Jenny McCarthy and Space Hippies

Santa Bot space hippies (Photo credit: shoveling_ferret)

Watching The Way to Eden, best known as the space hippy episode. Given Kirk's inability to keep it in his pants, you'd think he'd welcome a bunch of free-love types, but, no, he's all "get a haircut and lose the interstellar patchouli."

Anyway, the crazy, self-centered, irresponsible leader of the hippies, Dr. Sevrin is carrying a highly virulent disease that cannot be cured but can be prevented via vaccine. He apparently decided not to get the vaccine and has been knowingly wandering the galaxy exposing people even though he's been told how dangerous this is.

Why does this sound familiar?
Oh, right.

Anyway, the space hippies are annoying as hell and their drum circle sucks. Wow does it suck. Damn. 1969 in LA and they couldn't find better hippies? I mean, they could have paid them in pot and let them wear their own clothes. Instead they clearly let some 50 year-old dude who was a fan of the Monkees hire these assholes. "Yep, this is totally counter-culture. Them kids will totally boogy to this."

Also, Spock jamming with the hippies is physical painful to watch.

And could they possibly have been any more heavy-handed with the whole "the planet is made of acid!" thing? Burny acid, not trippy acid. Worst trip ever.

Apparently this episode didn't suck so much in the first draft. One of the hippies was supposed to be McCoy's daughter and Kirk was supposed to be all "mmmm, space hippy." And, obviously, McCoy was going to be all "you're gonna be dead, Jim." The original writer, the awesome DC Fontana asked they change her credit to an entirely different name, in fact, because she thought it sucked so hard.

Fun Fur Bikini

Watching Star Trek again. I think I need to reproduce the crazy lady-shaman costume (kahn-ut-tu) from A Private Little War.
Orange eyelash yarn, a complete disregard for dignity, a whole lot of spray tanner, and a cheap wig and I will have the best attention whoring convention costume ever.

I think Oreo would be an excellent mugato.

Tom refuses to take any part in my Star Trek geekery, so I guess he won't have to wear a blonde wig and buckskin vest.

Nerdgasm

Taken 2/29/12 in the Oval Office - Live Long & Prosper!:

Planet of the Spray Tan

Watching "The Apple" at the moment.

Also known as:
"Look at these freaking Oompa Loompas"
"Holy crap, it's the planet of the guidos."
"Beta Carotene is all we eat"

Also, I've discovered another instance of Star Trek character or Republican?

Check it out:

Orange dipshit.

Uncannily similar orange dipshit who borrowed Biden's hair.

Someone find me a Democrat Star Trek doppleganger. I'll give you an internet pie. Or something.

Psycho-kinetic Ancient Space Greeks Are Assholes

Image via Wikipedia

Woo, Star Trek.

At the moment, the episode Plato's Stepchildren is on. For those who are not complete nerds, this episode is best known for being one of the first interracial kisses shown on national television in the United States. Shatner got to smooch Nichelle Nichols.

As it was 1968, NBC was worried that backwards idiots might get all butt-hurt about a white guy kissing a super hot black lady. I'm guessing jealousy was a big part of that. I mean, what good, racist asshole wouldn't want to kiss William Shatner? Wait, what?

As it turns out, it doesn't seem to have been a huge deal. Maybe klan meetings were on Star Trek nights? Or no one felt like driving to LA to burn crosses?

Aside from the stupid racism, there's a huge pile of other stupid there. There are far more disturbing things than a kiss in that episode.

Shatner pretending to be a very vocal pony while being ridden by the character Alexander ranks much, much higher in the "holy shit, I am actively uncomfortable watching this" category.

Also, very short tunics. On men. Not good.

Spock is forced to dance around Kirk's head and then be all emotional.

Also, the bitchy "Platonian" lady seems to be getting off on watching Kirk and Uhura being forced to make out.

And Majel Barrett's eye makeup is, um, yeah...

An entire society of ancient space Egyptians would have been waaaaaay cooler.

And the Children Shall Lead

Turns out the Plaquenil was doing more than giving me heartburn. I've been out for about a month and the past few weeks my various autoimmune related symptoms have gotten much, much worse. I've been running a fever for at least the past few days, hands have swollen up again, arthritis is worse, tingling/numbness in hands, and my mid-back is like crazy painful. And, really, I was still having wicked heartburn. Dammit. Anyway, I've resumed taking it, hopefully it will work again.

