So, as I sit here, I am embarking on a week off from work. I love my job, but I also love being able to take time off from work as well. It’s always nice to get out and experience the world around you. Stop and smell the flowers once in a while. You could literally insert any nice saying here and it probably will apply to my thinking at this moment.
We will be in Atlanta next week for a few days mainly just shopping and being out and about. Hopefully the weather will cooperate and be nice.
I am also trying to recover from a nasty infection on my arm related to a fall I took at work a few days ago. It is very minor but a little challenging at the same time. I’ll be OK though and I am not limited by any means.
Oh, and in case you’re wondering, the Big Apple will see us again in September!
When this episode first aired, nobody had any idea that the Klingons would become such a formidable race in the Star Trek universe. I certainly don’t think Gene Coon (the writer of this episode) would have thought that either.
I have always wondered exactly what Coon was drawing on in current events to craft this story of Kirk and Spock trying to win over the pacifist Organians from the militaristic Klingons. Was he referring to the Vietnam war? Maybe the Cold War? It’s probably more an amalgamation of several conflicts. Suffice it to say that war in any form is certainly not desired, but it happens. Star Trek was sure at its preachiest in this episode, but that is definitely what the series has come to be known for over the years. (This will be even more evident in the next season during “A Private Little War.”)
The ending on the other hand, is 100% pure Trek. Just when you thought there was no turning back, these pacifists are much higher on the evolutionary scale than a mere mortal man. Their power effectively ended the war before it really began. Their influence even negotiated a peace treaty!
The 1967 audience would no doubt have thought that we would be seeing the Klingons again at some point in the future. I admire the acting of John Colicos as Kor, he made a very formidable, very scintillating enemy for Barona…. er, Captain Kirk.
Unfortunately, we have to go from a great tale such as this, to a tale that is so broken, so painful to watch, so…. you get the drift.
I think I should take some time here to explain something else that might be classified as “personal.”
I have been with Greg now for 12 years. They have been 12 wonderful years. I am so lucky to have someone who not only understands me, but actually likes to be around me. I never thought in my wildest dreams that I would ever find anyone who could do that. I am a terribly complex, challenging individual who is probably not the easiest person in the world to get along with at times.
I am loud, brash, outspoken. Greg is very reserved, very smart, doesn’t say a lot. So, why? Why are we so perfect for each other?
I thought about it, and I must admit I hadn’t thought about this at all really in all the time we have been together until just now. I just like being around Greg so much because he was the first person I ever met in person that spoke my language. He understood everything that I liked, he understood everything I desired to do. He was a missing piece in a vast puzzle that was my life in 2005. He really was the right person to come along at the right time and give me crucial inspiration to what I was doing.
Our courtship began in January, and we officially became a couple on March 26, 2005. It was in this very city of Knoxville, on a Friday afternoon jaunt down here after classes were done, that we fell in love for good. The days, weeks and years that followed have been so magical. So wondrous. We have done lots of things and gone many places and, yet, there is still so much more we would like to do.
We have had our ups and downs, but we have always been there for each other. I love him dearly, and as we approach 12 years as a couple and 2 years as a married couple, I look forward to the years ahead and couldn’t be happier.
Back before there were a gazillion TV channels, I’m sure you remember the scenario of sitting down to watch your favorite program and being greeted with an announcement like this:
You probably reacted with some form of sadness and despair: “Aww man, my show’s not on!? What am I going to watch now?” Then you start flipping channels to find out what you would watch. 50 years ago tonight, Star Trek was preempted for the second time in the first season, the program replacing it was highlights of the 1967 show of the Ringling Bros. & Barnum and Bailey Circus. As you have probably heard, that circus is shutting down this year after 146 years in operation. Here is an ad for the airing of that show on WNBC in New York:
The interesting thing is that, while the Thursday 8:30-9:30pm time period was preempted by WATE for the Rawhiderepeats, the powers that be decided not to do that and instead air this program! Guess they like lions and tigers and bears but not Vulcans! (Oh my!)
The 3/16/1967 TV Schedule
Now, I never really was a circus fan, so I probably would have flipped over to another network and watched something else.
