plus, some observations made.
4.1 miles. Get moving, Rob. Keep up.
Somehow Sherlock (the ultraswanky find program in the Mac's system software: it looks for a phrase on your disk as a file name, in the content of one of the files on your disk, or on the Web, a la Alta Vista, only it searches hundreds of sites quickly) had gotten broken, and don't even tell me it's possible to be a happy camper without a find program.
So I reinstalled System 8.6. I did this by doing a clean install, which creates a new system folder. Little by little, I've been moving customized stuff, like extensions for the Palm Desktop software, to the new system folder.
Big problem: QuicKeys is now broken. I have key equivalents for page up and page down that I use all the time and now they don't work.
I hate this.
Some intensely random observations:
- The romance section of the bookstore is dominated by a few authors, but there are tons of one-shot names sprinkled in there. The horror section is scary--all of the books were by approximately 5 or 6 people: VC Andrews, Stephen King, Dean Koontz, Brian Lumley, John Saul, maybe one other. There were maybe 10 books by other people. These are not good days in the horror genre, methinks. (Yes, I know they're not good for publishing in general, especially for the "midlist" author, but take a look at the horror section and tell me I'm making this up.)
- Romances appear to be set in two places: Texas and England. (Honorable mention: New Orleans.) All romance writers live in Texas (with the exception of Barbara Bretton). I don't know why this is.
- Clearly, I'm going to have to watch the Star Wars trilogy again, because I'm still wondering about one thing: was Darth Vader always keeping an eye on Luke? You'd think someone would have pointed out, "Hey, Mr. Vader, there's a kid on your home planet who has the same last name that you used to!"
Was Luke supposed to be hidden, and if so, what moron was put in charge of that witness protection program?
- Are the May sweeps over yet? No, we still have to suffer through Cleopatra on Sunday. Oh yes, and Homicide ends tomorrow night, going out with a whimper instead of a bang.
We watched Trekkies in the Sneak Previews class last night. Trekkies is a documentary about (what else?) fans of Star Trek. The executive producer and main interviewer was Denise Crosby, "Tasha Yar" of The Next Generation. The documentary interviews cast members about their experiences as being part of the phenomenon and the fans who are devoted to the universe and what it stands for. Lots of time is spent with the woman in Little Rock who attended the Whitewater grand jury in her Star Trek uniform, a teenager actively involved in his local Star Trek group, and a woman devoted--devoted--to Brent Spiner.
It's scary stuff.
There are some good things in there too. How much hope Star Trek has brought to people for themselves and for the world--the stories of little girls's worlds being rocked by there being a black woman on television who wasn't a maid, for instance. (Okay, she was a telephone operator, but whatever.) James Doohan's story of trying to help a fan avoid suicide is great. Leonard Nimoy is still trying to come to terms with what Star Trek and Spock have meant for people.
The dentist and his family who run Star Base Dentistry and who go around all the time in Star Trek uniforms were almost too weird.
The woman who's taken thousands of pictures of Brent Spiner and likes to gaze out toward the hill where he lives when she's feeling tense or angry...I think everyone in that theater went, "Whoa." It certainly sent chills down my spine. This is a town, after all, where the police have a special stalker unit.
The documentary is affectionate, but there are so many mocking scenes I had trouble believing most Trekkies/Trekkers (yes, there is discussion of what the difference is, and Kate Mulgrew does not do herself proud in attempting to define them) would really enjoy being portrayed this way.
If you've ever been affected by a phenomenon this way, you might want to see Trekkies, if only to assure yourself I'm not that bad. Other than that, I'm not sure who this documentary is for: it assumes knowledge of the Star Trek universe (which half the audience last night professed not to have) and it's not as focused as, say, your average documentary on PBS.
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Copyright 1999 Diane Patterson
Send comments and questions to diane@spies.com