I have also found a wonderful general care clinic. Very happy about that.

Discomfort has been keeping me up late - arthritis or heartburn/acid reflux seem to be taking turns. Grumble.

Tonight I decided some knitting and Star Trek were in order. Tonight, I was particularly interested to notice something about the episode "And the Children Shall Lead." The scary-ass Gorgan dude looks remarkably like a certain former Speaker of the House. Coincidence?

One used mind-control techniques to take advantage of others and sap their strength through fear. The other one is a fictional character.

Ba-dum-tish

And here's some bonus scary:

Is that Anton Lavey?

See my confusion?

Image via Wikipedia
Chief Attention Whore

Chief Thrall
Gamesters of Triskelion

The Trouble with The Trouble with Tribbles

Image via Wikipedia

Folding laundry, packing, etc, and watching Star Trek. The Trouble with Tribbles at the moment.

You know the famous scene of Kirk in the pile of tribbles falling out of the overhead storage compartment?

How creepy is it to realize Kirk is essentially standing in a pile of recently deceased animals? Ewwwww!!!
Reasonably certain they deleted the "ewww! flail!!!" scene.

Spoiler Alert: (for those too lame to watch Star Trek)
At the end we find out Scotty has disposed of the overload of tribbles on the Enterprise by beaming them somewhere.

Kirk is all "holy shit, you didn't beam them into space, you monstrous Haggis-eater!" (I may be fuzzy on the exact dialogue. Oh, wow, that was a horrible pun.)

Scotty is all "dude, chill, what the hell, I'm not that demented! I sent them to the Klingon ship. Geez, are you PMSing or what this episode?"

And then everyone is all LULZ, Klingons and tribbles hate each other - EPIC TROLL IS EPIC!

Except how are the Klingons going to deal with the tribbles unless it's by killing them in some way? Or will this become some interstellar game of Pass the Tribbles?

It's Not the Flight Suit, Dude

Image via WikipediaPacking and watching Star Trek.  Tomorrow is Yesterday is on at the moment.  That's the one when they get flung back to the 1960s and beam an Air Force pilot aboard after the mess up his jet.

Anyway, Kirk shows the guy around and eventually says "that flight suit must be uncomfortable, why don't we get you a change of clothes..."

Pretty sure that was a come-on.

Awkward!

ZOMG They Have Tribbles Glued to Their Boobies

If you hadn't already guessed, I did some knitting and watching of Star Trek this evening when I wasn't being creeped out by IKEA catalogs.

The colors are even more garish in the remastered episode.  I think I may have gotten sympathetic hives. 

Shore Leave is another one of those "really, WTF?" episodes in terms of dialogue and interaction between members of the opposite sex.

Most painfully creepy moment:  McCoy telling the yeoman she should try on the princess dress because he'd like to see her in it.  While they're both on duty.  On a mission. 

Also, people must have really damn short attention spans in the 23rd Century.  Kirk sees a guy he was at Starfleet Academy with and just takes the time to get in a fistfight with him because, um, the other dude was Irish and kind of a dick.

Then he runs into an old girlfriend and is all googly eyed and mushy while at the same time he's loosing communications with the ship and the rest of the shore party. 

Sulu finds a handgun and is all "pow pow pow" (what the hell is the gun version of "pew pew pew"?)  Because that is ALWAYS what you want to do when you find a random weapon under a rock for no apparent reason. 

Large Quantities of Spray Texture

Today's blog title answers the question posed by the Star Trek episode What Are Little Girls Made Of?

While this episode is probably most notable for a screencap that appears after the break, it was also set in an underground cavern system on an extremely cold planet.

Apparently the set designer must have been heavily invested in the spray texture industry, given that every "natural" surface is coated in the stuff.  It's also used in other "ice planet" episodes, of which there seems to be quite a lot, now that I think about it.  They may also have been anticipating the Lisa Frank ¹ craze of later years as all the surfaces are also pink and purple.  Because, um, alien ice is purple?  Or is this supposed to be rock surface?  If it's ice, then WTF is up with this outfit?