In case you were curious what those programs were:
I can’t even begin to tell you how much I enjoy this episode. “The Devil in the Dark” has always been in my top 5 for the entire series. It possesses all of the elements that make a great episode.
I won’t go into plot details here because that would make this post longer than it should be.
What makes this episode stand out is the acting of Leonard Nimoy when he is mind-melding with the Horta. To give you a small taste, watch this clip:
“PAAAAINNNN!!!” is what I will always remember. As many fans know, William Shatner’s father died during the production of this episode, and it’s a long told anecdote of his that when he got back to the set and Nimoy did that bit for him, he said “Somebody get that Vulcan an Aspirin!” Who knows if that is true or not, but it’s hilarious camaraderie on the set.
The moral questions raised by this episode are great ones. When it is finally revealed that the miners have inadvertently been killing the Horta’s children, everyone takes the right course of realizing what had gone wrong and are truly sorry. I always appreciated how everyone, while feeling they had to kill the creature to get the mining facility back up and running, that when they find out you have the last of a kind creature instead… you take a different spin. The crew realizes that such creature had cause for what was going on.
Eventually, coexistence wins out. That allegory still could teach everyone in this modern world, 50 years later. A lot of people could learn from the other and coexist together. At the danger of sounding political, that lesson is still very, very relevant today.
All in all, this is a top tier story of any Star Trek series.
No show next week, as Star Trek was preempted for an NBC special, so we’ll see you back in two weeks for the introduction of some people you might recognize!
In light of my post telling my coming out story, I feel like I need to say a few positive things. I have been very fortunate since I started on my current journey into the world of broadcasting to have met some great individuals who have encouraged me at every step to live my dreams. You couldn’t ask for a greater experience than the one I’ve had. My days in college at East Tennessee State University are some fond memories that I have. I learned a lot, made a lot of mistakes and learned how to be a great person in life. Not only in my career, but with everything in life. Tom, Candy and Tammy were great teachers that really were a great influence on the strong professional I have become.
I have met great people outside of college as well. You could consider this the last part of My Coming Out Story that I didn’t really expand upon, but it fits in here. Three people in particular that I met in between my coming out and getting to where I wanted to be in life are very important in keeping my spirits up over the years.
Dan Darnell, you are a great person. He let me come to his house on several occasions, even one Thanksgiving that I couldn’t go home to be with my family. He would be my friend out in public when a lot of people wouldn’t have been. That meant a very lot to me, and it still does to this day. He has a heart of gold and I know that a lot of people like him for that.
Jon Hunter, you are a great guy as well. He would come and take me places back in those dark days of 2003-2004 when I didn’t really have a reliable car and was walking to work. He would hang out and not have a care in the world to be around a guy like me. We would always give each other crap on our birthdays because he, well, let’s say is a little more “wiser” than I am (if you get my drift.) Haha. One of these days Jon, you and your guy have to meet up with me and Greg and just catch up. It’s been way too long.
Chris Ventura, our friend from the left coast! He has known Greg longer than he’s known me, and it’s been almost a decade since we first met in person in sunny Los Angeles. His warm compassion over the years has been so nice. He’s a talented, ambitious guy who is just as much of a media geek as me and Greg are.
I also need to mention all of my online friends, too many to name in this one post. Except for Klauss, he gets his name mentioned just because.
Of course, there are also many other people with whom I have worked with or have known in various places over the years, it would be impossible to try and mention them all here. The post would literally go on for a day-and-a-half! If you’ve ever been nice to me, know that it mattered a lot!
I realize that in the last 12 years since Greg and I have been a couple, and almost two years of marriage, that it seems like a lot of time has passed, but those memories of yesteryear seem like they only happened yesterday. Has it really been that long? Geez.
There are many great years ahead, and many more great memories to be made. I am really looking foward to making them together.
If you’ve ever wanted to see an episode of Star Trek where Spock comes out of his shell a bit. You know, let the human half of him hang out…… that sounded gross, didn’t it….
Sorry.
Anyway, thanks to some spores on a planet where nobody is supposed to be alive, all of a sudden, Spock is bouncy and in love!
A truly great episode, “This Side of Paradise” is an examination of a world where the colonists should be dead, but thanks to the effect of some inconspicuous spores, they are alive!
