dimland radio 3-13-10 show notes

Hey, kids! Well, the first show of Dimland Radio is in the can. It was a long time coming and I’m relieved that I got the show started and I didn’t screw up. Not too much anyway. Thanks to everyone who stopped by to listen, I really appreciate it.

I think I’ve finally recovered from the cotton mouth I was suffering through the show.

Here are some links to find more information on the topics I touched on…

Scooby Doo, Where Are You?

http://www.skeptic.com/junior_skeptic/issue34/

Strangely Enough!
Here’s a link to another blogger giving his thoughts on this entertaining book…

http://secretmountainlaboratory.blogspot.com/2008/01/strangely-enoughmetaweirdness.html

This link is to Brian Dunning’s skeptical take on the ‘Footprints in the Snow’ story I read on the show…

http://skeptoid.com/episodes/4031

(For my take you can scroll down to the previous post, just below this one.)

These next links are to Amazon.com, just in case you might want to buy your own copy. Highly recommended…

Music heard on the show…

Dimland Radio opening theme song: ‘Ahead’ by Wire
First ad break bumpers: ‘We’re So Cool’ by Au Pairs & ‘Driving The Dynamite Truck’ By Breaking Circus
Second ad break bumpers: ‘Generation’ by Red Lorry Yellow Lorry & ‘You Better You Bet’ by The Who
Closing song: ‘Angler’s Treble Hook’ by $5 Fiddle

With the exception of that last song, all music is available on iTunes. Regular listeners to my show can, if they really want to, although why I don’t know, get the $5 Fiddle track by contacting me through the chatroom.

I have a couple corrections to make…

1) When I talked about the original Jonny Quest series, I said that Dr. Benton Quest had a Van Dyke or a goatee. Actually, Dr. Quest had a full beard and mustache.

2) When I was going on about how great my musical taste is, I referred to Z Talk Rocks as Z Talk Radio. Whoops. I also didn’t complete my thought on Z Talk Rocks. I was going to say that I would have liked to been able to go over to Z Talk Rocks and play the full versions of my bumper music. Unfortunately, Z Talk Rocks is gone and I won’t have that opportunity. I meant to say that, but I didn’t. Sorry.

That’s it for this week’s show notes. Be sure to join me next Saturday night 11 central, midnight eastern for Dimland Radio on the Z Talk Radio Network. http://www.ztalkradio.com

Thank you and have a happy pi day!

strangely enough!

When I was much, much younger I was really interested in (and terrified by) the unexplained mysteries of ghosties, critters, strange visitors, and things that went bump in the night. I suppose this is a common trait of youth. After all, to paraphrase Winston Churchill, if you don’t believe in such things when you’re young, you may not have a heart; and if you don’t cast those things away when you’re older, you may not have a brain. Or, at the very least, you haven’t been taught to think critically.
Well, I was young and I did have a heart. And my favorite book in those days was ‘Strangely Enough!’ It’s an eerie, fascinating, fun collection of short stories of unusual events. Ghosts, UFOs, premonitions, disappearances, buried treasures, weird things falling from the clear blue sky. “Over 80 hair-raising tales to fascinate and intrigue you,” according to its back cover. And that’s only the abridged version!

C. B. Colby, the book’s author, suggested that these stories might all be true. “Fact or fiction? Real or imagined?” are the questions posed on its cover. Of course, I believed them all to be real back then. Many of stories included dates or names of people and places, so how could they not be true? In fact, in my youthful assuredness, I even went as far as to draw arrows on the cover; one pointing to “fact”, another to “real.”
My copy has seen a lot of use over the years. The well-thumbed pages have yellowed, the cover is tattered, half the back cover is gone (don’t worry I still have the detached half, I use it as a book mark), and its spine is quite taped up. I read this book, acquired through the Scholastic book program for a mere 35 cents, again and again and again. One time, when my fifth grade teacher had to leave the classroom for a few minutes, my classmates had me read a few stories from this endlessly intriguing book.

As you can probably tell, I loved this book. I still do. The stories are short and well written. They’re told in a gather-around-the-campfire-children-and-get-creeped-out style. They are quite suitable for campfire storytelling.

The cover of the edition I have is fantastic! Just look at that green hazy night, the nearly black and dormant trees, and that figure racing through the night. Is it a witch? A devil? A lunatic? A frightened villager? And is that ball lightening in the sky? Or, maybe, a flying saucer? I think the cover is a terrific illustration, perfectly suited for the book.

I also learned something important from this book, or, rather, one of my teacher’s reactions to it. Something that I realize now was a seed planted in my mind that would put me on the path toward skepticism.

I think it was during the seventh grade, when I brought the book to school to show to my English teacher, Mr. Raymond. Mr. Raymond encouraged his students to read and would set aside class time for us to read books we’d brought from home. (Anyway, that’s how I remember it.) I was so enthusiastic about ‘Strangely Enough!’ and I had such respect for my teacher that I wanted to get Mr. Raymond’s opinion of it.

