sfmaster

I've been a SF Fan since I began with "Fireball XL5" back in 1963. Have filled my parent's house with books; worked at STAR TREK Conventions; argued late into the night with other fans at the hotel bar about various SF issues over the decades.

To be a SF Fan means (like Alice in Wonderland) you have to believe in six impossible things before breakfast.

Time Travel; Aliens; Telepathy; FTL Travel; and I'm just scratching the surface here (it's 6:45 AM EST so my brain isn't fully working yet).

After a friend of mine saw the 1984 Dune he asked me for the novel and couldn't get past the first fifty pages since it was totally unlike anything that he'd ever read before - I told him that I'd read it at age 15 along with Foundation.

What mundanes (non SF fans) don't understand if that SF is literature as metaphor - SF is commenting on humanity now - using the future as cover to make it's point.

And sometimes we can laugh with works like "The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy" (which is why I keep a towel in the back seat of my car at all times).

Another Margarita please, no salt.

With a Romulan Ale chaser.

This is, IMHO, the final example of the moral, ethical, and creative bankruptcy of both TV and the movies.

Now, back in the 80s, I was perfectly willing to go the theater and watch every STAR TREK movie, because it added something new to the franchise.

But that was before JJ Abrams & Alex Kurtzman got their hands on TREK and proceeded to destroy it.

I can only speculate on the magic movie audiences felt in the 30s, 40s, and 50s, during the golden age of Hollywood. I've seen films of rapt audiences sitting in silence, transfixed by what's on screen.

Today you have people talking to each other, on the phone, loudly eating, playing music - even getting into fights (I've seen all this and more).

You may as well stay home - it's a lot safer.

Another Margarita please, no salt.

With a Romulan Ale Chaser.

What I would really like to delete on my six year old Android Tracfone bought at Rite-Aid for $8 (I just replaced the battery for $13 - not welded in and something I did myself) is to delete Facebook - but it's part of the OS.

I can't write here what I think of Facebook and it's creator - I'd be banned for life.

Another Margarita please, no salt.

With a Romulan Ale chaser.

To be a lifelong SF Fan means I always ask questions.

Today, in between household chores and writing bad fiction that doesn't sell I made an interesting discovery:

There are NO alternate world SF novels where Caesar isn't assassinated.

I was shocked to say the least - none of my favorite SF writers who specialize in this - like Harry Turtledove have written about this obvious turning point in history.

Another Margarita please, no salt.

With a Romulan Ale chaser.