch up on the Doctor's adventures, and I look forward to great things to come. 

The Tyranny of Choice

A Moment of Melancholy

How sad that there will likely never be a Blu-Ray box set of Toilet Chase, Pipe Maniac, and Toilet Chase III: Flush Point. 

Keep an Ear Out

Photoshop's pen tool is the scariest of all Photoshop tools, so I gritted my teeth and experimented with it to create the curvy tagline worming its way into this eerie ear canal. 

The Spectre of Shakespeare

Even the 20th century's greatest skid row Renaissance man, Edward D. Wood Jr., must have felt, as all writers do, the silent approbation of history's most celebrated scribe. I've been working on a story called "The Crawling Ear" and LEGO Shakespeare's wry gaze seems to condemn me to Wood's fate - as a forgotten hack of cheap, tawdry dime novels. Well, I can think of worse fates...plus it inspired me to shoot this (I hope) amusing photo. 

Bathroom Beam-Out

Clown in a Photo Booth

Freefall with Nathan

Two nights ago I dreamed I was spacewalking outside a Russian space station with Nathan Fillion. We watched as a Soyuz docked at the station, then he turned to me, the stars his backdrop, and said, "Well, I guess we should be heading back to Earth."

By way of reply I saluted jauntily and let myself fall freely toward the planet, for after all that's how astronauts returned, not in spaceships, but by simply allowing ourselves to be recaptured by the gentle tug of gravity. At first our descent was slow, but then Nathan pulled off his helmet and tossed it aside, and that seemed to accelerate us; we drilled man-shaped holes through the clouds, hooting and cawing in delight as we hurtled through the sky.

Nathan disposed of the rest of his spacesuit and I was unsurprised to see that he was wearing his Captain Mal costume from Firefly. But I was comfortable in my marshmallow-like costume, and I performed midair antics as we fell; I made silly faces (unseen, of course, through my helmet), posed like Superman, relaxed with my hands on my head as if I were napping in a hammock.

It was in that relaxed pose that I slammed into the ground, at the same instant as Nathan, and each of us created a massive network of splinters through the already-cracked desert landscape.

"Wow!" I exclaimed. "Those last few meters sure come up fast!" I finally pulled off my helmet and began the beat the dust from my spacesuit. Nathan had landed on his feet, which annoyed me a little; he had remarkable poise.

Suddenly I was alone, looking up at an azure sky that faded to deep black, and the stars above gleamed. 

Planning a Powell's Pilgrimage

One day - perhaps this summer - I would like to visit Powell's Books, the world's largest independent new and used book store. Perhaps I'll take a couple of flex days surrounding the Canada Day holiday. Who's with me? Sean? Sylvia? Jeff and Susan? Steven? I suppose that's a lot of people for one vehicle...

Alberta Velocipede

A few years back, Mom and Dad caught some people riding velocipedes on an Alberta farm. The original image was a little crowded, so I tested my image manipulation skills by seeing if I could paint them out convincingly. It turned out all right, but then I had the idea of adding blur to make it look like the cyclist was speeding across the prairie. It's a little primitive, but sort of fun. 

Grass River Crew Cut

Here's Dad near the Grass River in Manitoba sporting a truly archetypal 1960s crew cut. The original photo is pretty overexposed and resisted my efforts to correct it; I need more practice. The grass is sure a vibrant green, though. 

Bridge to Nowhere

I'm running out of provinces and territories for the Nowhere series to visit, so here I'm resorting to a fake behind-the-scenes "making of" text, the first non-fiction work in the not-yet-a-series. This bridge is just north of Leaf Rapids, straddling the Churchill River. 

Cape Nowhere

I hadn't done Nova Scotia yet in my series of imaginary "Nowhere" book covers, so this time I tried a photo cover. It might work better with the title on the bottom, my name at the upper right, and the Nova Scotia space-scape overlaid on the gantry.

Hmm. This is a little better, I think. 

Signature Moment

A wedding photo?! I know, I know. But it's never a bad time to praise our friend and photographer, Yolande Cole, who so generously donated her time and talent to our wedding. And it's also never a bad time for a bad pun; this was, after all, a signature moment. 

Roadkill Stanzas

Help! Help!
We die! Ugh! Oh!
Over the dangerous cliff we go!

Help! Help!
We fall! Ack! Aiieee!
This unfortunate circumstance we did not foresee!

