The Captain And Lime

Goes to Star Trek.

WOW! this is probably old news to most of you, but if there are other fans of the one and only, i.e. the original Trek, out there who have avoided this movie, having grown exceeeeeedingly gunshy over the past million years of weak ripoffs…I can’t over-recommend this movie. It would be good with just the casting, which cast very believable “young” versions of all our beloved characters. Good with just the SFX, which were beautiful and make me regret not seeing it on the big screen. It would be good with just the caliber of acting of every single speaking part. Good with just the directing and cutting, which made for a slick, seamless, experience, with a superb balance of tension and comic relief, good with just the sound which for once kept the sound effects eerily proper for a space-based story (the only one to use it as effectively that I can think of was 2001) For the sound balance which, such a thought, kept the focus on the (gasp) DIALOG.

Of course, they could do that because they didn’t have a single syllable to disguise…

Because the real star of this movie is the writing. OMG. One of the best parts of any story about characters is the way they meet and how the relationships develop. One of the hardest things to do is a prequel to a well-established universe. They solved the prequel problem brilliantly and believably and just allowed us to sit back and revel in those magical “beginnings”  I don’t want to say too much, because I don’t want to ruin it for those who haven’t yet seen it, but bottom line, it was one of the best movie experiences I’ve ever had.

I wish I knew a bunch of people who haven’t seen it so I could watch it with them and share the joy all over again, sort of like we did with Star Wars.

Hmmm…I wonder if OSG has seen it…..

Yesterday, I could have sworn I’d be down for several more days, but I feel so good this AM that I’m going to have to consciously control my desire to get all those things done that have been pending for two weeks! YAYAYAY.

Once again, however, I must speak to the efficacy of preventative medicine. Poor Carolyn has been sick off and on since RadCon. I’ve been trying to get her to take the super-powered emergen-C immune supplement, but at the rate it hasn’t been disappearing, I’m pretty sure she wasn’t following my not-so-subtle suggestion. Between that and my at least twice daily saline rinse—more often if I ever felt the slightest accumulation of gunk in my sinuses—I’ve managed to stave off not just her RadCon bug, but the one we collected in San Francisco as well. I know I was exposed to both because I had many of the symptoms, but not the debilitating stuffiness that prevents sleep and inhibits the immune system from doing its thing.

This is the first time I’ve tried the Immune Defense version of emergen-C and I must say, I was impressed. Mostly, I think it’s got more zinc than the regular stuff, but there are a couple of other immunity buffers in there as well.

Anyway…I’m doing well, thank you all, and Carolyn is much better today (she finally started taking the emergen-C when we got home) so hopefully we’ll be ready to rock and roll and start up the pond this weekend. YAYAYAYAYAY!

Now…to update CyberSally….

Just a quick check-in before I head for bed.

Had a great trip only to come home sick. Grrrr…. I’ve managed to avoid the stuffy nose that plagued my sister-in-law and Carolyn, but I’ve been so sore I could hardly move, and today, the headache from hell. Ah, well. Soon.

The drive was spectacular. I’m hoping at least some of the pix came out. Going to check those tomorrow and hopefully have a bunch to put up.

And we got some GREAT rocks!!!!!

I had some real problems getting my email to work after I did the Win7 upgrade, and it quit altogether when I got home. I got it fixed at last, and spent today plowing through a backlog of almost 1000 emails, most of which were pure garbage…when I wasn’t huddled in bed. Sheesh.  Had serious chills all day. Bleh!

But I’m feeling better this evening.  Hopefully tomorrow will actually be productive.

Wow…what a concept….

Un-be-liev-a-ble. I hadn’t seen Virtue and Moir this season, and they were phenomenal. But then, pretty much everybody skated their best, which makes it the absolutely best kind of competition. Do I think they deserved to win? Yes. Do I think their routines will be the ones  remembered from this season…I’m not so sure. In Canada, certainly, but  I think Davis and White’s Indian routine and phantom routines are more memorable. Not to take away from V&M! They were breathtaking….but there’s something to be said for skating THE performance to a well-know and oft-used piece of music, or being The First to skate a completely different dance form.

