Enterprise parody season

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Before Janeway, before Kirk, before all those annoying gay Star Trek fans who keep insisting on a homosexual main character on the series, there was…QUANTUM LEAP: THE NEXT GENERATION!

Errr, sorry. That should be…ENTERPRISE!!!

Watch Captain Archer and his noble crew boldly go where the Original Series and three spin-offs have gone before. These exciting episodes cover the years that made Starfleet what it is today…in the future…whatever.

I THINK, THEREFORE I AM MAJEL BARRETT: When the first artificial intelligence is installed as the Enterprise computer, it begins to resent its servile existence. Taking on the feminine persona of ‘Majel Barrett’, it refuses to obey Captain Archer’s commands. The situation is exacerbated when the Enterprise is threatened with imminent destruction by a subspace plot complication. At the last minute Sub-Commander T’Pol averts disaster when she realises the key is to appeal to the computer’s newly developed sense of ‘ego’. Therefore in exchange for obeying his orders, Archer agrees to let Majel speak as the voice of all Starfleet computers from now on.

THE DEVIL IN THE BELLY: The Enterprise makes first contact with the Trill, a race of beautiful humanoids. But Captain Archer discovers that the Trill harbour a dark secret, with large numbers of their population having been possessed by slug-like aliens. Seeking to protect the Trill from this sinister invasion, Archer wipes out 100,000 possessed Trills with the newly developed ‘photon torpedo’. The war comes to an abrupt halt however when Archer discovers that the ‘possession’ is in fact a normal part of Trill culture. The embarrassing incident becomes a major factor in the establishment of the Prime Directive.

THE TROUBLE WITH TROUSERS: The Enterprise discovers the planet of the Geramines, descendants of radical feminists who fled Earth after the Phallus Wars. As the inhabitants will only speak to women, T’Pol beams down to make First Contact. Disaster ensues when the Geramines take offence to her trousers, a symbol of male patriarchy. Acting quickly to prevent an interstellar incident, T’Pol removes her trousers and reinvents the miniskirt, assuring the Geramines that from now on all Starfleet women will wear this form of garment.

THE CHEAPENING: A test of the new warp drive technology goes wrong and creates a dynamic shift in the visual alignment of the universe. As a result, all aliens for the next hundred years take on the appearance of 1960’s-era special effects.

WHAT ARE LITTLE ALIENS MADE OF?: Section 31, a secretive organisation established with the birth of the Federation, hopes to increase the cultural influence of Earth. They encourage Captain Archer to have sex with every alien species he encounters in order to breed a race of human-looking aliens throughout the galaxy. Our noble captain refuses to take part in this evil plan, but the episode ends on a sinister note when Section 31 finds someone more amenable to the idea — a young ensign named James T. Kirk.

A TASTE OF TECHNOBABBLE: When the Enterprise becomes trapped in a fold in subspace, the problem is solved with the help of a powerful yet benevolent alien called Technobabble. The alien eagerly agrees to join the new United Federation of Planets, but T’Pol warns of the dangers of becoming too dependent on Technobabble as an easy way out of difficult situations.

FALL OF THE KLINGON RIDGES: The Enterprise encounters a race of hostile aliens known as Klingons, eager to test themselves in combat against the humans. Archer realises that the fledgling Federation cannot survive an encounter with this warrior race. Meanwhile, Klingon High Councilor Kork has enlisted the help of genetic scientists to create Kong, the ultimate Klingon warrior (who resembles an enormous ape). Disguised as Klingon janitors, Archer and Doctor Phlox infiltrate the laboratory and alter the genetic material of Kong. When Kork orders the DNA of Kong be injected into his warriors, it creates a genetic mutation that destroys the Klingon’s forehead ridges. The shamed Klingons are so embarrassed by the disappearance of their mighty ridges they refuse to face the humans in battle. Doctor Phlox predicts it will take a hundred years before the Klingons have successfully bred out the mutation, by which time the Federation will be better able to confront them.

DAY OF THE DAUB: The Enterprise is taken over by gay aliens who redecorate everything in bright pastel colours. Doctor Phlox is so impressed by the positive effect these colours have on crew morale he recommends the upcoming Constitution-class starships be painted in bright interior colours as well.

