Residents From The Gone Boldly Assisted Living Center for Retired Space Center Staff See Star Trek Beyond in Costume! Theater Imaginarium.

Patients from the Gone Boldly Home for Retired Space Center Staff at the Theater. I'm happy to report they were reliable. No issues were reported by the cleaning staff.

Disclaimer: The Troubadour brings you news from all the Space Centers inspired by the original USS Voyager. Trust our news to be fair, impartial, at times confusing, and nearly accurate. We like to season our offerings with a spray of imagination to give it just the right flavor for tired eyes.

     

     Senior Flight Directors, staff, and abnormally long term volunteers whose service to the Space Center during my tenure as director was labeled exemplary, are eligible for post Space Center service care in The Gone Boldly Treatment Center for Retired Space Center Staff.  GBTC offers both outpatient and inpatient care. Residential services are reserved for those who find themselves confused, bewildered, challenged by reality, and most importantly - unreliable in the bathroom (brought on by holding it too long during prolonged battle scenes or elongated, multi character narratives - where the flight director engages in conversations with himself as another character; which introduces us to another common Flight Director malady - schizophrenia).

The Gone Boldly Treatment Center for Retired Space Center Staff.
It is a color picture, the place is just sort of gloomy year round

     Several of my dearest Space Center comrades currently in GBTC residential treatment got a special treat last night. With the permission of their therapists, and a sincere promise to be good - despite past experiences where that promise was broken - they were released on their own recognizance to attend the new Star Trek Beyond motion picture.  You may recognize some of them in this photo taken at the theater  

     Todd Rasband with his date Isis Stormwalker, Skyler and Emily Paxman, BJ Warner,  Jacqueline and Bradyn Lystrup were photographed at the theater last night.  Had a member of the GBTC staff been with them, they would not have been photographed in front of that particular display.
     Understand proper dress is not an issue with these "once trusted with your children" former staff members. They notified the staff they would be going to the movie in fancy dress.  The van driver alerted us to the fact that their costumes didn't compliment a Star Trek film. It was a battle we didn't want to fight so we let it go. 
     It had been a long day dealing with a disturbing incident in the cafeteria. Long term care patient Mark Daymont, already unsettled by finding bananas in his jello, dropped his mental mooring and slipped into his Chief Okinawa character to confronted David Kyle Herring over the last serving of lasagna.  Kyle Herring abruptly stepped aside to let his engineering character, James Carvell, emerge from years of psychiatric insulation and repression. It was the battle of Space Center engineering characters.  Food ended up everywhere. The cafeteria manager pushed the red button. The home went into red alert. Straps were applied and calming medication administered.  It was one of those days.
           

BJ and a poster man

      BJ did very well considering. His only issue was confusing a poster character with someone real. He kept asking the posterman if he could have his picture taken with him. After being ignored for the fifth time, BJ filled the theater lobby with words so vulgar, a nearby construction worker was seen to blush.  "Take the picture!" BJ ordered after Bradyn explained in terms he could understand that the posterman was just that, a poster.  Out of embarrassment, BJ hid his face behind his miniature shield until the movie started.    

     Skyler Paxman, married to Flight Director Emily Paxman, played along with them.  He was never a flight director nor is a patient of the GBTC. Being a dutiful husband, he supports his wife's treatment every way he can, no matter the cost to his wallet or pride. 
     I'm happy to report the patients returned to the Home happy and well entertained. It was a grand adventure for all concerned.  
     If you're ever in the area, please stop by the Gone Boldly Treatment Center for Retired Space Center Staff and visit those flight directors who worked so hard to entertain and teach you. They love seeing their former campers. They love even more visitors patient enough to sit through hours of stories of missions long gone. You may even see some of them flying the new Voyager at Renaissance Academy in Lehi. I'm arranging work release for those eligible for extended release. Won't it be something to see them in the flight director's chair again?  Don't worry, they will come properly sedated.  

Mr. Williamson  

They Did it at the Last Star Trek Film, and the One Before That!

Ben Murdock with Morgan Mitchell. Jacqueline and Bradyn Lystrup. May 2013.

And with Spencer Dauwalder at the first Star Trek Film in 2009  

Theater Imaginarium

Using Horcruxes to Reincarnate the Voyager. The Voyager Control Room. The Imaginarium.

