Questioning Star Trek.

I watched Star Trek: Nemesis tonight. (Note that I am catching up. This film was made only fourteen years ago.) It raised a few questions.

The first is the one that’s been asked many times: Why do the Romulans, who live in a far galaxy many light years away, speak English with an American accent? ‘Ah,’ you might say, ‘they don’t. You have to suspend disbelief and accept that it’s only presented that way so as to avoid having to invent a different language and use subtitles.’ ‘Oh right,’ I would respond, ‘but there’s a scene in which a Romulan commander is talking to Jean-Luc through his big TV screen, and she’s definitely lip synching with an American accent.’

Second question: Why does the Romulan rebel, Shinzon, speak with a British accent? ‘That’s simple,’ you would reply. ‘It’s because he’s a clone of Jean-Luc Picard. Jean-Luc speaks with a British accent, so his clone would speak the same way.’ No, he wouldn’t. If he’s been brought up in Romulan culture he would speak with a proper American accent like all the other Romulans.

Third question: Why does Jean-Luc speak with a British accent anyway? His name is definitely French, and I seem to recall there being a ST film in which he goes back to his family’s vineyards in France. So why doesn’t he speak with a French accent? Better still, why didn’t they just cast Gerard Depardieu in the role, so when Geordie says ‘All the shields are down Captain, we have no photon torpedoes left, there are seventeen Romulan warbirds closing in for the kill, and we’ve run out of cornflakes. What do we do?’, Jean-Luc could just do a massive Gallic shrug and everything would make sense.

And hasn’t anybody noticed the obvious reference to Arthurian legend in the relationship between Jean-Luc and Shinzon? It was obvious enough when the father/son-style hostility first appeared, and was later confirmed when Jean-Luc despatched his young clone by shoving a big pointed stick through his chest. It was lifted directly from the scene in Excalibur in which King Arthur dispatches Mordred in exactly the same way.

But now I’m becoming serious. Time to stop.

Savouring an Historic First.

I saw in today’s Times newspaper that Donald Trump is now leading the opinion polls, and it occurred to me that this is probably the first time in history that Europeans have been genuinely interested in the US Presidential Election. The majority of us don’t usually give a damn, but this time it’s different.

The appearance of Hillary Clinton in the contest is no surprise, even if she is crooked as many claim. Crooked politicians are ten a penny in both the free world and the not-so-free world. The main difference is that free world politicians tend to be more circumspect about admitting their propensity for cheating and lying because they have a greater need to protect their public image. So a crooked Hillary Clinton (if such she be, and I make no such claim) would be just your average candidate for the job.

But Trump? Not only is he outside the box, nobody even knows which box or bunch of boxes he does inhabit. He sells himself like a used car salesman – cheaply, bawdily, and with all the shifty qualities of a callous chameleon.

That’s why we’re increasingly fascinated by the prospect of the seemingly impossible coming to pass if Americans actually go so far as to elect him to the White House. And if that does happen, we’ll be even more fascinated to find out what happens next. And especially we’ll be watching with keen interest to see how the rest of the free world leaders approach the unpleasant prospect of having to sit in meetings with him, attend banquets with him, and even shake his hand. I should imagine, for example, that Queen Elizabeth is not at all amused.

That’s why the current election is such an historical ground breaker. It’s simply unbelievable.

Priviliged Information.

Sometimes I get bored during the long hours between washing the dinner dishes and going for a shower at around midnight, and then I have to find something interesting to do. One of tonight’s options was to Google Cities north of the Arctic Circle, and you know what I found out?

The Arctic Circle isn’t fixed. It varies, apparently, on a 40,000 year cycle, and at the moment it’s moving north at the rate of 49ft per year. So imagine if you lived in a house with walls less than 49ft long and whose southern extremity was sitting precisely on the Arctic Circle. Next year you could have postcards printed with a picture of palm trees on the front and a message on the reverse which says:

We don’t live in the Arctic any more, so now you can come visit us.

And you could send them to all your friends who live in more hospitable latitudes, and they would reply:

‘Did you move?’

And you could reply back:

‘No, the Arctic did.’

And then they’d all think you’d been touched by the midnight sun and would be sure to keep their distance. But you’d know different and could scoff at their ignorance, as do I.

Oh, and the biggest city north of the Arctic Circle is Murmansk (which is in Russia, in case you didn’t know.) I suppose it’s a distinction of sorts, but I should think the people who live there must get a bit grouchy in December.

Being Oddly Trivial.

My new friend Chloe (the vegetarian who works in Sainsbury’s) greeted me cordially today while I was hovering confusedly around the vegetable display.

‘What are you looking for?’ she asked.

‘An alternative to carrots. I’m fed up with carrots.’

‘Have you tried these?’ she enthused, pointing to the bags of ridiculously expensive purple carrots.’

(Purple carrots?!)

‘Do they taste better than ordinary carrots?’ I continued. ‘Only the problem with supermarket carrots is that they don’t taste of anything.’

‘No, not really. But they look cool.’

‘Well, I’m not spending a pound on a small bag of carrots that don’t taste of anything just because they look cool.’

She left and I resumed my search. I saw her again later, and she asked:

‘So what did you get in the end?’

‘One of those white things.’

‘White things?’

‘You know, those things that are bit like turnips only different.’

‘Can’t think what you mean.’

I rummaged through my shopping trolley and produced the article.

‘Parsnips?’ she queried.

‘That’s it: parsnips.’