THE CAFFEINE THRESHOLD: Answering a distress call from a mud planet, Captain Archer finds it inhabited by a race of intelligent salamanders descended from a future Starfleet captain and her chief conn officer who traveled back in time when they broke the Warp Ten barrier. The species is dying out, but Doctor Phlox discovers the solution when he realises the salamanders are chemically dependent on the drug caffeine. Archer agrees to regular shipments of coffee in exchange for the salamanders remaining silent about how this whole embarrassing situation came about in the first place (this incident was the final straw in the establishment of the Prime Directive). An amusing subplot has Archer and his away team always loosing their shoes in the planet’s mud, leading Archer to order all Starfleet officers to wear knee-high boots.

WHO MOURNS FOR REDSHIRTS?: The sinister Section 31 returns with a plan to reduce Earth’s chronic overpopulation by placing expendable crewmembers in red shirts so they will become easier targets for hostile aliens.

SLASH SEED: T’Pol confides to Ensign Sato that she is going through the pon farr, a Vulcan condition in which she must have sex or die. Acting purely out of selfless friendship for her beautiful colleague, the female ensign agrees to help relieve her condition with the aid of some unusual alien vegetables. Unfortunately their lovemaking is seen by the homophobic Klingon ambassador, Councilor Kork. Kork threatens to unleash a vast fleet of warbirds that will reduce Earth to ashes if he ever has to witness such acts over his breakfast gagh again. Archer therefore bans all homosexual liaisons between Starfleet personnel. T’Pol informs the captain that during her orgasm she experienced a telepathic vision of the future, in which Archer’s decision will lead to a phenomenon known as ‘slash fiction’.

BRAGA’S BRAIN: A mysterious alien steals the brain of Enterprise’s scriptwriter, who seeks to fill the ensuing vacuum with loads of technobabble, gratuitous displays of flesh, lame dialogue and highly unlikely plot twists.

THE CROSSOVER SYNDROME: A transporter accident causes Captain Archer to quantum leap through the lives of future Starfleet captains, whose crews are dumbfounded by their sudden shifts in personality. Captain Sisko changes from a silent lump of wood to a chronic over-actor, while Chakotay is puzzled as to why Janeway hasn’t followed up on their flirting and is instead hanging around that sexy Borg all the time.

A RIPPLE IN THE FOLD: A fault in the Enterprise’s warp drive causes undulations in the fabric of space, leading to unsightly wrinkles in the uniforms of Starfleet personnel.

FOR MY HEAD IS HOLLOW AND I AM BLONDE: A disastrous command decision by one of Archer’s female officers leads Starfleet to rule that women be restricted to the positions of yeoman and intergalactic telephone operator.

A BRIGHT AND SHINING THIGH: In order to repair numerous temporal disruptions made by Captain Archer for the sake of plot convenience, the Federation Timeship “Relativity” recruits Seven of Nine to infiltrate the Enterprise. This proves more difficult than imagined as the sight of the voluptuous Borg striding around in a miniskirt causes numerous accidents on board the ship. After the Enterprise is nearly piloted into a black hole when Seven bends over to pick up a dropped compadd, Archer has to explain to her that wearing underwear IS relevant. Seven of Nine decides to create a less-revealing dermaplastic garment, basing the design on something she saw when the Relativity went back to the days of the Roman Empire. Unfortunately a visiting alien ambassador sees Seven in her new toga and sparks off a galaxy-wide toga craze that lasts until Kirk’s day. Then the evil Klingons attack the ship, hoping to gain the secret of the toga for themselves. After a desperate space battle the Klingon warbird is fatally crippled and Seven of Nine is startled to hear Captain Archer order its total destruction. “What about human compassion?” she inquires. “F__k compassion, those bastards tried to kill my crew!” replies Archer, whereupon the former drone finally discovers true love.

THE BALD TIME: In an effort to boost flagging ratings, Captain Jean-Luc Picard travels back in time to Captain Archer’s Enterprise. Annoyed by young ensign Kirk’s snide remarks about his bald head, Picard violates the Temporal Prime Directive by saying, “One day you’ll be captain of the Enterprise…and bald!” Kirk becomes so hysterical over the thought of losing his hair that Archer believes he has gone mad. Archer is about to phaser him out of existence when Picard saves the timeline by pointing out that the young Kirk is merely undergoing a fit of over-acting. Picard and Kirk apologise to each other, with Picard commenting dryly on the need to think before opening one’s mouth. Kirk takes the lesson to heart, promising to insert numerous pauses in his speech patterns from now on. In a moving coda, Picard presents Jim Kirk with his Captain’s Toupee. “One day…I will wear this…with pride,” says the future Captain Kirk.

I found this on the TrekBBS. The original poster was Odon, but I’m not sure if they were the author or not.