Help! Help!
The artist is mad!
Condemns us with malfunctioning brake pad!

We die! Ugh! Oh!
Where all of the supernumerary characters go!
We fall to our dooms without rhyme or reason -
This is the Golden Age, the super-hero season! 

Odious Candies

Shipwrecked on Candy Isle
Gilligan ate everything but
Goodies and Big Turk

A Clean Alternative

I was helping Sylvia with the wash this weekend when we were both startled by the sound of something clattering out of the clothes dryer. When I leaned down to see what had fallen, I was initially baffled by the sight of an Alternate key - until I remembered that Sean and I had each saved a key after smashing our old Atari computers. I must have saved it in my sweat pants pocket and forgotten about it until the pants and the key went through an entire wash cycle.

The key came out spotless, both inside and out - no mean feat, considering it had been sitting in a dark, musty corner of a basement for years. Cleaning keyboards can be a frustrating experience, but the next time that task faces me, I may very well pop off all the keys and throw them in with my next load of clothes. The results are spectacular! 

Manitoba Horror House

When Sean and I went to Manitoba in 2009, we came across this creepy abandoned farmhouse. I thought this was the only reasonable response. 

LEGO Noir

Rubber Falls Flat

Last night Sylvia and I watched Quentin Dupieux's absurdist comedy-fantasy Rubber. I enjoyed it well enough, though I wish it had been a little less self-consciously clever and a little funnier. For Sylvia, however, the movie fell flat - as did, in a strange coincidence, our right front tire after having lunch at Creole Envie with her parents. Thankfully Sylvia's father Gill came to the rescue and slapped on the emergency spare.


Two weeks ago Sylvia warned me that the right front tired seemed to be losing air. But as is sometimes my wont, I merely nodded and promised to fill it soon. Naturally I forgot, leading to today's embarrassing pit stop.

I wouldn't blame Sylvia at all if she considered both the film and my cavalier attitude toward auto maintenance somewhat...tiresome. 

TNG Season Two in HD: Worst to First

Yesterday Sylvia and I finally finished season two of Star Trek: The Next Generation in high definition. Way back in 2012 I finished season one and ranked those episodes from worst to first. Now it's time to see how season two's episodes stack up against each other.

Season two is generally regarded as an improvement over season one, and while I generally agree with that common wisdom, season two has a lot more stinkers than I remember. Still, the show is clearly finding its feet, and a pair of episodes from this season hint at the real greatness to come.

Reviewers with keener eyes than me have said that the quality of the HD presentation in season two falls short of the stellar quality of season one, but these episodes still look better than they ever have. As I've said before, watching TNG on Blu-Ray is like watching it for the first time.

Here's how I rank the 22 episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation's second season:

22. "Shades of Gray"
Star Trek's first and only clip show, this episode was clearly made only to round out the season to 22 episodes. For 42 minutes we see poor Jonathan Frakes as a wounded Commander Riker sweating and moaning on a biobed as Dr. Pulaski uses "powerful memories" (i.e. clips from old adventures) to purge the disease that's killing him. Very weak.

21. "Where Silence Has Lease"
This episode has a great title, but the story is pretty thin gruel. A space monster called Nagilum tortures the crew for his own amusement. A redshirt is killed, but Picard and company outwit the beast in the end and sail off into the stars with some homily or other I've forgotten.

20. "The Outrageous Okona"
A cheap Han Solo rip-off rips off the plot of Romeo and Juliet while Data learns how to be funny from Joe Piscopo (ouch). Notable only (for me) for featuring a pre Lois & Clark Teri Hatcher as Lieutenant B.G. Robinson.

19. "Time Squared"
This is one of those dreaded Enterprise-runs-into-a-spacial-anomaly episodes. What's meant to be trippy, mind-bending time travel results, but in the end it's just an incoherent mess. Even Patrick Stewart, playing two different versions of himself, is lost here.

18. "The Icarus Factor"
Riker's absentee father shows up in an effort to reconcile with his son and Worf goes through a silly Klingon ritual. Also features the debut of ambo-jitsu, a nonsensical martial art that's embarrassing to watch.

17. "The Dauphin"
Wesley Crusher falls in love with a shapeshifting alien ambassador, but has to let her go because only she can stop a war. There's a nice scene where Wesley shows his new girlfriend the wonders of the holodeck and the beauty of the universe, but everything else about this episode is pretty forgettable.

