re: #246 Swampwitch

True story.
I used to go to Trek conventions in Des Moines. The last one I went to was about 13 years ago in one of the downtown hotels, but there were tons of conventions going down that weekend and I ended up having to park a mile plus from the venue.
John deLancie was the big guest at this one and I watched him break a nerd’s heart during the Q&A when the kid asked him if he had ever read any of the Trek books, and deLancie lectured him for a good five minutes about real literature and wasting one’s time with books that don’t matter in the real world. He then went on and on about how he only does the conventions to make money so he can create real art. I’ve read that he’s really nice and approachable at every other convention, so I’d like to think he was having a bad day.
ANYWAY…A very nice Black lady, dressed as an old school Starfleet Admiral, and I sort of caught each other’s eye as this was going on, and we ended up eating together at the hotel restaurant. Just us and her two 6 foot plus sons dressed and made up as Klingons. Excellent costuming, even better makeup jobs. Convention and dinner over and it was close to midnight and she asked if I was staying at the hotel like they were, and I told her I had a 3 hour drive ahead of me and that I had parked so far away.
So there I am, walking in not a nice part of downtown Des Moines, late at night, guarded on either side by Klingons. The stares we got. And a ton of just delighted smiles.
Looking so forward to Q and Guinan and Crusher on Picard this year. More than a little ticked off that Janeway’s been relegated to a voice on a kid’s cartoon.

I was sitting at a table next to John deLancie’s a couple of years ago and we started talking. In fact, I was holding a star trek novel and he asked me what I thought of it (so so, there are some really good ST books, this wasn’t one of them). Nothing about the waste of my time, so I’m going to say that either he was having a bad day back then or he’s mellowed with the years.

(It took me a while to learn that you can produce great literature in any medium, including formulaic TV series novels. It took much less to truly appreciate that ninety percent of everything is crap.)