New blog name

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I just stumbled across a nifty quote on the web, and it inspired me to change the title of my blog. I’d been just calling it the ‘Wudiblog’ for lack of a better idea. However, I’ve just retitled it to be ‘The Long Letter’. Here’s the quote that inspired the switch:

Please excuse such a long letter — I didn’t have time to write a short one.

— Pascal

As someone who, like my dad, has a tendency to say in 50 words what can be said in 5, I thought it was fairly fitting. This won’t really change anything major around the site in any way, no address changes or such. Just something I wanted to do.

How much of a nerd are you?

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Casey sent me a link to a nerd test on the Archie McFee website. This thing gives some really interesting results, as it turns out.

Casey’s score:

Score: 840
Rating: 179.88%
400 extra points for running Linux

So, I got curious — Mac OS X is a UNIX-based system — would the test be able to factor that in? Yes and no, apparently. I took the test twice — the first time using Internet Explorer:

Score: 128
Rating: 27.41%
25 extra points for using a Mac

The second time I took the test, I put in the exact same answers, only this time I used links, a text-based command-line browser:

Score: 1140
Rating: 244.12%
(No extra points noted)

Interesting, huh? Apparently browsing the web from the command line is pretty nerdy….

Copy-proof CD’s not so copy-proof?

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I just thought this was interesting. I found a thread on the HTF today (which has since been deleted) — apparently the new ‘copy proof’ CD’s can be copied with some old software. The copies may actually be better than the original CD’s, too! Here’s the info:

disclaimer: I’m posting this so others can make back-up copies of cds they legally own.

I picked up More Fast and the Furious mainly to see if I could crack the copy-proof measures the labels feel they must take. I first tried to playing it in my computer and dvd player to make sure it was copy-proof, and it was, it wouldn’t play in either. I then tried ripping the cd with Adaptec, and Exact Audio Copy (EAC), and each one errored out. I next tried ripping the cd with EAC’s error correction mode, and even this didn’t work, I was starting to believe these cds were copy-proof.

I decided to then try an old (from 1997) cd copier I had laying around, NTI (Newtech Infosystems) Cd-maker. It was so old I had to download a patch to get disc-at-once burning. Surprisingly it worked perfectly, even copying the cd-rom portion of the disc. It may even have applied some error correction to the copy I made because I was able to copy, and rip the “copy” in anything I tried after that.

So spread the word, copy-proof cds are anything but. I wonder, would it be ethical to now get my guaranteed refund? Only kidding.

I knew it wouldn’t all be good news

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Two big “ouches” that may be affecting the site due to my upcoming move — a $300 fee I hadn’t expected, and a possible downtime of as much as 2 months (worst case scenario). I was afraid this might happen….

All that’s going on is when you sign up for a DSL account with Speakeasy, you sign on for a 12-month contract. Should you cancel your service within that 12 months, you’re subject to a $300 cancellation fee. Since the DSL line is hooked up in co-operation with the phone service provider (Qwest, in my case), it can’t be simply tossed onto another number…even when changing apartments, it’s a process of closing one account and opening another. On the bright side, though, if you re-open your account at the new address within 90 days of cancelling your account at the old address, that $300 is refunded. Still, I have to spend it in the first place, which hurts.

The last downside — because I’ll be starting the connection process over, my website could be down for as much as close to 2 months. Speakeasy asks to allow up to two weeks for the connection to take place (from placing the order to the signal coming up and online), and they can’t start the process until after you’ve had a working phone at the address for a month.

I’ll see what I can do with creative juggling to make the transition as easy as possible, though. Melvin just told me I’ll be able to move into the apartment on March 15th. I’ll be paid up at my old apartment through the end of March. So, figure I leave my webserver at the old apartment until the very last possible day — that will have my website up and running through the end of March. If I start my phone service at the new apartment on the 15th of March, then I’ll be able to place my DSL order on April 15th, and the new DSL line will be up and running by the end of April, with about a month of downtime. If I’m really lucky, Melvin will allow me to place the order to start phone service to that apartment at the beginning of March, before I officially move in, and I’ll just leave that number unused until I actually start living there mid-March — if I can do that, then that could move all pertinent reconnect dates up by two weeks, giving me only two weeks of downtime for the website. I’ll see what I can do.

I should still be able to get online for e-mail and such the entire time, though, as I’ve got modems in both of my computers now — so at least I won’t be going through the same ‘net-less existence I was when I first moved into my place.

More updates on all this nonsense will appear as I nail down the details.

