Random thought: who cleans the Enterprise?

Or any vessel in Starfleet, really. You never see Riker, Spock, Janeway, or Dax break out the old Dirt Devil and can of Pledge and I can't imagine that the ships have some kind of housekeeping department (hmm, would those be red/gold shirts?). Starbases and space stations would, and maybe the Galaxy and Sovereign classes due to their size, but not the smaller Mirandas, Excelsiors, and such. A possibility that occurs to me is maybe they clean using the ship's transporters? Maybe the main computer is tasked with scanning the ship for dust and dirt with the internal sensors, then beams the stuff into space. A more likely possibility is that the air filtration system on Starfleet vessels are just so damn good, that nothing ever gets dusty. Man, I would kill for that, especially when it comes to allergies.

Heh, the mental image of Picard vacuuming is priceless, though.

For the Rogue Space fans

I think you might like these pictures I found.

Space Tea.

Space Suits and Combat

Borg.com.

Because if you’re going to have a blog called “Rayguns and Space Suits”, then you better post something about space suits! Anyway, the genesis for this nugget of a post came from random thought that crossed my mind the other day. I noticed that in a lot, if not most, military science fiction and space opera, you never see the crew of warships wearing space suits during combat situations. Star Trek (specifically during the Dominion War), Star Wars, Babylon 5, and Battlestar Galactica are all examples. It’s just odd that if you’re about to go into battle or if there is a potential for combat - such as patrolling a border shared with an adversarial state, an area rife with trouble, etc. - you would wear a suit to protect yourself from loss of atmosphere, life support, etc. David Weber’s Honorverse is a good example of what I mean. In the first book, On Basilisk Station, there’s a scene where Honor Harrington and her crew don suits prior to combat. Granted, a ship’s crew wouldn’t need to wear a suit if they’re part of a Home Fleet or just jaunting from port to port.

Oh look, a picture of the Doctor and his new companion

Nerdvana.

Nothing to say other than I like the way the Doctor dresses. It actually reminds of the First Doctor's style of dress for some reason.

Of escape pods and wargaming

Not the escape pod you're looking for (via Wookieepedia).

Recently* over at the excellent Super Galactic Dreadnought, Desert Scribe made a post about escape pods he made using swanky beads his wife gave to him. Even before I got a quarter of the way through the post, ideas were already flitting around my head, about prospective uses for escape pods in space-based wargaming. What if when ships are destroyed, their respective players have to roll to see whether or not any crew escaped. Maybe there could even be an option to have the crew abandon ship if the vessel is damaged badly enough. If the roll succeeds, the player then rolls to see how many pods make it on the board.

Then things get interesting. The pods are stationary and can be retrieved by either side. If the player rescues them, they gain points for each pod. Its the same if their opponent captures them. On the other hand, the enemy has the additional option of simply destroying the escape pods for points, although there should be some kind of roll involved to balance it out, otherwise, they’ll just blow the pods away every time. If a player does decide to snatch up the pods, the ship they send has its movement drop to the slowest speed, if not stopping altogether. If their ship has shields, they have to drop them and their field of fire is restricted due to escape pods floating around.

Another idea is that if you do rescue escape pods from one of your own ships, any crew lost on the rescuing ship can be replenished.

So, thoughts?

*Okay, so it’s been like two weeks since the post went up. I’m lazy, sue me.

In which this blog wins an award

Apparently so! CaptainSciFi of the eponymous blog has award me (and five others, but let's not quibble over mere facts) the Kreativ Blogger Award. Granted, I don't know why, but again, let's not quibble over facts and just run with it. Unfortunately, whoever created the Kreativ Blogger Award forgot to make a trophy to go along with it, so I'll just make one and mount up on the ole wall here.

*Takes out a marker and a scrap of paper, and scrawls Kreative Blogger Award Winner across it. Then takes a staple gun, presses paper against wall and staples it to the wall* Ah, excellent! Now, could someone please bring me a staple remover and if it's not too much of a bother, some gauze? I seem to have stapled myself to the wall here.

But in all seriousness, thanks to CaptainSciFi for the honor.

RIP Ray Bradbury, 1920-2012

Certainly a surprise, but not a terrible shock; the man was 91 years old after all. Doesn't make it any sadder, though and literature and humanity as a whole as lost a giant. There's not much I can say that others haven't already, but he definitely left a mark and Fahrenheit 451 will stand throughout time as a warning against censorship and the danger of simply not reading.

Farewell and godspeed, Mr. Bradbury.

The Ghost Brigades - A review

So, as I previously mentioned, I just finished The Ghost Brigades, the second book in the Old Man’s War series by John Scalzi. Here’s a one word review of the book: Awesome. And here’s a two word review: Frakking awesome. That not enough? Well, hit the jump for a longer one. Spoiler warning, though.

Just finished The Ghost Brigades, review coming soon

It was a good, though.

George Lucas retiring, Kathleen Kennedy taking over

Yup. George Lucas will remain CEO and co-hair of Lucasfilms., while Kennedy handles the day-to-day stuff. Maybe know we'll get some more Star Wars movies, like an adaption of the Thrawn Trilogy. I vote for Nathan Fillion as Han Solo.

We'd probably end up with Ryan Reynolds instead. Never mind.

But anyways, Lucas wants to go back to making "experimental" movies like he did before Star Wars, like THX 1138. Good luck to him on that and thanks for all the great movies.