I don’t recall how long he held onto the book. It might have been a day or maybe just through that class, but when he returned it to me he gave his opinion. He thought it was interesting, but very probably most of the stories weren’t really true. He told me that the fact or fiction question was most likely a gimmick to make the stories seem more compelling. He also said that, despite the names and dates giving it an air of authenticity, most readers wouldn’t bother verifying the alleged facts.

I’m sure I was a little disappointed by his lesson. However, I know that, in his way, without being too blunt, Mr. Raymond was telling me to think more critically. To be skeptical. It’s interesting how that brief conversation could have such an impact on me later in life. I know now that it’s most likely that the majority of these stories are urban legends, apocryphal morality tales meant to frighten and teach. But, I didn’t know about urban legends when I was a kid.

Imagine my surprise when years later, but still some time ago, I bought a Reader’s Digest publication titled, ‘Mysteries of the Unexplained’. I was still a believer in odd things then and I was stunned to find a story in that book that was of the same event written about in ‘Strangely Enough!’
The story was about footprints in the snow appearing overnight and stretching for 100s of miles. This was one of my favorite stories from ‘Strangely Enough!’ and it was one with dates and real places. This was a second source! I wasn’t sure what to think.

I let that corroboration slip from my mind until very recently, when Brian Dunning of Skeptoid.com did a podcast on the story. http://skeptoid.com/episodes/4031 Brian is a skeptic and he’s rising fast in today’s skeptical movement. His podcast and blog are well written, concise, and well researched. Apparently, there was a story reported in the papers of 1855 touting this impossible, seemingly supernatural feat. According to Brian, much of the more incredible claims were “purely anecdotal, unsubstantiated, uncorroborated verbal reports” in the media of the day. It’s a good thing the media of today are much better at vetting stories of the supernatural. Oh, wait. What am I saying?

Some used copies of ‘Strangely Enough!’ can be found on Amazon. You can even get the unabridged edition, but you’ll have to shell out eighty bucks or more. The abridged version is more reasonably priced.

Pick it up, if you like. Bring it along on your next camping trip. And creep out the kids.

another quick one

These images are awfully small, but I think you’ll get the idea. They’re both from those internet ads that appear along the side of various website pages; usually next to the dancing people, mortgage refinancing ads. I’m sure you’ve seen them.

The first one is from an ad for some home security system. I just love the image. “‘Tis a good thing we be having yon burglar alarm, me hearties. We doesn’t want to be invaded by Cap’n Hook!”

The second is from a mortgage refinancing ad, however this fellow ain’t dancin’. My guess is the fellow shown is supposed to be an average person, but what the hell?! I mean no offense to the man, but surely the ad agency that put that ad together could have found a better picture. This guy looks more like one of those facial reconstructions that forensic artists sculpt to help identify human remains. Maybe that’s the thing the designers wanted – some strange image to get our attention.


Still. Yeesh.

this decade ain’t over yet…



During an episode of ‘The X-Files’ in late 1999; Scully, the show’s skeptic, pointed out to Mulder, the show’s woo-woo advocate, that the new millennium would not begin with the ending of 1999, but that it would begin when the year 2000 came to an end. And Mulder’s reply to Scully’s correct observation? “No one likes a math geek, Scully.”

Ain’t it the truth? When everyone was all giddy at the approach of the new millennium as 1999 came to a close, I was practically pulling my hair out. “It is not the new millennium!” I kept saying. We had one more year to go. The second millennium wouldn’t be starting until January 1, 2001!

There was no year zero, people!

Ten years later and my hairline is getting nervous again. As 2010 approaches, we are getting all the lists of the decade coming out. But, I’m telling you… the tenth year of this century’s first decade is just beginning!

Look at it this way, when you count to ten, how do you do it? You start at one and count to ten, right? But the way people are considering this decade, just as with the millennium, they are counting to ten by starting at zero and ending at nine. See what I mean?

However, with age comes wisdom, as they say. And a little mellowing. I’m still bugged by this, but I understand that people are actually looking at it as though the “zeros” or “aughts” (or whatever we call it) decade is coming to an end. I’m ok with that. After all, one of my favorite podcasts is ‘Stuck in the 80s’, a celebration of our favorite decade – the 1980s. For the purposes of that show, the 80s began in 1980 and ended in 1989. That’s true. Those were the 80s. However, the 80s was the ninth decade of the twentieth century and it lasted until the end of 1990.

Remember: there was no year zero. And when we count to ten, we count from one to ten, not from zero to nine.

Have I straightened out the confusion? Probably not. Have I changed any minds? Doubtful. Do people still hate math geeks pooping on their party? Absolutely.

the first season of star trek: the next generation kinda…sucked



Yes, I’m aware this is well past the point of relevance, but it’s my blog. Lately, one of the local TV stations has been playing Star Trek: The Next Generation. I haven’t seen the show for several years, so I’m taking advantage of their airing it to enjoy them again.

