Dinner With Mania

Had some dinner tonight with family. Unless you're from Mars, you probably know the topic was Harry Potter. If you are from Mars, you should have brought your heat ray to the restaurant. You could have set it on fire, and that might have changed the subject for a while.

I really can't remember the last time I saw mania like this; everybody is talking about Mr P., and knows all about the characters and the school. And here I am, a Star Trek geek (Trekker or Trekkie? I don't know, but there is a difference). I can tell you within five seconds which episode you are watching. Sometimes I don't need to see the screen, the sounds of The Enterprise, the music, or the dialog are often enough. And I haven't watched Star Trek in a long while.

I'll rattle off a thing or two from the top of my head.

On the show Beat the Geek, the Star Trek geek and his opponent were tasked to name as many Star Trek devices as they could. The geek won by a gizmo, but he was wrong. He named (don't expect me to get the spelling right) velouvial dampers. No dude, that's a Star Wars tool used to repair the hyper drive on the Millenium Falcon. See the end of The Empire Strikes Back. Was I the only one who caught that?

How about metallurgy? There's Murinite, which comes from the Rigel Colony. In A Wolf in the Fold, the handle of a knife, used as a murder weapon, is made of it. The blade is made of Boridium. Poor Scotty is accused of murdering two Argelian women and Lieutenant Tracy with that knife. In case you haven't been on shore leave, let me explain that Argelius is "a planet whose inhabitants are as peaceful as sheep." Yup, direct quote there.

There's castrogidium. Sounds corny, but it's tough as nails. This is used as a shielding on the outposts along the Romulan Neutral Zone, although the Romulans blasted through it with a newly developed plasma weapon. Too bad the contractor who built the outpost didn't know about Neutronium. It's phaser proof and probably plasma proof as well. Might make a good bicycle frame if it's not too heavy.

Neutronium, a blueish material, covers the exterior of the Doomsday Machine (also the episode's title), a super weapon from another galaxy that slices up planets with a force beam. Sensor scans show the beam is composed of "pure anti-proton". How was it stopped? Kirk flew the USS Constellation into the mouth of the machine and detonated the ship by way of an impulse engine overload. And did you get the subtle answer to man's possible doom by his super weapons? It's not a bigger club, but a change from within. That was like, total Vulcan wisdom there.

I could go on, but you'll want to turn that Martian heat ray on me. I'll conclude by saying that even with my extensive trivia data banks, I felt bested by the students of Hogwarts.