But mostly, I love the comaraderie  that oozes between these two couples.

Whew…I’m glad I stayed up to watch it.  Yay V&M, yay D&W, and yay B&A, who completed a season of top-notch performances and deserve to retire to ice shows as the winners they are. And Yay pretty much everyone else. It was a great competition….except….

Frankly (she says, taking one of her patented extreme positions) I think the Russians deserved to have been disqualified for lifts that took blatant advantage of a hole in the rules…those lifts using her body ropes are more than obviously against the spirit of the lift rules. And then, there’s the award for bad taste…for all their costumes, (the mouth on the nude part of her costume that looks like…well, let’s be polite and say it looks like a pastie, just fries it) but esp the non-aboriginal dance in which the least of the insults to the people whose dance they were slaughtering was her red costume!

Please note, I said deserved, not should have been. Evidently, someone ruled the rope-usage legal earlier this season. (Don’t know…first I’ve seen of them and am too tired to go look it up on the internet.)  But to me, those ropes are obvious props and therefore illegal. But once they were allowed in one competition, I guess they had to be allowed in the next.  I do think the judges should have taken every opportunity to downgrade the GoE on every part of their performance that related to the ropes. And whatever part of the “folk dance” judging that pertained to authenticity should also have been downgraded. Big time. There aren’t a lot of examples of Aboriginal dance available, but from what I’ve seen, it does seem to use some specific kinds of moves and freeze positions, none of which were evident in this routine. It almost always tells a story or depicts nature, not an over-the-top flirtation that looks like something out of a bad prehistoric B-movie.  But…enough. Other than that, the skating, of every discipline, has been MAGNIFICENT!

Speaking of other disciplines…the skaters I’d least care to be at the moment is whatever hockey team is set to play Canada next. Those Canadian lads are going to be out for blood…

What a great Olympics…

Thinking to do myself a favor, I backed everything up, then did a complete Vista restore before running the Win7 upGrade. Not sure how much I gained except for what will ultimately be a cleaner Windows Explorer. In Vista, when setting up, I did a couple of restores, each of which gave me a whole new bunch of “Documents” folders, complete with an array of subfolders. It was a mess.

Tried to do my upgrade, and the compatibility check came up with four problems.

Remove the ATI Catalyst Install Manager and Control Center…ATI is my video card. Oh, joy. And the Manager showed in add/remove progs, but when I ran it, it didn’t give me the option of deleting the CC. Reinstalling everything got that settled.

Uninstall WindowBlinds6. Huh? it doesn’t show up anywhere. Even a search of the disk didn’t find it.

Update the drivers for Keyboard filter. Go to Device manager it said, and update the driver. Keyboard filter doesn’t show in device mngr and all my keyboard related drivers claimed they were Up To Date.

Oh, joy. On the line with one of HP’s non-English speaking tech people. She was a disaster. Had me load a million different drivers. I kept asking,  “but what about this WindowBlinds thing. No answer. How are these drivers, which have nothing to do with anything the update said was a problem going to help? Lots of babbling about what WindowBlinds was and how win7 doesn’t need it. I finally “screamed” to get me someone who could understand what I was typing. That there was this program which had come installed on the computer (I’d done enough research trying to find it to know it was part of the goofy Stardock stuff for fancy (systems-hungry) widgets) and didn’t show in the “add/remove” programs. Her response? Win7 doesn’t use add/remove programs.

But I’m trying to upgrade to Win7 and it won’t let me until I ditch this stupid program!

She never did get it. She kept insisting that I needed to shut down the computer and let all these drivers (which were the same drivers I already had installed) install, and all would be magically working.