16. "The Royale"
This episode features a well-executed atmosphere of surreal dread, and the plight of a long-dead NASA astronaut is genuinely chilling, but in the end it's really just a shaggy dog story of little consequence.

15. "Up the Long Ladder"
I prefer this episode's original title, "Send in the Clones." Not only is it a terrible pun, but it has a stronger connection to the episode's clone-centric plot, in which Picard plays matchmaker to two lost Earth colonies - one made up of offensive Irish stereotypes, the other a rigid society of clones dying out due to replicative fading. This episode has an interesting central concept and includes a strong pro-choice message, but the haphazard execution takes this otherwise promising story down a few notches.

14. "Unnatural Selection"
This episode isn't terrible, but it's laid low by two unfortunate tropes: the rapid-aging gag and the ability of the transporter to fix virtually any problem. The episode's depiction of Federation-approved genetic engineering is also at odds with other Star Trek stories before and since.

13. "Pen Pals"
Data winds up breaking the Prime Directive by striking up a long-distance friendship with a little alien girl whose culture hasn't yet developed warp speed. Both Data's naivete and the crew's churlish reaction make everyone seem a little out of character, and the episode's predictable resolution is hardly ground-breaking. How much more effective could this episode have been if Picard actually stuck to his guns and enforced the Prime Directive? It would have been pretty shocking, at least.

12. "The Child"
You have to give the producers credit: season two's opening has a lot of baggage to explain, and they pulled the episode together in spite of a writer's strike, re-using a script from the aborted 1970s Star Trek: Phase II project and melding it with some necessary exposition explaining Dr. Crusher's sudden replacement by Dr. Pulaski. Despite these obstacles it's a sometimes moving story, and Marina Sirtis' acting has improved enough to carry its considerable emotional weight.

11. "Contagion"
Some nifty special effects, a guest appearance by the Romulans and Geordi's hilarious ride in an out-of-control turbolift give this otherwise unremarkable story about a computer virus some extra punch.

10. "Samaritan Snare"
The infamous Pakleds make their début. There's something offensive about these slow-witted alien bumpkins, but their hilarious dialogue makes me chuckle to this day: "We look for things. Things to make us go."

9. "Manhunt"
Lwaxana Troi returns, and she's looking for a husband. Every once in a while there's nothing wrong with a light-hearted episode, and this one is pure fluff. Patrick Stewart does a wonderful job as a panicked, fearful Captain Picard playing chicken and hiding in the holodeck to avoid Troi's affections.

8. "A Matter of Honor"
Commander Riker temporarily joins a Klingon crew as part of a cultural exchange. Fun blood-and-thunder nonsense.

7. "Peak Performance"
War games result in a potentially deadly encounter with the fiendish Ferengi! Notable for some clever misdirection and the remarkable Lieutenant Burke, a Starfleet officer who clearly couldn't care less about anything, especially his own job performance. To this day I regret that Burke never reappeared.

6. "The Emissary"
The wonderful Suzi Plakson makes her first appearance as K'Ehleyr, Worf's old girlfriend and eventual mother of his son. And as a bonus, the episode actually has some interesting things to say about cultural identity, belonging, compassion and mercy.

5. "The Schizoid Man"
Brent Spiner offers another great performance as Data, this time possessed by a dead, ego-maniacal scientist. Worth watching for Spiner's magnificent snark alone, and Patrick Stewart's outraged reactions.

4. "Loud as a Whisper"
A nice little parable about disability, dealing with sudden loss, and the difficulties of communication.

3. "Elementary, Dear Data"
Superb production values (including really remarkable sets and costuming), a great guest performance by Daniel Davis as Professor Moriarty, and a fantastic ethical conundrum make this one of the standouts not just of season two, but of the entire series.

2. "Q Who"
Not only does Q return - always one of the highlights of the season - but he introduces the deadly Borg, who are never scarier and more menacing than they are here (more's the pity). It's refreshing to see Picard and his crew taken down a notch by a threat they simply can't understand or fight; in the end, Picard is reduced to begging. And he learns from that.

1. "The Measure of a Man"
This Blu-Ray release features a real treat for fans: an extended version of this, one of Star Trek's very best episodes. The extra scenes add a little extra depth and texture to an already great story, one that asks us to consider the nature of sentience and human rights. This is possibly also the best use of Whoopi Goldberg's Guinan, who with casual but deadly logic leads Picard where he needs to go. Great stuff all around.

Release Me