I mean, she is an android, but still

Star Trek is back on Netflix streaming

Oh yeah, the epic red tights are epic.  Why the hell did anyone think men in the future would be all about some red tights?  Or was Bill Weiss foreseeing the rise of hipsters?

Wow, that is actually worse than the Shat in tights.  Impressive.



And I am so not getting any work done.

I figured my head couldn't hurt any more...

Mudd is apparently part evil, evil chipmunk.  Via Wikipedia

Some time ago I got Star Trek:  The Animated Series from Netflix.  The DVDs, because they are so not available on streaming.  Actually, I got the most recent disk in July.  I haven't finished watching it because, well, damn are they bad.
The animation is cut-rate cheese.  And the voice-acting, despite being from the original cast, is so clearly one-take only, has my check cleared yet, that it's painful to hear.  I have the novelizations of the episodes.  I really, really wish I had just stuck with those.  The stories are actually good (some of them), but oh man, the actual shows are super bad.
(Snarkier readers will probably say that the same is true of the original series, to which I give a hearty single-finger salute.)

Anyway, tonight we watched Mudd's Passion.  The premise is that they run into their old con-artist buddy, Harry Mudd.  This time he's selling "love potion."  Taking advantage of Nurse Chapel's huge crush on Spock, Harry tricks Chapel out of her phaser.  Chapel takes the love potion and goes to touch Spock, which leads to painful awkwardness as, apparently, it takes a few minutes for the potion to work so he's all "What the hell, human, why are you touching me?"  This snaps her back to her senses, she figures out the phaser is gone and goes to kick Harry's ass.
Hijinks ensue, Harry kidnaps Chapel, the love potion kicks in and Spock starts being all emo, plus a bunch of it gets spread through the ship's ventilation system, so the ship turns into a giant rave for a while.
There's also some weird Spock-Kirk hugging (the love potion creates "strong friendship" between men or women, because apparently the future is like Iran and has no gay people).

"Thanks, Jim, it's good to have a friend like you."
"Strange, that's how I feel about you, too. My dear friend Spock."

I wonder if this is to blame for Kirk-Spock slash fiction?

Anyway, there's a monster on the planet and stuff, but they manage to rescue Harry and Chapel and the love potion wears off.  Yay.



Awesome quotes:

I wish I was a three-eyed giant poop slug.  - Tom, when the episode's monster appears

Oh my god, that was horrible.  - Me, roughly every 2 minutes.

Spock, can't you take your hands off her? -Kirk

"Captain, Doctor... I... uh, wish to report a number of strange... emotions."

That is an outstandingly stupid idea.  - Spock, apparently echoing my thoughts about watching this show.   You can actually hear this quote here.

Steampunk Star Trek

I should be getting ready for work and/or folding laundry.

Original image from here.

Text is all mine, baby.

Speedos and Pageant Ribbons

I've branched out from only using Instant Play from Netflix (and thus having DVDs sitting around unwatched for weeks) and have actually been watching DVDs. Yesterday I got Star Trek: The Animated Series.
I read the novelization of the episodes years ago, but had never seen the actual show.
Oh, it's awesome.
All the cast except Walter Koenig (Chekov) play their roles.
The music sounds like it's from The Love Boat.
The animation is at times hilariously bad.
But it's Star Trek and I love it.

Today I watched the episode Yesteryear. It involves adult Spock going back in time to rescue himself as a child from being eaten by a green scaly mountain lion. This was always one of my favorite stories.
I was knitting (in the round with DPNs, no less) while this was on so didn't see all of it so much as listen and glance up every now and then.
One of the things I glanced up to see was this:

Why are male Vulcan children typically (?) dressed in Speedos and pageant ribbons? It's a freakin' desert planet. Wouldn't there be unfortunate burns and chafing? Also, that chubby one better watch his back before the other bullies turn on him.  And do I want to know what the girls wear?
I realize it was the 70s, but seriously - who decided on this outfit?  Was it a nod the tradition of dressing females on the show in as little as possible?  More shopping at Intergalactic Disco Pimps R Us? 
It really is a cool episode.  We get a bit of back story for Spock and his childhood, including seeing his pet sehlat. 
Still disturbed by the outfits.