I wonder whether she’ll greet me cordially next week. The fact is that when you’re both reclusive and a bit off the wall, you get drawn into conversations that are at once mind-bogglingly trivial and yet oddly surreal. And as such shall I be known, I suppose.

Asian Encounters and Heroic Diplomacy.

I stood in a queue today next to a woman who looked vaguely North or East Asian. She was wearing a splendidly colourful woolly hat with dangly bits at the sides.

‘I like your hat,’ I said.

‘Thank you,’ she replied, smiling sweetly.

‘Where did you get it?’

‘I made it. That’s what I do; I make hats.’

My next question should have been ‘And where do you sell them?’, but instead I was gripped by the strongest urge to ask ‘Are you from Tibet?’ I didn’t, of course, because I’ve learned to be diplomatic when talking to women wearing strange hats.

*  *  *

And on that Chinese note (by obvious extension) I finally came face to face with the Lady Coco in her money changing establishment today. I noticed that she was wearing a dress ring on the third finger of her left hand.

‘Are you engaged,’ I asked.

‘Yes. I’m getting married in May.’

I sobbed inwardly, of course, having held the remote – and one might say ‘inconceivable’ – notion that the Lady Coco might be my passport to a closer understanding of traditional Chinese culture. ’Tis evidently not to be, but I was a brave boy.

‘That’s nice,’ I muttered with conviction, and continued to pay the £5 cheque into my Building Society account. Am I a hero, or what?

The Tabloid Subtext.

The front page of today’s Daily Mail was given over to the case of a Polish lorry driver who has been convicted of causing death by dangerous driving while using a mobile phone. It went on to say that seventeen other foreigners had been similarly convicted, and ended with: ‘The law must be strengthened!’

I agree; the law should be strengthened because using hand held mobiles while driving is dangerous and responsible for a lot of serious accidents. What concerns me is the fact that the Mail made no mention whatsoever of the disturbingly high incidence of drivers using hand held mobiles in the country generally. I see it nearly every time I go near a road because it’s very common.  Only the eighteen foreigners got mentioned, and so the subtext is obvious:

Foreigners are dangerous people who show no respect for British law and civilised values. Keep them out!

And the Bozos of Britain continue to buy it – both the principle and the so-called newspaper.

Post Mortem Mischief.

This is the ghost I intend to be when the final curtain inevitably falls.

I will be forever the kind, gentle and helpful friend to every child, but to others…

The others...

I will haunt the lanes and byways of the Shire, being glimpsed first here and then there, but only briefly. My tread shall be light, but not so light that the lone walker will fail to hear the footstep as close behind it falls. The dogs and horses will know me, of course, and they will not be afraid.

I will sing sad songs beneath the windows of the sleeping in the early hours of cold winter mornings.

I will cast the shadow of my unseen form across their eyes on bright summer afternoons.

I will caress the napes of their necks with the chill breath of my spectral presence.

I will show brief flashes of my red habit through the half open doors of those who are home alone.

I will howl in their chimneys when the wind is still, and chuckle in the corner when their lights are low.

I will take their hand gently as they drift into sleep at night, and clatter noisily down the stairs upon their waking in the morning.

I will sit unseen at their breakfast tables, curdling their eggs and crushing their cornflakes and leaving three drops of milk on the surface. Always three…

And none shall escape my attention, save those who live by Shakespeare’s dictum:

Is she kind as she is fair? For beauty lives with kindness.

*  *  *

Well now, that passed an amusing half hour. And I wasn’t entirely joking.

The Fierce Fish Phenomenon.

I’ve noticed that all fierce fish, like the shark, the pike and the Moray Eel, look fierce no matter what they’re doing.

Do Not Stroke!

Fierce animals, on the other hand, generally don’t, except when they’re explicitly engaged in an act of fierceness for some justifiable reason. Lions, for example, look quite noble when they have no reason to look fierce.

  

And hippopotamuses – said to be responsible for more human fatalities in Africa than any other animal – just look grumpy.

 

I wonder why that is. Maybe it’s because fish don’t drown in water. You must admit, that’s pretty weird.

Belated Understanding.

I’ve been listening to the rock group 10cc for a long time (ever since my then wife threatened me with detention if I didn’t.) I was listening to an album of theirs in the car yesterday, and it was only then that I realised how clever a couple of the lines in Life is a Minestrone are:

The seat of learning and the flush of success

Relieve a constipated mind

Lyrics often skip over your head, don’t they? You hear them but you don’t listen to them. That’s why it came as a pleasant surprise to suddenly notice the metaphor attached to a couple of stock phrases. That’s clever writers’ stuff, that is. Lavatorial maybe, but clever.

Questioning Halloween.

There’s something I don’t understand about Halloween. I understand why we should choose to celebrate a particular festival on a given day because that’s what humans do, but what about its reputation?

Halloween is traditionally said to be the night on which the veil between this world and others is at its thinnest. It’s the night when ghosts gather, witches fly with gay abandon, and demons do their damndest to distress us. So why October 31^st?

If there really is a night when creepy things climb through the flimsy gauze of reality between this world and the nether regions, wouldn’t it be more likely to be on the night of some natural or cosmic event like a solstice or an equinox? Why the last night of October, since the calendar months are nothing more than a convenient human artifice?

It’s an important question, but not half as important as whether putting a glass of scotch and a piece of fruit cake out for the little people at Halloween is a wicked waste of good cake and whisky.