A diagram of the basics a Vulpine pilot wears while on duty.
It all starts tomorrow. Here’s a look at standard issue equipment that Lt. Senia Felix, Corporal Hardy Maynard and Corporal Clarfax Billings will take with them in this adventure, the prequel to Swift Fox and the Pirates of the Jackai.
The title of this week’s quotes is something that came to mind while I began writing it. I usually will find something humourous when I begin setting up the post for interesting quotes, and in this case the first thing that came to mind was a line from a movie (or it could have been a book). Sort of goes along the lines of “My eyes, my eyes!” or some such thing. I’ll have to do some searching later on. But imagine if you will, someone looking to the heavens and crying out “The quotes! The quotes!” Do it out loud, it’s even funnier.
Image by cliff1066™ via Flickr
He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose. ~author unknown
The grateful heart sits at a continuous feast. ~anonymous
Your job won’t take care of you when you are sick. Your friends and family will. Stay in touch. ~author unknown
“Children are the hands by which we take hold of heaven.” ~Henry Ward Beecher
Tomorrow’s the big day.
That’s when the series kicks off with full earnest.
So today, here’s another teaser before Rocket Fox and the Great Critainian Library fully kicks off into high gear.
The Royal Vulpine Authority Space Port was more than just a military installation. There was a civilian section of the port that hung in orbit around Vulpinia. Cargo cruisers from the three other planets that held life in the system frequented it quite a bit, bringing with them merchant goods, supplies, and even dignitaries. There were the grand Vulpine Shipyards, seeing service for over three hundred years. Many a grand vessel was constructed there. The seven ships that held the name Tritan, flagship of the Vulpine Fleet, were all built in the shipyards. Even ships that weren’t nearly as intimidating, but held a sort of admiration, like the Barrow’s Revenge. A Vulpine cargo cruiser, refit with armour plating and extra weapon ports and a landing deck for a small squadron of Maverick Class fighter ships.
Each and every one of us dreams of what something, anything unknown, might have come to be or to be like. If any of us has any curiosity to the way things came to being or exploring the unknown, then many of us might have thought of such a thing.
This universe we live in is vast, never ending. Millions of light years across, maybe even more. We can’t tell for 100% how big the universe is. The possibilities of what’s out there are entirely endless. Take a look at our own planet. Hundreds of life forms, with human beings said to be the dominant species. Was it a chance that we, out of all the life on this planet, ended up becoming the primary species? I know there will be scoffing and rebuttal from certain corners of the debate of “how we came to be”, but one could even argue that we, as humans, are extremely vain if we think that some immortal being that looks down on us and gave us all life looks exactly like us. What if God is a big monkey, or maybe a beetle (the bug, not John, Paul, George or Ringo), or possibly a single cell organism. We don’t know what God looks like. We don’t even know what God’s gender is. We truly don’t even know if God actually exists.
But I will leave the aspect of religion out of this, thereby cutting short any debate. This is all merely speculation, which ties into what I’ve been writing, working on and preparing for February.
We all agree, the universe is vast, hundreds of lifeforms across this planet, scientists are discovering other Earth like planets light years away from ours. Do they have a complete ecosystem? A dominant species? If so, what does that species look like? By some freak chance, what if that species happened to be similar to one on Earth, but instead of humans to evolve, what if it was velociraptors? Or wolves? Or tigers?
Science has proven that many creatures on Earth that we’ve believed are not intelligent are actually highly intelligent. Wolves have a very structured social circle and intricate communication system. Cats have been known to problem solve. Certain breeds of parrot (in the wild) are known to name their young and call out with those names. Foxes are extremely cunning and can problem solve. Many different species have the ability to remember activities and can learn quite easily.
This does sound like the stuff of science fiction. But some ideas from science fiction have become science fact. Kepler finds a planet that is similar to Earth 600 light years away? Douglas Adams predicted it first in Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. We don’t know what’s out there. But we shouldn’t allow that to intimidate us. It may take some time, but the things we’ve read in different science fiction books, watched on television and seen in movies might one day happen. When it does, we should embrace it, and explore. Fulfill our curious nature and see what’s out there, and discover what is similar to us along with what may be different.
