Captain Huff

I think each time this poll comes up on the boards, I answer similarly, but this time I'll ponder a bit more.

For me "first watched = loved most" doesn't hold. I find that I adapt to the style of time with little regard. Instead, what I find most important are the depth of the characters. For this reason, I think I love all of the series, just in different ways.

I don't care that TOS was cheap and cheesy. I still found Kirk, Spock, and McCoy to evolve as the series progressed. It was only a three season run, so I don't expect the same amount of evolution as in a series that ran seven years. Even so, as I watch it again on DVD, the growth is there. The bonds of their friendships strenghten. We see the complexity of Spock's psyche. We see the warmth underneath Bones' cranky demeanor. We see the shallowness underneath Kirk's pompousness... (Do I know people in real life like this? You betcha! And I love them too). And so on.

I don't care that TNG needed to explore the boy-genious theme so often... Okay, yes I do, lol. But as they worked out the stiff kinks of the first season or two, and the characters started to emerge... Wow... what a powerhouse of depth. When Picard came back from the Borg... holy cow. Riker went from uptight dork to a man comfortable in his own skin. Worf... Data... Troy... I could go on and on.

VOY... Hey, I don't care about how many shuttles they lost, and since I love time travel, the sci-fi element was just fine by me. I think of all the series, this one had the biggest powerhouse of characters for me. I found them the most real. There were more shades of gray, more subtlties, more complexities. Ahhh....

DS9, I have not given a fair chance. There were too many main characters that irritated me too much to stomach it on a regular basis. (So many of the characters felt forced and contrived). But I fully intend to rewatch it and look for what is good rather than sucky. I will get back to you. :)

And ENT... I simply haven't seen beyond the first half a season. I know! Shame on me. Don't worry - DVD's are on my next holiday list.

0605.23: The landing party gets their bearings as the next moon-quake storm begins. The shuttle hatch is ripped off. As the storm abates a blood red dusk rolls in. The tar beasts come out, refreshed and hungry. Kresh and Precip leave to survey rock outcroppings for shelter. Three beasts drag off Kresh while Precip returns to the shuttle. Kresh kills two of the beasts while the third runs off. The rest of the landing party make it to the outcropping while Precip searches for Kresh. Meanwhile, the captain’s dinner date… goes well.

0605.16: The Copernicus is caught in cosmic instability above Dendros Prime and is sucked into the atmosphere. The planet is in a state of tectonic instability with moon quakes every few minutes. The most intelligent life are tar beasts in the plentiful tar pits. They are buffalo-like, twice the size, striped, horned, mean, carnivorous, swim in tar and run like the wind on land. Our shuttle skids to a rough landing and then starts to sink in a tar pit. Sarvek is unconscious and Root is bleeding from the head. The Nacelles are long gone. Root hardens the tar and stops their descent, albeit at a sixty degree angle nose down. The donuts are saved. Meanwhile unaware of any problems on the Hood, Huff has dinner with the beautiful Risan XO.

0605.09: Dendros Prime: Enroute to Tranquility II, we are ordered to do a quick survey of nearby planet system Dendros where deposits of Zionite are suspected. Kresh, Sarvek, Root, Turel, and Precip depart on the shuttle Copernicus. The team reads the highest concentration of Zionite from Dendros Prime, a class M planet in the system. They move in to investigate.

0605.02: Root confirms the Camria volcano alien device has been destroyed. Dr. Fektion informs Huff that Bethany may suffer some short term memory loss form the incident. Her heart has also been damaged and repaired, but will have lessened function during recovery. Her hair follicles have also been damaged and may need cosmetic restoration in the future. Huff sends updates to Starfleet and receives new orders to report to Tranquility II. Starfleet also recalls Ksanders and Rex with orders to take their shuttle back to the Hood. Kresh, Perfect, Rottingham, and Dynamite decide to pull a prank on Bethany and put her in Zareh’s bed… Meanwhile the cargobay package is delivered to huff’s room. As she opens it, she screams…

0604.25: Science determines that the volcano device is an augmentation of natural phenomenon. Engineering passes around Bethany’s leg to security with the hypothesis that the leg was rewired by Muerto to make an antenna, not sabotage. The leg is kept for evidence. With transporters back online, the remaining crew is beamed up and science activates volcano detonation device. Boom. Meanwhile a box in cargobay 1 is found addressed for delivery to Captain Huff.