     The Great Western School of Wizardry and Magic is perched precariously on a long majestic curve of crumbly cliffs. Above the school are hundreds of miles of snow covered peaks circling outward for hundreds of miles before descending into purple rolling hills. The school's mountain, as seen from a distance, floats on an ethereal cushion of clouds drifting up from a heavily forested valley deep in the inner sanctum of the Rocky Mountains.  
     The Western Hemisphere's greatest wizards and witches are educated at the GWSWM. Its graduates are sought after in the magical world of business, government, and education.
The school's field work in spell archeology is renowned. Their wandmanship and spellology are unique in both form and phraseology. It is to this school we went in search of a wizard knowledgeable in the mystical practice of horcruxes.  Our quest was simple in definition and questionably impossible in execution. My associates and I had two questions requiring answers: 1) Was the original Voyager truly gone?  2) If not, was enough of it locked away in heavily spelled hard drive horcruxes to be enchanted back from a forgotten code? 
     The heavily robed, tri-bifocaled headmaster was obliging during our interrogation. He answer both questions while searching his patchy gray beard for bits of unfinished pork pie unceremoniously deposited during the midday meal, much to the delight of the first year students who sit closest to the elevated masters table.  
     "The Voyager was preserved to some extent by Professor Ricks," he said. "It is he, and he alone, who can cast the spells necessary to bring what was - back to what is."  The headmaster walked to the open window to lean out for a listen. Grunting in the negative, he tapped his left ear with his wand and extended it further out, his body teetering a degree or two from finding an end at the bottom of a long and painfully unforgiving cliff.  Pulling himself back from the brink, he revealed his finding. "Professor Ricks is in his workshop on the verge where the forest brushes up against the mud pond. I hear him smithing. He loves to tinker with bits of this and that."
     We found Professor Ricks' workshop. He was inside working the bellows while turning a glowing metal rod.  In the corner sat a simple contraption, the imagine of a person made of rods, pulleys, and wire.  We explained who were were and the purpose for our visit. His eye's sparkled with the news that the time had come to pull the essence of the mother ship from the horcruxes he had so faithfully spelled five years previously. He asked for patience while he changed from his smithing overalls. Then, dressed in his muggle's best, he gathered the horcruxes, placed them gently in a knapsack and strung it over his shoulder. "Let's be about it!" he exclaimed as he strode out into the dusty twilight. We followed, carefully steering away from the mud pond on his advice.           

     Professor Ricks enchanted from the cassette tape the Voyager's original Sick Bay program and wizarded the code into the waiting computer. 

     The spells complete, Professor Ricks checked the second generation IMac in the Voyager Control Room to see if it had paired successfully with the computer in Sick Bay.  The horcrux was stubborn. Several attempts were required before he announced the procedure successful.
     The news gets even better. Professor Ricks handed me a USB thumb drive containing all the printable messages once stored on the Voyager's IIFX station. The messages were in Appleworks. Today's Mac's can't read Appleworks; however I have an old Mac laptop at home which has the ancient program. I can dehorcrux the USB myself!  We will soon have all the first Voyager's documents: the mission messages, the engineering reports, the damage control reports, everything. All my work, and the work of so many volunteers and staff, recovered and usable once again.  It is good news.  The Voyager lives on. 

More Test Missions  

     Isaac Ostler, with the help of three students from our Flight Director Academy, ran another test mission on Saturday.  There were glitches. The microphone cable failed just as the mission was about to start. I think these cables are engineered to fail at the most inopportune times.  "Mr. Williamson, we need another microphone cable," was something I expected to hear at least two or three times a month when I directed the Space Center back in the day. And sadly, it appears Fortuna has decreed that this problem should continue to haunt me at Renaissance Academy.      

The Voyager Control Room with my Diet Dew in in proper place.

      In the end the mission was successful. Isaac is a good problem solver and the FDA staff were brilliant as is expected.  

     New missions are being written for the Voyager. Old missions will return and the new Voyager will once again fly alongside the other ships of the fleet.  

     I want to thank Mr. James Porter, director of the Christa McAuliffe Space Education Center, for his help and support. The Space Center is in good hands. I want to thank Casey Voeks, Skyler Carr, and Brandon Wright, and my other good friends at InfiniD, for their contributions to the quality and professionalism of our missions. 

     I've worked with all these good folks for many years. I take pride in the work both organizations are doing - forging ahead with this unique form of experiential simulator based education I imagineered back in 1983.

Mr. Williamson   

The Imaginarium

 How to Speak to Women

Star Trek Beyond Starts Tonight! Simulator Centered YMCA Camps a Huge Success in Pittsburgh. The Imaginarium.