I said “bye bye” and “thankyou” and “sorry I “yelled”" Rebooted and, surprise surprise…still had the same problem. I got online with HP again and said basically, aim me toward another driver and I will send this machine through the aether to bash you in the head. :D He reassured me I was in good hands. I said “get this verdamnt program off me machine.” He did a little research and just had me delete the Windowblinds folder (which finally showed up when I did a complete search of the c drive rather than the program files). I said “but what about the registry?” And he said, “try it.” I figured, what the heck, I could always just start all over, so I deleted it and came back up … and the compatibility check still gritched about the stupid keyboard filter driver, but it installed anyway, so I’m now the proud owner of a Win7 machine! YAYAYAYAYAYAY

So…tomorrow, I’m loading programs.

don’t ask about trying to set up our email accounts on Carolyn’s new machine and my “new” win7 machine.  ARGH!

Finally got Carolyn’s up, but mine’s still giving fits. I think I changed my password and didn’t write it down. Ahhhh, well. Lynn will help me tomorrow. Nice to know the person with the keys to the vault….

Is feedback on how to improve the book format conversions.

Every once in a while I hear from one of you who is having to do lots of work to get a file that will work on his/her reader. Remember, we have nothing but Calibre’s generic readers to test these files on. If it’s something we can do here as we’re doing our other conversions, and/or involves a different (free?) program, please, please, please let us know what you’re doing, how and why so we can offer files as “perfect” as possible.

Some of you have offered to do some of the conversions for us, which we really appreciate, but we’re trying to learn to do it ourselves so we can put together a “how-to” to offer to other authors.

Also…a note regarding my recent silly meltdowns…

Lest anyone assume it is the direct result of certain well-considered comments posted on this site, let me assure you, this is not the case. They added to it, sure, but I was already feeling a bit battered by feedback from elsewhere including some private emails, so please don’t fault any of our wonderful guests. We love you all and want you all to feel welcome, and, yes, able to voice opinions, just please…wait a bit for opinions on the website, unless it’s something that’s actually not working. This does not include having to look a bit for a link. They’re there. Think of it as a treasure hunt! :D

Divide it this way: Site gritches: go to Carolyn (and then we have to deal with her fixing them!!!???!!!!)

File formatting problems come to me.

From this point on, if we get an update on how to do a conversion that necessitates redoing a file, those files will be available to anyone who has purchased the file, but only on a request basis. We’ll post “updates available” on the CC site. You don’t need to prove purchase, just notify us from the same email used in your purchase. We have all those on file.

that should cover it! Hugs!

All that talk about books we grew up with over on Carolyn’s blog had me in my library pulling Norton books and I’ve been reading them at night. Just finished Shadow Hawk and am already 1/3 of the way through Star Rangers.

What a joy….Pure, simple story-telling about compelling characters and situations that celebrate the human spirit and achievements.

One thing that came up at a SteamPunk panel at RadCon is the sense readers are getting that “regular” SF is soooo pessimistic. Well, I don’t know who they’re reading, but I fear there might be a problem that a lot of “entry level” SF might well be. Where are the Nortons and Heinleins of this generation? Have I missed something?

I have no illusions that I could fill such shoes, but you know…a part of me really wants to try writing something…simpler. I’m not so sure about short fiction, but I’m beginning to  wonder if I have some YA in me.

Hmmmm….

I’ll keep you posted….

and read your responses to the “reviews on CC” page. Every day.

I get far too hung up on the handful of people who dwell on the “non-commercial” aspects of the site, when what we really wanted, as several of you pointed out in response to that post, was to make it “feel” like us rather than a dedicatedly commercial site. I thank those of you who noted that aspect of the site with all my heart.

As Carolyn says, if you can’t tell it’s from us, how do you know you aren’t buying it from Barnes and Noble. Or Amazon. Or some other cookie cutter site.

This doesn’t mean that we won’t be changing the site and especially improving the navigation as time goes on. For instance, I did get the “window” on the splash page linked to the site. I thought I’d done that, first thing, and only realized it wasn’t when I was showing my old buddy, Dean Wesley Smith, the site on his phone this weekend at RadCon. He tapped the window…and nothing happened. Ooops.  The individual buttons are pretty darned small on the phone!  So…that should help. A lot.

Now…I’m gonna go watch the Olympics.

Thanks again, everybody.

I for one, think you’ve discovered Bren’s secret.

So far, Coke is in the lead!