Tuesday, June 10, 2014

Space, the Final Frontier

By: Julie L. Cleveland

I won’t confess to being a trekkie. I know trekkies, and I am not one of their kind, but I do have a certain affinity for the original Star Trek series. It may be a throw back from my youth, or it may be because when you grew up in the 50s and 60s, most of your formative years were spent being amazed by space. Let’s face it, we went to space, we went to the moon, we launched rockets and we were given our fair share of War of the Worlds type scenarios. With the space frontier came other unnerving events. We had a missile crisis, the threat – both real and imagined – of communism and upheaval and unrest within our own country.

Maybe these things were the catalyst for those who wanted to escape to write and produce classics like Star Trek. All I know is that for a few moments at the end of each school day, I would sit down and watch a re-run of Star Trek. The series was still on prime time, but we were being introduced to that wonderful word: syndication. It’s a word I like very much. I don’t think I paid a lot of attention to the actual show. It was more of a down time thing, and I only remember a few of the episodes. Like I said, I am not a real trekkie. None the less, Star Trek was an amusing past time, and I liked the characters well enough. While I didn’t always give a flying saucer if they were stranded on a hostile planet or not, to me, the series was interesting enough to make sure I watched it. My favorite was “The Trouble with Tribbles”. It was lighthearted and fun.

While recently roaming around Seattle, I stumbled upon the EMP museum that is just below the Space Needle. We had intended to go to the museum to see the Jimi Hendrix exhibit and take a walk around the top of the Space Needle. The Jimi Hendrix portion of the museum was very small, and it was a little bit of a let down, but the rest of the museum had some wonderful secrets to reveal. Imagine my surprise when I rounded the corner and walked right into the Icons of Science Fiction exhibit.

The Trouble with Tribbles

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"Just before they went into warp, I beamed the whole kit and kaboodle into their engine room, where they'll be no tribble at all." -- Scotty, explaining how he got rid of the tribbles (The Trouble With Tribbles)

Look at all these delightful little tribbles! That IS the Command chair from The Original Series!
I must apologize for the poor quality of the photos. I was doing a snapshot day, and I was only interested in capturing the images to share with family and friends and had no thought to publish these in any form.

Here She Is

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“Mr. Spock, sometimes I think if I hear that word ‘frequency’ once more, I’ll cry.” – Uhura

She was the hot chick of the Enterprise, and I have heard more than one adult male agree. It wasn't ALL about Ginger or Maryanne. This was Lt. Uhura, and she had no equal.

The Next Generation

I think somewhere along the line, when my son was younger, we might have watched The Next Generation together. I know the character’s names and such, but it was not something that I watched like I did The Original Series. I do know who Data and Wesley Crusher are. Even before The Big Bang Theory made them household words again.

Meet Mr. Data.
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“My hair does not require trimming, you lunkhead.” – Data

While I did spend a lot of time in the trekkie section of the exhibit, there were many other very cool parts of this exhibit. If you are wandering around in Seattle this summer, stop by the EMP museum and gawk at the tribbles.

Enjoy,

Julie and Blu
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