0604.18: We determine that a weapon concealed in Bethany’s leg went off during transport, due to sabotage. Meanwhile, Science devises a way to activate the volcano to melt the device in it.

0604.11: Engineering gets through the alien transporter block, and after testing the transporters on some lab rats and Root’s plant specimens, we start to beam the remaining crew up. However, Bethany’s prosthetic leg causes transporter feedback and she is critically wounded AND transporters are damaged. Bethany is rushed to sickbay and Eng works on the transporters. Huff orders a method to be devised to blow up the volcano device once the transporters are fixed and the remaining crew is back. Bethany’s condition worsens and she begins to convulse.

0604.04: We convince the happy Root to beam up Sarvek, Huff, and OClaire WITH our tricorder un-happy device. We then beam up our engineers just in time before the planet device erects a forcefield that blocks transporters. The device also amplifies the happy field which taxes our tricorder. We hook the tric into the Hood systems and extend the field first to the whole ship and then into our deflector to reach the planet. We still don’t have transporters or most of our crew.

0603.28: Eng and Sci hook together an array of equipment, and after one blown-up tricorder, they successfully beam Root to the Hood! Meanwhile, Bethany is legless and out of the dampening field with Zareh where they delve into a deep psychological discussion of the meaning of Bethany’s lack of leg. Root is also again in the Happy field.

0603.21: The roaches brilliantly set up a field to block the alien mind-altering device with a tricorder, for a range of approximately one meter. With their headaches gone and adrenaline from the excitement, they carry the tricorder to the largest grouping of Hood senior officers and wait for it to work. When the group sobers up they extend the range of the device to ten meters and go off to find more tricorders and equipment so our engineers and scientists can make additional units and find a way to transport up to the empty Hood.

0603.14: The good mood continues, with the exception of anyone in close proximity to Bethany – their mood is slightly less good for the time they are near her. The sun sets and most are happy to dance around the fire. Meanwhile, the roaches continue to have constant headaches. They hypothesize a theory why they are the only ones who seem not to be affected by whatever is causing the madness. They piece together a broken tricorder and get some preliminary readings that seem to support their theory…

0603.07: We continue to gorge on donuts and soon discover that many of our spoken wishes appear in material form. The crew partakes in various recreational pursuits, many of which are on the beach. Bethany however, is still a bit irritated, and the cockroaches also seem unaffected by the “good mood” contentment of the rest of the crew. Meanwhile, the Hood is crew-less in orbit.

0602.28: The message translates, “Extreme Danger: Do Not Approach.” The crew’s mood continues to improve, but we order the landing party to return anyway. The shuttle can not approach, and we detect some kind of energy field emanating from the volcano. It scans our computer core. As the crew whips up donuts and coffee with Chef in the messhall, suddenly deck by deck the entire crew dematerializes and rematerializes on the planet surface. As the crew takes off to have fun, we are treated with a giant tray of donuts and a pot of coffee at the beam down point. Bethany is off picking daisies. Huff’s new hedgehog is eaten by a freed lab snake and dies happy. The landing party meets up with the rest of the crew and partakes of the donuts.

0602.21: The team fixes both the transmitter and a large computer unit, though they don’t know what the function of the large unit is. The two units are of different origin, and we recognize the communications device as a standard design. OClaire treats the coffee addicts, who start to feel better quickly. In fact, all the crew starts to feel a little better. While we are running the communications transmission through decrypters, the large unit erects a forcefield around itself and blows up the small communications unit. A translation starts to come through our decryptor…

0602.14: The shuttle modifications are finished and the team takes off for the volcano: Hans, random, roaches. On the bridge we watch the beautiful image via the shuttle cameras. The volcano is enormous and steep. The shuttle lands on the mountainside, and the team continues their journey to the crater on foot. The signals are just as broken up here as they were from orbit sensors, however. Meanwhile OClaire and Root are interrogated the Security on their coffee production.

