Holiday

Haircut: done
Breakfast: done
Errands: done

And it’s not even noon yet.  So what to do now?

Saturday

I spent a ridiculous amount of time today going though some stacks of old CDs that I had not transferred to my iPod/iPad.

I came across a lot of 90s music that I haven’t listened to since, well, the 90s, of bands that I have no interest in listening to now, nor can I recall any of their songs, like Everclear, Frente, Belly, Big Audio Dynamite, and others.

All this started because I discovered that I did not have the D2: The Mighty Ducks soundtrack in my library.

I ended up adding like 30+ CDs to the library, including some Disney CDs, some MTV Unplugged stuff, all three Austin Powers movies music, and some other movie stuff.

Also, John Williams Olympic music, and the national anthems of 16 countries.

I bought a lot of odd CDs over the years.

A while ago I added the sound effects from Star Trek The Original series.

And how did I also not have Paula Abdul’s “Forever Your Girl” in my library?

I must have started doing this at about 10 this morning, and 6 hours later I realized that I was hungry.

I ended up driving out to Five Guys for a burger and fries.

Currently I’m finishing up the day with the Warriors game, and learning how to play Dinosaur Island.

The 20s

I won’t embarrass her with pictures here, but today is my niece Regina’s 20th birthday.

Yikes.

The one memory I’ll share here is one day when she was maybe a year old, and my sister’s family had come by to visit.

I had set up the old Avalon Hill War at Sea game, and Regina sat on my lap as I played a turn.  The British and German navies were attacking each other, and as I rolled the dice, Regina would say, “uh oh” whenever I rolled a ‘5’ (ship damaged/crippled) and exclaimed “oh no!” whenever I rolled a ‘6’ (ship destroyed/sunk).

I hadn’t even explained the rules to her.

In 1999 (I think), my sister called me shortly after the beginning of the Daytona 500.

Maria: What did you teach her?
Me: What do you mean?
Maria: We were watching the start of the race, they waved the green flag, and Regina said, “Go!”
Me (laughing): I didn’t do it.

Regina has always been a smart kid.

Last one:

In 1999, I was babysitting at their place, and Regina was sleeping on the couch.  I left her alone until she woke up, sat up, and vomited all over her onesie.

Eeeek.

I quickly scooped her up and removed the puked-on garment, found another one, changed her diaper since she had also peed, and dressed her in the other onesie.

I then held onto her until she fell asleep again, and then her parents came home.

Happy Birthday, Regina!

The 50s

February 9, 1968: premiere date of the Star Trek episode ‘Return to Tomorrow’

Telepathic aliens take control of Kirk and Spock’s bodies with the intention to build new, mechanized bodies for themselves.

One of my favorite episodes, if only for this moment:

As cheesy as Shatner can get, this is my favorite of all of Kirk’s speeches, in all of Star Trek.

I love that they copied it in Free Enterprise.

It’s also cool to see Diana Muldaur in her first appearance on Star Trek:

 

And of course, smiling Spock:

I’ve found myself in this or a similar pose over the years.  Maybe influenced subconsciously by this episode?

The Falcon

I managed to find my copy of this book yesterday.

I searched for it mainly because of a two-page spread that was being shared around social media on Monday.

The configuration in the left column, center row looks like the ship we see in the Solo trailer.

In the book, the Falcon was named Stellar Envoy when it was seen in Revenge of the Sith.

It will be interesting to see how they go about explaining whether or not this is still true, and how the Falcon eventually looks the way that we’re all familiar with from the Original Trilogy.

Again, I may be a little excited about this upcoming movie.

Solo

June 1977: After I had seen Star Wars for the first time, and before I would ever know what kind of impact it would have on me, all I knew was that I wanted to be Han Solo.

About a year or so later, Star Wars books started to appear, and among them was Han Solo at Star’s End, the first of the original Han Solo Trilogy, by the late Brian Daley.

Since then, I had always imagined that they would make a movie about Han Solo and his early adventures.

Flash forward almost 40 years:

Anyone who says that no one wanted this movie made has never met me.  This, and the Jawas film/TV series, are two things that I’ve wanted from Star Wars since first seeing it when I was 10 years old.

I sound biased, but this could be the best Star Wars film since Rogue One.

You might say I’m more than a little excited about it.