in which everyone finds something to dislike.
I'm never going to run again. But it's my own fault, for not going to buy the warmer running clothes I need in this weather.
There's lots and lots of Patrick Stewart in it.
Okay, now to everything we didn't like, and everybody had something different that he or she didn't like:
- Darin: the science and technology.
- Brent: the logical and ethical gaps.
- Mike: the tactics and strategies.
- Diane: the story and characters.
The plot is as follows: Mr. Data the android apparently goes nuts while on a survey mission of a peaceful, agrarian society, the Ba'ku (read: yet another race of people who look like refugees from the nearest Renaissance Fair). The Federation admiral in charge of the survey asks Capt. Picard for Data's schematics, so that when Data is recaptured, he can be turned off. Or something.
Anyhow, Picard decides that since he's a)Data's commanding officer and b)Data's friend and c)bored silly with the diplomatic mission he's currently on, he'll just pop over to the Ba'ku world and see what Data's up to. He and Worf subdue Data (by singing Gilbert and Sullivan--don't ask, though if you're wondering Stewart's singing voice is just as nice as his speaking voice).
Together, they manage to track down exactly why Data went nuts: he was defending the Prime Directive, whereas the Federation and their new partners, the Sona (led by F. Murray "The 80s were better" Abraham) are violating it because of a particular characteristic of the Ba'ku's world: eternal youth. The Sona have a way to harness the power of the planet--at the expense of the habilitability of the planet: the Ba'ku must go.
And so on, and so forth.
It's all very silly. There's a subplot with Data learning to be a child. "I have to go home now," is one of the funnier lines. There's a romance between Picard and one of the "older women" on the planet. There are the Sona, who are amazingly technologically advanced, given the history of their race. And there's lots of stupid "scientific" talk about "genetic manipulation."
The biggest problem with the Star Trek universe is that their cardinal rule is "Thou shalt not mess with the franchise," which means that the characters get protected--and can't grow. They also have abandoned the "science" end of science-fiction. One of the interesting distinctions I've heard is that the original Star Trek was TV written by science-fiction writers, and The Next Generation was science fiction written by TV writers. And that's what this is. There isn't an original thought in the script.
Roger Ebert's review of the movie and the questions it raises (and doesn't answer) is spot on.
I've decided I have to get organized. Darin and I have been using Claris Organizer, but I haven't been using it, or when I do type an appointment or some kind of note in I don't consult it later.
When I was in high school, the seniors and juniors (classes of 50 each--we all knew one another) had a tradition at the end of the year: the juniors put on a skit making fun of each of the seniors--one girl in my class was named "Queen of the Snow" and I didn't even get what that meant, that's how naive I was--and each senior gifts something that's helped them to their "little sister" in the junior class.
My "big sister" Rebecca--who was the actual big sister of my best friend in high school, Elizabeth Friedenwald (in case she does a web search on her name)--gave me my first calendar, one of those ubiquitous Week-at-a-Glance calendars.
I have used the week-on-two-pages format ever since.
But since I'm such a computer junkie, I thought an electronic calendar would be just the thing. It isn't. I can't take it with me, I hate printing out the individual pages and punching holes in the pages, and I don't consult it. Hasn't been of much use to me.
I got to talking with Pooks one evening about calendars and she got me all fired up about organizing my time again. She mentioned the book The 10 Natural Laws of Successful Time and Life Management: Proven Strategies for Increased Productivity and Inner Peace by Hyrum Smith, which I bought and read. I'd read a lot of the same advice elsewhere, but it inspired me to get a calendar--the two-page-per-day format! oooo!--and start writing things down.
The two-page-per-day format has the following things: a timeline from 8am to 8pm, an Action List (a To Do list), and a full page for the "Diary and Work Record"--that is, a blank page for notes or a journal or whatever.
Like I need another journal, right?
Well, yeah, actually, I do. To write down conversations I had with my manager, or what I did today (the dry and boring version), or whatever. This isn't the place for a lot of that, and I'm not going to put them in my private diary. Right now, I don't think I need a full 12 hour calendar to plan my days--yet--but I'm using it to keep track of where I've been and what I've been eating. (Food journal: haven't forgotten about that one, have you?)
I will continue, however, to keep my master Address Book in the computer--it doesn't change as often, and it's not as much of a pain to print out and cut out as my entire calendar.
I've been using my private diary a lot more recently--inspired, I suppose, by getting a fountain pen (or two). But I've been rediscovering its powers--it serves a different function than this one. Different rules.
What I'd really like to do is find some way to interleave my two journals, but considering I write my private diary in a bound volume, that's going to be a neat trick. Something for the people who will keep my papers in the future, I suppose.
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Copyright 1998 Diane Patterson
Send comments and questions to diane@spies.com