Photo credit:  Shamelessly stolen from Star Trek:  The Animated Series website

Star Trek Beer Cozy = Awesome + Win

Mr. Spock Season One Beer Koozie
Originally uploaded by lizzylaws

Lizzylaws has created a fabulous beer (or other bottle) cozy based on the Star Trek uniforms from Season 1 of the original series.
I love the details - the rank stripe, the delta-shield insignia with the science device.
Super nifty.

Even better, she's offering it as a finished object in her Etsy shop, LizardKnits or for the knitting-abled, as a pattern for sale on Ravelry.

Given my fondness for Star Trek, knitting, and root beer and ginger beer, I am an enormous fan!
You can find out more at her blog, too!

My life of excitement

Just watched Star Trek:  The Motion Picture because I was feeling in the mood.  Unfortunately, I only have the films on VHS.  I haven't watched a VHS tape in years.  Based on the past few hours, then, I have the following observations:
- Holy crap that was some static-y sci-fi.  Must obtain DVDs
- I'm kind of amazed that our VHS player actually still works.  The remote doesn't (even with new batteries), but the player does.
- Do we ever find out why Kirk's hair changes from light brown/dark blonde and mostly straight to dark brown and wavy between the series and the films?  Do they work in an Interstellar Hair Club commercial in the background somewhere?  A freak shuttle accident?
- Could they not have gotten the Ilia-probe some freakin' pants?  Is having cold legs and potentially flashing your robotic girl parts part of "observing the normal functions" on the Enterprise?  (Actually, now that I think back on the women's uniforms from the original series, I think it may well be...)
- I think Doctor McCoy shops for his civilian clothing at Intergalactic Disco Pimps R Us.   He's sporting a pretty awesome gold medallion with his open-neck wing-collared jumpsuit thing along with the Unabomber beard.  Pretty awesome belt-buckle, too.
- The uniforms from this movie are awful.  Who the hell thought pants with boots built in and pastels were a good idea?  Also, spandex is not forgiving.

In other news, I got several inches knitted on the sweater I'm working on for an Xmas gift.  My nose is freezing for some reason.  And I'm now trying to come up with a potential product-line for an Etsy shop called "Intergalactic Disco Pimps R Us."

This Evening's Dinner

Star Trek Eggo Waffles.  Apparently there was a run on frozen waffles at the store and this was all Tom could find.  Weird, but not disgusting.
I got about 11 hours sleep today (starting at 6 am) and want more.  Crap.
Last night was spent attempting to cast on for some fingerless gloves.   I think I did it about 8 times trying to find the proper permutation of needle type (bamboo or metal), size, and number of stitches to cast on.  These are being knit flat and then seamed up the side because I don't have double points nor no I have multiple sets of circular needles in the same size or a super long cord for my interchangeable circs, so knitting in the round isn't really happening.
I watched the old 1940s adaptation of Pride and Prejudice with Greer Garson and Laurence Olivier and was deeply disappointed to see that they decided not to use period costumes.  Then I watched the 1990s adaptation of Little Women which inevitably makes me cry.

Holy Lasers, I'm a Nerd, Batman!

Just got back from dermatology appointment. Quick, non-eventful (in a good way) aside from some to-ing and fro-ing because the department is now split between floors for some dumb reason.

However - there was a scary part. I was totally in the neural neutralizer room from Dagger of the Mind.

There was one of these on the ceiling:

And the chair was kind of like this:

Except that it didn't have a screaming William Shatner in it. Or his hairpiece. Lame.

Okay, so it was actually the laser treatment room (or so they claim) and not a place where people's brains are erased and re-written in whatever manner some other lunatic thinks appropriate (that's across the quads at the University proper). Anyway, I think I just got stuck in there because it was convenient. No lasers for me.

On a side note, my sleep schedule re-setting plan was a big fat fail. I went to bed at 11. Couldn't sleep. At all. Finally got up and laid on the couch around 4:30 and read for a bit. Then fell asleep for maybe an hour. So, now I'm trying to stay awake all day. I apologize in advance for any increasingly incoherent posts that may result.

Also, my thumb hurts again. Stupid thumb.

Trek

Trek
Originally uploaded by downtownmonsters

These nifty little polymer clay Star Trek dudes are awesome. Gorn, Bones, Kirk, Spock, and Orion Slave Girl. Very fun. Downtownmonsters has them available for sale on etsy if you're interested.