0602.07: Modifications to the shuttle are underway for it to withstand the intense heat of the Kamria volcano. Random and Seiben are to pilot it. Meanwhile, Huff and the Chartreusians return to the Hood, and Bethany’s reign of terror continues as she orders Security to search for illegal coffee makers and food stashes.

0601.31: The Hood arrives at Kamria in the Mygteo Sector, and Bethany orders the modification of a shuttle for it to withstand the intense heat of the volcano where the Mygteo communications relay has detected transmissions.

0601.25: Admiral Bethany imposes diet restrictions and mandatory exercise programs for the entire crew. Restrictions include immediate removal of all coffee and donuts.

0601.17: Without wasting any time, Admiral Bethany ships Huff off to the Grimkazi mining complex to deliver a series of lectures on safety features for new minders and cadets. Grimkazi is a lovely frozen planet with three hours of pale light a day. For extra company, she sends the Chartreusian cockroaches along. Huff and Chartreusians depart in the shuttle Discovery while Bethany takes Huff’s seat on the bridge with Zareh by her side. They depart for the Mygteo Sector.

0601.10: The Happy Field: Shuttle Copernicus arrives with Zareh AND…someone else. Nak and Rex pack up and ship out.

0601.03: The team beams back up and Nak gives the incredulous report to Huff. Reports are prepared and Starfleet is notified. OClaire begins to examine any of the crew from the first landing party who may have consumed the people-cubes. Meanwhile, Huff reads new orders regarding Rex AND Nak…

::holds hands back from typing a revenge log::

You may all thank Sarvek... *this* week. :P

Happy Birthday, indeed. :)

::packs shoes::

rofl, I can only imagine how much the guy paid for his nerd prize that probably did little more than hang on display over his wide screen TV...

Okay, Chattaway arranged it for solo piano - you can get it from a bunch of online music distributers. Just put it in your search engine and have at it. Have fun. :)

Uh, I believe I jotted that melody down somewhere... I'd have to look and my studio is, frankly, a mess. It's for irish whistle in D (which is what his little "flute" actually was). I didn't bother with the piano episode because it (the arrangement) didn't interest me. It doesn't sound like I have what you're looking for. I'm assuming that web searching didn't turn anything up?

OMG, a Qob log! It's been so long it took me this long to even scroll past our boards, and I just about fell out of my chair! And not only a Qob log, but a good one!

I *guess* we'll have to put off the Alternate Universe Pink Qob plot for each week there's another log... :blink:

Fortunately for me, all the good stuff is done in the ebay auction I was sucking my credit card dry on... whew. (It was movie props from two of my favorite non-Trek movies - I'll tell you what I got around the pool). So... I'll book a flight as soon as I pay off enough to do so, lol. Dang. I hope they don't put any more cool stuff up. ::must not bid:: ::must not bid:: I need a better job. I did reserve a room. I hope there's a freezer on the grounds big enough for our special buckets... Mmm... lime.

Well, if she were male, we would have named her Mojito (We also thought Detonator or Diesel would be good...), but she is a girl and we settled on Candy. :blink: Thanks for the suggestions!

Okay, first an update:

1. The hedgehog is now topsoil on an alien world, thanks to one of our escaped lab snakes.

2. The ferrets will be arriving soon, their fate TBD. I was thinking of going with the hyper coffee theme suggested, either Frappaccino and Cappuccino, or Java and Buzz, or something along those lines. (Or Phaser and Burn, depending on how they work out, lol).

3. For the future chihuahua, either Salsa or Estrella, both totally cool names, but we have to get through the ferrets first and have some time there.