One thing that occurs to me while watching the first season is that the show wasn’t that good when it started. I am aware that the show went into production while a writer’s strike was raging in Hollywood, so I guess it’s understandable that the scripts are far less than stellar (is that a pun?). In fact, much of that first season wasn’t any better than the lousiest episodes of the original series. (Think ‘A Piece of the Action’ or ‘Spock’s Brain’.)

The cast all looked and sounded uncomfortable, especially when you compare them to how they seemed long about the third season. By then the cast had better writers and a much better understanding of their characters. Riker grew a beard (although he never lost that walking as if he had a board up his back), Picard became less bombastic, Worf’s make-up got better, Tasha Yar had been killed off, Wesley Crusher would soon be written off the show and other various improvements.

Some of those other improvements included better costumes and production values. I had heard somewhere that the cast wasn’t very happy with the costumes early on. Apparently, they were too tight and itchy. That may have contributed to the awkward acting in that first season. The set lighting was a bit substandard. And the alien planets looked a lot like sound stages, just like in the original series. Along with the acting and writing, many aspects of the show improved as it became more popular and profitable.

As I said, there was a writer’s strike going on that first season so viewers were treated to some pretty awful storylines and dialogue. In an early episode we were introduced to Lore, Data’s evil older “brother.” (The producers didn’t wait long to use the evil twin cliché.) Lore behaved suspiciously and Data seemed conflicted, so Lt. Yar, the Enterprise’s chief of security, asked Capt. Picard if he could still trust Data. Picard said he could and then admonished the rest of the bridge crew about Yar’s question being a “perfectly legitimate security question.” Picard’s outburst seemed strange to me and Yar reacted like a blushing little girl. This rough and tumble, tough as nails Star Fleet officer was bashfully smiling and batting her eyes at Picard’s statement!

In another episode, this one featuring Q (possibly the best character of that first season) offering Commander Riker the powers of the Q Continuum, a group of nearly omnipotent beings. The actor playing Q, John de Lancie, still hadn’t quite gotten a handle on his character. He had moments of overacting, but he was still interesting. Anyway, he zapped a few members of the bridge crew to the surface of a sound stage where they were menaced by what Worf referred to as “savage animal things.” Really? “Savage animal things?” They couldn’t come up with something better than that?

Then there was Wesley Crusher, the 12 year-old son of the ship’s chief medical officer, Dr. Beverly Crusher. Wesley was probably the fans’ least favorite character. When Wesley wasn’t looking stupid or grinning ear-to-ear, he was saving day. He must have saved the ship half a dozen times that first season alone.

Wesley Crusher looking stupid.

Wesley even suffered the “not now I’m too busy to hear your vitally important information because you are only a child” brush off on more than one occasion. This happened, despite Wesley’s track record of saving the day and the fact that some time traveling alien said Welsey was the next Newton/Einstein /Solock phenom (I wanted to do the two real names and one made up name device used so often in Star Trek). The phenom element never was fulfilled by the series for Wesley. Fortunately.

There were a few interesting moments and developments in that first season, however. The Q and Data characters. Tascha Yar and Data having sex (Data’s an android, by the way). Patrick Stewart had some good moments of acting to go along with his more over-the-top moments. That episode with Q I mentioned had Picard delivering a fine speech quoting Shakespeare’s ‘Hamlet.’ That’s not surprising given Stewart’s background as a Shakespearian actor.

One episode late in that first season did something rather ballsy, I thought. One of the main characters was killed about 15 minutes into the show. It was Lt. Tascha Yar, the chief of security for the Enterprise, not very well portrayed by Denise Crosby. The ballsiness was somewhat diminished when, at the end of the show, the main bridge crew all gather on the holodeck (if you don’t know Star Trek, I’m sorry I’m not going to explain the holodeck) where they watched a prerecorded message from Lt. Yar. It was her chance to say goodbye to each of the cast… er, crew members. But, why would she have made such a recording? Her character couldn’t have been more than 28 years-old and she’s making farewell holo-images for her crewmates? It would have been better to have the bridge crew gather on the bridge or 10 forward (again if you don’t know Star Trek, I’m sorry) to talk about losing her. But then Denise Crosby wouldn’t have had her big goodbye moment, something I’m sure the show’s producers had to do to get her agree to be killed off so early in the episode.

Still, I like the series. However, when it first aired, I didn’t watch it. For some reason, I wasn’t interested. It was during the third season that I tuned in. The series had really gotten rolling by then, which is fortunate, because had I watched the series when it began, I might not have stayed with it for very long.

Grow old and do well.

Correction 12/29/09:

I had listed Wesley Crusher as being 12 years-old. It appears as though he was probably 14 years-old during season one. My apologies to all the Wesley Crushers fans that… oh, wait, there were no Wesley Crusher fans, were there?