 Star Trek Beyond Launches Tonight

Hello Space Fans!
     I have to admit I'm excited for the new Star Trek film launching tonight from theaters nationwide. I didn't think I'd be, but they say time heals all and time is exactly what I needed to get over the ridiculousness of the last movie.  Besides, 2016 is the year we celebrate the 50th anniversary of the classic Star Trek series I knew as a boy; so according to my diehard fan contract signed when I was eight years old, I'm required to be excited. And excited I shall be.

     My friends and family know I'm not a "Trekkie" or "Trekker" in the classic sense. I don't own a Starfleet uniform. I don't have the episodes memorized. I don't even know the actor's real names who played many of the major roles. What does make me an unusual and devoted fan are the simulators my team and I created at the Space Center - all based in the Star Trek universe. 

     Gene Roddenberry's creative genius and the Starship Enterprise and crew he imagineered was my Harry Potter and Hogwarts back in the day. The vision Roddenberry shared through his stories rang true to me. He believed mankind could and would solve their societal issues. He envisioned a united human species venturing out into space to explore strange new worlds, seek out new life and new civilizations, and boldly go where no one (always PC) has gone before. He preached a science fiction gospel opposite to the doom and gloom of nuclear holocaust, alien domination,and zombie infestation so prevalent on the silver screens.  Roddenberry was a visionary, and we have the opportunity to gather again to enjoy another film in the franchize he created.

  
I'm told there are a few things about this movie which honors the original 1960's series.

1.  The story isn't about space battles; it's about exploration.  
2.  The story is an endorsement of 1960's liberalism.  Once again affirming a world where human differences have been resolved and people work together in peace. 
3.  The film tries to reflect the diversity pioneered in the original series. In the 1960's Star Trek there was a black communications officer, a Russian navigator, a Japanese helmsman, and a Scottish engineer (which nearly pushed the diversity concept beyond the plausible!).
4.  The film is about legacies. It was written by two avid Star Trek fans who pay homage to the original cast from 50 years ago in various scenes in the film.

     So, strap on your phaser and tricorder, practice your Vulcan salute, review your Klingon language basics, and squeeze into your spandex Starfleet uniform. It is time to attend your nearest Cathedral of All Things Possible and worship at the altar of great science fiction. Save the front row, end seat for me. My bladder isn't what it use to be.

Mr. Williamson       

Dream Flight Adventures:  YMCA Camps a Huge Success in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

Hello Space Fans!

     Admiral Starblayze at Dream Flight Adventures shared the following story on his blog.   Congratulations to our good friends at Dream Flight and Harrison Middle School for a offering summer camps never to be forgotten.

     Dream Flight Adventures was founded by Gary and Sarah Gardiner in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Gary was a camper at the Space Center in Pleasant Grove in the 1990's. He caught the starship simulator bug and the rest is history.  Today Dream Flight Adventures provides curriculum and missions to four different school based simulators in Pennsylvania, one mobile simulator in Washington D.C., and one school based simulator in Venezuela.  

Mr. Williamson

Posted on July 20, 2016 by Admiral Starblayze

     This just in from Admiral Huckleberry—YMCA Dream Flight Camp completed at Harrison Middle School:

     From July 5th-July 8th the YMCA partnered with Dream Flight Adventures in the IKS Highlander in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania to create 4 of the coolest field trips EVER! Over the course of the week, 120 kids from ages 5-14 were inducted into the ranks of the “Infinity Knights”. They flew 3 different missions that matched the theme of camp that week, all while under the watchful eye of Admiral Huckleberry and the on board computer.

     Our Camp Voyager flew Contaminant on Tuesday, where they learned all about the ecosystem and the damage pollution does to the environment.

     Camps Western and Elroy both shrunk to the size of a blood cell on Wednesday and flew Pandemic. In this mission they worked to fight ancient bacteria and learn all about the different organ systems in the Human Body.

     On Thursday and Friday, Camp Cloverleaf fought off the dastardly Orion Pirates in Succession, where they learned to work together as a crew to accomplish to goal of saving the Oracle of Delphi and bringing Peace to the Universe!

     At the end of every mission, the hardest part, was trying to get the campers to leave. We always had a couple stragglers begging to stay and come back the next day. Even our 5 and 6 year olds had no problem adapting to the technology, and if there was ever an issue, one of the older kids from the crew would rush over and work with the younger Infinity Knight to get all emergencies solved!

     FROM THE YMCA: “We couldn’t be more thrilled that we were able to have this partnership with Dream Flight, and can't wait till we are able to return! I have never seen the kids, or even the Staff, so excited after a trip. Thank you Dream Flight Adventures for truly inspiring our kids to think and dream!”

The Imaginarium

Gentlemen, Keep These Things in Mind