Now... out of a neat coincidence... A new member has been added to my RL family(!), and of course I need to name her now. :D (I like names that are real people names. So far I've thought of "Candy," but we need some more suggestions.) Take a look!

Chihuahua baby!

I don't understand. The hotel supplies innertubes... What else do I need? Oh, right, mojitos! But they make those there, you don't have to pack them.

(Yeah, yeah, I have an ample supply of SPF-Million so I can stay a pasty cyber nerd).

Probably won't be on until sometime Tuesday. See you then. :)

Here's my first submission.

 

Very slick layout. I like "Star Trek" nice and big as you have it, and the whole layout in general. Can you make the planets maybe shades of blue and/or darker so that they don't contrast with the words quite so much? And maybe the white in the letters have a light blue tint? (just imposing personal taste here, but would love to see it...)

AHHHH! Two is my limit! Ask anyone who's had the unfortunate experience of me "joining" their sim in the last few years... WHEN I show up, I stare at the screen eating a giant bowl of icecream, not even reading the screen. I'll put my spoon down long enough to make jokes in PM's and type *maybe* three lines to the screen in an hour, lol. I suck. You don't want me. *I* wouldn't want me.

Mirror Universe! Totally. Though... knowing myself, I fear where it would go..

YAY!!

::doing the happy "It's not dead yet!" dance::

"Felis Catus, is your taxonomic nomenclature..." (Both times it was used, first by Data, and then by Riker in a later episode reading Bevery's play).

"Ode to Spot"

Felis catus, is your taxonomic nomenclature,

An endothermic quadruped, carnivorous by nature.

Your visual, olfactory, and auditory senses

Contribute to your hunting skills and natural defenses.

I find myself intrigued by your sub-vocal oscillations,

A singular development of cat communications

That obviates your basic hedonistic predilection

For a rhythmic stroking of your fur to demonstrate affection.

A tail is quite essential for your acrobatic talents,

You would not be so agile if you lacked its counterbalance.

And when not being utilized to aid in locomotion

It often serves to illustrate the state of your emotion.

Oh Spot, the complex levels of behavior you display

Connotes a fairly well-developed cognitive array;

And though you are not sentient, Spot, and do not comprehend,

I nonetheless consider you a true and valued friend.

The Late Night hidden secret, known as the Qob sim, will start this week at

10 PM ET!

Tuesdays in the Ready Room

Oh yes, the Latin Quater has some of the most delicious food in Orlando... but this...

 

THIS is one of the BEST steaks I have ever had in my life. If you feel like shelling out the cash for it, it's worth it. I miss the days of my 50% discount at the Latin Quater, if not I'd have it alllll the time :lol:

Well. I'm sold. lol.

More later. :D

Thanks, John, good info.

Btw, here's the March menu at the Latin Quarter...

Appetizers

Shrimp Latin Quarter - Bacon wrapped jumbo shrimp stuffed with jalapeno jack cheese and served with guava mustard sauce. $8.99

Tres Amigos - A combination platter of bacon wrapped jumbo shrimp stuffed with jalapeno jack cheese, tostones topped with chicken enchilada and shredded beef empanadas makes this a crowd favorite. $12.99

Chicken Quesadilla - Grilled flour tortillas stuffed with chicken, Portobello mushrooms, jalapeno jack cheese, roasted peppers, black eyed peas, corn and ancho chilies. Served with Pico de Gallo , shredded lettuce and sour cream. $8.99

Crispy Taquitos de Pollo - Corn tortillas filled with chicken, onions, peppers, tomatoes and Monterey Jack cheese. Served over shredded lettuce Tomatillo salsa. $7.99

Entrees

Chilean Salmon Ensalada - Filet of Chilean salmon served over mixed greens, fresh avocado, sweet orange and mango dressing. $12.99

Marinated Roasted Pork Loin - Slow roasted and basted in our sour orange and cilantro mojo. Served with boniato mash and black beans. $15.99

Churrasco Shirt Steak - Grilled marinated shirt steak served with Chimichurri sauce over garbanzo frito and chorizo sausage. $18.99