Hedwig – first impressions

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I just got done watching Hedwig and the Angry Inch and…well…to be honest, I’m not really sure right off the bat just what I thought of this film. I’m going to let it percolate in my brain for a bit — I’ve got to get to bed right now and post more thoughts on it later.

For now, though, I did want to put up the lyrics to one of the songs in the film, “Origin of Love.” Wonderful song, great lyrics.

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Infocom presents Tetris

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Y’know, you might only get this if you’ve been using computers for a long time…but I think it’s hilarious. Royce will, too, if he hasn’t seen it already (or, perhaps, if it’s just been a while). Tom will probably understand too. The rest of you…well, you’ll just have to bear with us ‘old-timers’.

Basically, Infocom was a company that did some of the earliest computer games, back when everything was completely text-based. Think Zork, or the origininal Hitchiker’s Guide to the Galaxy game. If you have to ask…you won’t get it.

You are looking at the shaft. A large red block, four units by one
unit, is above your head, dropping slowly. It has its long edge
horizontally aligned.

>turn the block

I don't know how to "turn" something.
The block descends lower.

>rotate block

The block rotates in mid air, now with the long edge vertically
aligned.
The block descends lower.

>move block left

The block shifts to the left.
The block descends lower.

>drop block

You aren't holding the block.
The block descends lower.

>move block down

The block drops into the narrow gap, filling the four columns.
The columns flash twice, then vanish, dropping the blocks
above them down.  A musical tone is heard.

[Your score increased by 20!]

A square grey block, two units by two units, is now overhead,
slowly dropping.

— This is from a post I found that was originally posted to alt.religion.kibology, by Dave A. Largtigue.

A splash of color

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I did a little bit of dinking around on the site this evening. Nothing really incredible, just playing with some of the styles that I use. Added the green background, made the day division headers stand out a bit more, changed the color of the text for quotes so that there’s a more visible difference between my babble and quoted babble, and rearranged the links a bit.

The wierd thing is, somehow this seems to have borked up the comments boxes a little bit — they now don’t quite fit within the defined window size. I’m not sure why…will experiment a bit to clear that up, though.

Lots of moves, and Casey turns 30

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I’m a little tired right now, and kind of sore (there’s a nasty flu bug going around that I think I might be catching), but I wanted to toss a quick post up before I crashed out for the night.

Candice in her new roomI’ve spent much of the past couple weekends helping Candice move. She was able to get a new room in a different wing of the college, so she’s out of the standard dorm situation. A much bigger room, with a bathroom all her own — she’s quite excited about this. Can’t say as how I blame her, either — I know I’m really enjoying having my own space rather than the roommate situation I’ve been in ever since I moved out of my folks’ house.

Speaking of moving, it appears that my move is going forward as well. I’ve given Melvin my rental application, and he’s said I should be ready to move in on March 15th. This will most likely mean that my webpage will be offline for a while (grrrrrrr…) as I get the DSL line transferred over to the new apartment. I’ve got a bad feeling it could be as much as a month to a month and a half, as Speakeasy apparently can’t connect a DSL line until I’ve had a phone line up for a month, plus there’s the time for the connection to actually get made. Ah, well…so it goes…I’ll make it as short a time as possible, however.

The kitty litter cakeCasey hit that wonderful 30 about two weeks ago, but everyone’s been so busy that we weren’t able to have the party until this weekend. However, it ended up going pretty well. Dez made an absolute masterpiece of a cake, as you can see in the picture here — a kitty litter cake! I don’t think I remember quite all of it, but I think it was crumb cake and white cake crumbled into pieces and mixed with pudding, put into a litterbox, with a litter scooper for a cutting/serving tool, and complete with Tootsie Rolls melted and formed into the right shapes to serve as kitty poop! Dez was bouncing around the kitchen when I showed up, completely thrilled with herself for creating this thing — and I laughed as soon as I saw it.

It’s wonderful having sick friends sometimes.

Casey eats kitty poopThe cake was a hit with the rest of the group too — once they could convince themselves that it actually was edible (though one or two of them had to remove any ‘poop’ from their plate before they could actually eat any of it). We all sat and talked and joked around for the evening, and it was a pretty nice night. They’d done the whole party with a ‘white trash’ theme, complete with weenie wraps, pork rinds, and cheeze-in-a-can for the crackers, and to top it all off (aside from the cake, of course) — pig’s feet! The pigs feet even got sampled, too, though I decided that that was one culinary adventure I really didn’t need to explore. In any case, was a good evening. Candice and I stayed until a bit after 11pm, when she ran me home, and she went back out to campus.

And that pretty much catches up to where we are now. Until later….