I have always been truly fascinated by the character of Leila Kalomi (played so wonderfully by Jill Ireland.) I would love to have more on the backstory of when she was interacting with Spock before their meeting here. That would be an interesting love story to see unfold. As it turns out here, Spock just simply cannot love her because of the way he is.
I loved the scene in the final act where Spock beams Lelia up and she realizes that he is no longer under the influence of the spores. Just watch:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6gMVrQ4Zq3M
Both Leonard Nimoy and Jill Ireland are just so great in this scene. It is one of the best scenes in the entire first season, and the tracked music from “Shore Leave” really is well used here.
The one problem I have with the plot of this episode is how the spores just all of a sudden take over the whole crew of the Enterprise. I mean, couldn’t someone just stop it? Surely there are enough knowledgeable people on board to not let the situation get out of control. So much as to the whole crew beaming down to the planet against their will and putting Kirk in the highly dramatic situation of being marooned on his ship!
Don’t get me wrong, I like any excuse to see Shatner ham it up to the extreme as much as the next guy, but come on! The whole crew? I hear you out there again… “suspend your disbelief!!!”
But the solution is rather ingenious. Sonic vibrations to drive the effect of the spores out. Quite clever.
That’s it for this week… coming up next week, one of the top 10 episodes of the whole series!
You might want to sit down for this one. This is not the sappy tale you think it’s going to be. My life has been a complicated one, but one that I have never wrote out or told publicly. That changes now.
I struggled with my sexuality all through my childhood. I have always felt an attraction to other guys as far back as I can remember. It was just there. It didn’t happen overnight or anything, it was just… there. I didn’t understand it then because well, those things weren’t talked about in such a rural place like Southwest Virginia.
All throughout high school, the feelings were still there, but with no guidance, I never did anything about it. I didn’t have any kind of meaningful relationship. I couldn’t come out, not then. I was fortunate that it never became an issue that anyone would bully me over. I was made fun of a bit for other things, but not for being LGBTQ. It’s unfortunate that anyone should ever have to be bullied for anything at all, but we’ll come back to that.
EDIT: I just wanted to add here that I had some good friends and did have some really great times during my high school years, so it wasn’t all pain and suffering. I have many great memories from those days.
I didn’t start to figure things out until I was 19 going on 20.
Me at 20 Years Old (Dec. 1999)
I remember my first so-called “relationship.” (I put it in quotes for a reason.) The details of what it was aren’t important to this story, but suffice it to say that I still couldn’t tell everyone who I was, even then. I think I knew by that time that I was gay. At the same time, I knew 100% that I couldn’t tell anyone for fear of being a social outcast. In a small town of around 2,000 people, it would be like drinking poison in a way. I look back on that now and say, “What were you thinking!?”
I wonder if anyone I knew then would have cared if they had known. Some probably wouldn’t, some probably would. I’ll probably never know, nor does it matter at all.
The first person who I came out to was Brian, a great friend and co-worker at the time. He was very understanding and didn’t think any less of me. I distinctly remember him saying, “I don’t care.” That was a very encouraging thing to hear. Brian and me are still good friends to this day.
The first family member I came out to was my sister Naomi. It was 2002. I was taking to her on the phone while walking in a store. I felt this huge weight on my shoulders. I felt like I just had to tell someone, to just let someone else know who I was and hopefully that I wouldn’t have that gut wrenching feeling in my stomach anymore that I was contained in such a small space in my own existence. Naomi understood, she said “I still love you, everything will be OK.” That was a very big relief. I didn’t come out to anyone else in my family on my terms, they just kind of found out over the years. They still love me, even if they might not approve. I respect them no matter what, and I know, or at least hope, that they respect me.
Since that day, the issue hasn’t been a big one for me. I could be who I was. I met new friends, experienced new things. Even had a few bad relationships. The normal stuff any person might go through. Then the man who stole my heart walked into my life in 2005. And, well, if you know me, you know most of the rest of the story.
Until it came up one last time: 2008. My 10 year high school reunion. I went and caught up with some great people. Until one person started questioning me about being gay. He said that he couldn’t believe it, that he thought I had failed them. I just couldn’t believe it. I wasn’t scared, or afraid, or worried, no. I was just literally dumbfounded at such a statement. I just brushed it off and reaffirmed that I am who I am. I left it at that. Why should be sexual orientation be on full display in a place where it shouldn’t matter? Isn’t that the culture that we all would hope for, where we can be ourselves and coexist happily? I just went on about my business.