The Cuban Sandwich - The classic favorite with bolo ham, roasted pork and Swiss cheese. Served with pickles, mustard, black beans and white rice. $9.99

Paella de Latin Quarter - Chorizo, scallops, shrimp, mussels, clams, squid, green peas and roasted red peppers, all slowly cooked with Spanish rice. $21.99

Guava BBQ Ribs - A full rack of ribs grilled and served with crispy French fries. $16.99

Caribbean Crusted Mahi Mahi - Freshly blackened with seared scallops, roasted red pepper sauce and served with yellow rice and sweet plantains. $18.99

Caribbean Jumbo Shrimp - Bacon wrapped whole jumbo shrimp stuffed with pepper-cilantro sauce and topped with guava mustard. $21.99

Fajitas Latin Quarter - Severed sizzling hot on cast iron skillet, complimented with yellow rice, black beans, cheese, sour cream, homemade Pico de Gallo and warm flour tortilla.

Grilled Chicken $14.99, Grilled Churrasco Steak $15.99, Caribbean Snapper $16.99 and Chicken & Churrasco Combo $15.99

Snapper Chorizo - Broiled Red Snapper topped with thinly sliced chorizo sausage, cilantro butter sauce with yellow rice. $18.99

Specialty Drinks

Margarita - A mouth watering blend of Sauza Commemorative Tequila with lemon/line juices and Triple Sec. Served on the rocks or frozen. $6.99 or Pitcher $25.99

Mojito - Features Bacardi rum with a refreshing mix of fresh squeezed lime, mint and sugar. Service on the rocks. $6.99 or Pitcher $25.99

Latingria - Our very own version of Sangria. A blend of red wine, fruit juices, Triple Sec, Brandy and Peach Schnapps. $5.99 or Pitcher $19.00

Pina Colada - Delightful blend of Bacardi Rum, pineapple and coconut juices. Served with whipped cream and pineapple. $6.99

Thanks Guys! You are all too kind!

 

Odd the Weather Freaks have the same Birthday! Lol!

 

-Precip

Not considering that the 4th of July with all its loud thunder fireworks was nine months earlier. ;)

Huff paced anxiously within the perimeter of the tricorder field. The scientists and engineers had successfully used their equipment to operate the Hood transporters remotely, and Root was safely in the Hood transporter room as evidence.

The next step would be for Root to beam a full team on board. Their objective would be to find a way to destroy or block the alien device in the volcano as quickly as possible. Once this was done, the entire crew would return to normal thinking patterns and the Hood could be happily on her way.

In the meantime, Huff prayed that their makeshift tricorder field-blocking device would continue to function. As annoying as it was to be confined to ten meters with headachy, over-stuffed, over-caffeinated officers in need of fresh uniforms, it was a relief to be out of “Happy Land” thinking. Though Huff couldn’t help to glance over at the Admiral, safely IN the happy-field…

Huff’s biggest concern was that this alien device was adaptive and sophisticated. If it were able to process their verbal wishes into material objects, could it not discern that they were now blocking it? If it became aware of being blocked, could it not then construct a device to compensate? After all, all they had were a few stinking little tricorders – It would not be hard to zap those… Then without the tricorders, they would be back in Happy Land and back to their original predicament. Only Root would be out of… would be out of…

Oh no! Huff froze in mid pace. Once he’d beamed onto the Hood, Root was back in the happy-field! The tricorder field-blocking device was left behind. Did he leave the remote transporter operator behind as well, or was it in his hands as he beamed up?? Huff whipped around to see…

Hm... I didn't look originally, but there does seem to be a little bit of Argentine tango in Orlando. Let me know if you're interested, and I'll pursue it more. My shoes will be with me regardless, so it's all good. ;)

(Johnny - the following places show up repeatedly on my searches - Do you know anything about them?)

Club Copacabana, 5454 International Drive

The Latin Quarter, 6000 Universal Blvd

The Zebra Room, 2609 Gowen St