When I talk about iconic music keeping something alive, I should probably explain a lot more than that. Music sparks a memory. Many who’ve read this blog will know that when I write, I write with music playing in the background. I find it helps. Lately, everything I’ve been listening to has been soundtracks.
In particular, soundtracks from space.
The title themes of many different sci fi movies, television programs, even radio serials, can spark memories or even the imagination. I know several people who know exactly the TV show just by hearing the opening sequence of “Space, the final frontier…” They know right away that it’s from Star Trek, whether that’s the original series or the next generation. That monologue was even used in the last episode of Star Trek Enterprise, as the different parts went between Captain James T. Kirk, Captain Jean Luc Picard and Captain Johnathon Archer.
That speech is just as iconic as the music itself, from any of the Star Trek series.
Another that doesn’t require a long discussion about, happens to be a British series. This series has gone on even longer, and started before Star Trek. It also happens to be a series that just by hearing the familiar klaxon, or seeing the words “Police Box” knows what it is without having watched a single episode.
Doctor Who is just as iconic (if not more so) than Star Trek is. A lot of that happens to be thanks to the familiar music of the show, just like Star Trek. From the first Doctor to the thirteenth Doctor, there are those who are going to recognize at least one, if not more of those pieces.
Back in the 1970s, science fiction on television wasn’t as ubiquitous as it is today. Those kinds of shows usually failed. But there has been the odd one that made an impact. This one happened to have been the first time I even saw Lorne Greene (even before seeing him on Lorne Greene’s New Wilderness).
One of the most iconic intros (or themes or anthems) for a movie series happens to come from the same era as Battlestar Galactica. Never a television series itself (though, there were a few animated series featuring Ewoks and droids) but hearing the opening music one knew right away what it was from.
Star Wars had the notoriety of two themes being well known, with the second, for Darth Vader, being just as popular, if not more so.
There’s most likely more that people can remember. I remember the theme to the old seventies cartoon Rocket Robin Hood (yes, that pretty much dates me right there).
While this entry may not have been incredibly informative, I at least hope it brought back a few good memories. Have one of your own from an iconic television show or movie to share? Leave a comment.
NASA’s Kepler telescope finds 26 new planets | News | National Post.
This is immensely exciting!
From a synopsis of the article.
Kepler, NASA’s planet-hunting space telescope, has found 11 new planetary systems, including one with five planets all orbiting closer to their parent star than Mercury circles the Sun, scientists said on Thursday.
The discoveries boost the list of confirmed planets outside the Earth’s solar system to 729, including 60 found by the Kepler team. The telescope, launched in space in March 2009, can detect slight but regular dips in the amount of light coming from stars. Scientists can then determine if the changes are caused by orbiting planets passing by, relative to Kepler’s view.
Kepler scientists have another 2,300 candidate planets awaiting additional confirmation. (Photos/illustrations by NASA/Ames/JPL-Caltech; University of Toulouse; Reuters/AFP/Getty Images)
Go to the above link to view the conversation. It starts off with really uniformed, racist garbage.
It got me thinking about a conversation I had last night. All the news we (meaning, here in this part of Canada) hear about are the drug cartels and the killings and things like that. There is another side to the story. Mexico isn’t a haven of blood thirsty cutthroats, anymore than the United States is. I know people who live in Canada who think that way about the United States, and for a time, thanks to stereotyping, so did I.
The people I talked to about this last night, however, pointed to the fact that sometimes people who get into trouble in Mexico do so because they did something dumb. They flipped somebody off, got drunk and started a fight, walked into the wrong section of town. Which, when you think about it, is no different than anything in the area we (meaning those who live in West Central Saskatchewan) happen to live in. Would you go down a dark alleyway at midnight on 20th Street in Saskatoon? Probably not, because certain sections of 20th are pretty rough. And while they aren’t necessarily tourist areas, if someone out of country happened to do such a thing, get attacked, and then return home, would have a negative story to tell. Have this happen enough, and the negativity grows.