This year marks 20 years since I graduated high school, and I don’t really want to go back to another reunion. Not because of that encounter, but because I feel more disconnected from where I grew up than I did 10 years ago. I didn’t belong there. My ambitions were elsewhere.
So, that’s my story. An unusual one, but that’s what it was. You may ask yourself why my story needs to be told? Because it needs to be told. So many people struggle with coming out, with being who they are. I’m here to tell them “YOU matter.” Don’t be afraid, there are lots of kind, nice and warm people here to help you with who you are. That’s why I am telling my story. I’m proud of who I am, I’m proud of my strong relationship and I’m going to be proud of everyone. I love my life, I love this world, and I am not going to be silent. I am proud. 🙂
The saga of network television and the people that make the programming decisions can be a perilous one at times. Particularly when you decide to put a long running show out to pasture. “Gunsmoke” starring James Arness was a tried and true success on CBS, first on radio (from 1952-1961) and then on television starting in 1955. In those 12 seasons, the western enjoyed great success and was really popular among viewers. But then, the bean counters at CBS looked at the ratings, and made a rather surprising decision: to cancel the show! Look at this article from February 1967 in The New York Times.
You will note that “Gilligan’s Island” got renewed at this point. Here is where the story gets interesting. CBS reconsidered that move, and in March they reversed that decision. A network changing their minds was not very common. Once a decision was made, that was it. However, since the beginnign of TV that hasn’t been a concrete rule. In this article on TV Obscurities, several campaigns saved shows before, but they were few and far between. As a matter of fact, another one was going on at the exact same time. NBC was mulling over the fate of “Star Trek” as well, but thanks to viewers inundating the network with a deluge of fan mail, that show was renewed. Much the case here as well.
In addition to that, a Kansas broadcast owner, Thad Sandstrom, harnessed the energy of fan backlash in that state (which is where the mythical Dodge City of Gunsmoke is), that the House of Representatives even urged CBS to think again about what they did. Read all about this strange development in this March 20th, 1967 article in Broadcasting magazine.
But wait! It gets even better! Sherwood Schwartz, creator of “Gilligan’s Island”, has told a slightly different tale about how the “Gunsmoke” was renewed. The following clip is taken from the E! True Hollywood Story of “Gilligan’s Island,” produced in 2000.
I find it amazing that nobody working on the fall schedule had any idea what the President of the network they were working for actually in fact liked! That to me is NEED TO KNOW information! I definitely, wholeheartedly, 100% would not want to have been on the receiving end of what happened when he got back from his vacation.
To add one more piece of perspective on this, a few days later, Milburn Stone, who played Doc on “Gunsmoke,”talked about what it was like when the show wrapped filming of its 12th season. Then a very low key “wrap party” happened. I couldn’t imagine being in that precarious scenario of suddenly having to admit it was all over so suddenly.
In summary, it is so amazing to me that this situation even happened in the first place. It would have been just another footnote in history that “Gilligan’s Island” ended its run after three seasons, than to be renewed then be cancelled in spectacular fashion. At least that’s what I call it anyway.
I failed to mention one thing in last night’s Trek Review of “A Taste of Armageddon.” Kirk’s move to call for General Order 24 towards the end of the episode.
General Order 24: An order to destroy all life on an entire planet.
Now, was Kirk bluffing, was he making up regulations? Remember what he did in “The Corbomite Maneuver,” in his great bluff of Balok to not destroy the ship. I don’t think he was bluffing here. While Kirk doesn’t have to go through with it here, the notion of it does come up again in the Third Season episode “Whom Gods Destroy.” Captain Garth doesn’t go through with it then, either, but still… the notion of this order is frightening!
I don’t think Kirk ever wanted to go through with it, but given the situation of being held hostage by Anan Seven and the high council of Eminiar VII, he had no choice but to do his duty. If I were in the same scenario, I would probably be a bit hesitant to do it, but ultimately I would do it too.
Does that make me a bad person? Depends on your point of view, doesn’t it?