Same thing with Mexico. While I have never been to Mexico, I’m sure there are very nice areas of the country, just as there are more than likely very bad areas of the country. Probably no different than down in the States or up here in Canada. Or any country, for that matter.
Part of that is a problem with the media, where we are only given one kind of view of a country. For instance, a massive stereotype about the Middle East is it’s filled with camels, nomads, sand and oil. The latter being often cited as the only good thing in the Middle East. Obvious, Dubai must be this mythical place that really doesn’t exist in the Middle East (/sarcasm). Most likely, a lot of those countries look at us in the same manner.
As far as ESL, I’ve known several people who have come to Canada who have taken English as a Second Language. It is not, as the original rant in the link states, English “is” a Second Language. It’s teach people English as “their” second language so they can communicate with people much easier. Because, a lot of times those individuals who emigrate from other countries to Canada (or the States) will end up running a business, which means they will be creating jobs.
Now, I know there’s a lot more information that needs to be explored, but it’s something we have to actively do. Bottom line, don’t spout off on a rant without knowing some important facts first.
A 'Blue Marble' image of the Earth taken from the VIIRS instrument aboard NASA's most recently launched Earth-observing satellite - Suomi NPP, received by Reuters January 25, 2012. This composite image uses a number of swaths of the Earth's surface taken on January 4, 2012. The NPP satellite was renamed 'Suomi NPP' on January 24, 2012 to honor the late Verner E. Suomi of the University of Wisconsin.
I always find images like this extremely drool worthy (I know, maybe the poorest choice of words, but the photos are still amazing). Hi definition photos of the planet Earth. Click the picture for more.
How To Capture Awesome Auroras : The Picture Show : NPR.
So beautiful and such a great article for photo buffs to take great pictures of the Northern Lights.
These bring back quite a few memories from when I was a kid. We lived on a dairy farm, and had a good number of cattle. During the winter it was always pitch black out with only the stars winking down at us. And some of those mornings there was the most impressive display of lights.
I really miss seeing that sometimes.
2005's Southern Spectacular: A satellite took this image of the aurora australis (southern lights) in September 2005, after a solar flare sent plasma — an ionized gas of protons and electrons — flying toward Earth.
A little bit more from the workings of the first series of the Lupine star system. The scene takes place at one of Vulpine’s oldest airfields, sort of like a World War II airfield in Britain. The location in the story is near a village called Chattingham, and not far from the town of Warrenshire, home of the Royal Military College. I picture it to look similar to the photo below, which is Seletar Camp.
Seletar Camp was a British airfield and camp. The airfield is still there but has been converted to a commercial airstrip. The buildings, once barracks and officers' quarters, are now used for aerospace related commerce and for residence.
The barracks themselves weren’t anything extravagant, but they did have a somewhat homey feel to them. There were the neatly laid out bunks where each cadet slept, along with enough room for a locker so a modest amount of personal items could be stored. A small area near the bunks had been cleared away to make room for a seating area, complete with a small wood burning stove so that the cadets could make tea should they wish it. As the four cadets walked into their barracks, luck should have it, tea was being served.
Natalie Bascombe, an older, heavy set Vulpine, with a charming smile and twinkling eyes, was pouring a few cups already for some of the newer cadets who would be attending full classes in the fall. She looked up as the four entered, cooing softly as she saw Senia.
“Now there’s a smart lass in uniform,” she said with a smile as she placed the tea pot back onto its trivet on the tea service. “A sharp look, Left-tenant. Remind me o’ me own uniform b’fore I joined the 103rd.” Natalie wasn’t just a caretaker around the barracks, she was a veteran of the Great Lupine Land War of 3572, New Calendar, and she was an alumni of the Chattingham Airfield Academy. “Ah, but I do see a long face that go with it. C’mon now, all o’ ye sit down for a cup o’ tea. You’re just in time. Malcolm, get a couple more chairs, will ye?” she called out to one of the junior cadets who nodded and quickly retrieved a few extra chairs.
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