“Babies have big heads and big eyes, and tiny little bodies with tiny little arms and legs. So did the aliens at Roswell! I rest my case.”
The day is still dismal and it’s colder. It rained last night, and the wind blew. My front lawn has disappeared beneath pine needles, and the deck is filled with leaves plastered by the rain. Today is not at all inviting.
The computer is back, but I can’t use it. My keyboard and mouse are wireless and useless until I can load their programs. I need a mouse to load a mouse so I’m still using my laptop, and it’s driving me crazy. I don’t know how to type. I use two fingers and am usually pretty fast but not on this keyboard. It’s too small. I keep hitting the caps lock.
Clothes are sitting and wrinkling in the dryer. My bed is disheveled and unmade. I haven’t even gotten dressed yet. I’m not even sure I will. I haven’t a speck of ambition.
Captain Midnight was the TV show which helped whet my appetite for science fiction. My memories of specific programs are hazy, but I remember his sidekick was named Mudd, and he always introduced himself as Mudd with 2 d’s. I wanted to be a member of his secret squadron, but my mother couldn’t be convinced we needed jars and jars of Ovaltine.
Early Saturday morning programs were often old science fiction serials from the movies. I followed them week after week and learned a lot from watching them. I learned that the domination of Earth was the common ambition of every alien, especially Martians, and all of them, to their detriment, underestimated mankind. A hero would rise, assume the mantle of leadership and send those aliens to perdition. Our hero would fall in love with a beautiful scientist who had a doctorate in some odd science which would prove invaluable in defeating the aliens. She would place her hand over her mouth and scream at her first encounter with the alien. She’d also run away and trip and be saved by our intrepid hero. She would be wearing a suit and heels.
I’m still waiting for my first alien encounter. My neighbor from Brazil doesn’t count.
Explore posts in the same categories: MusingsTags: aliens, Captain Midnight, Science fiction
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November 6, 2010 at 12:10 pm
It was a British SciFi series that made me love the genre. I think it was called Space: 1999. An explosion on the moon sends the moon away from earth and it travels through space. I think they only showed the first season here and I heard that the second was a disaster. Martin Landau had a leading roll if I remember correct.
But then I saw Star Trek and got really hooked 🙂 I love those old episodes 🙂 🙂 Naturally I also got hooked on Star Wars like most others got. Did You know that “The Force” now is an acknowledged religion in Great Britain? 🙂 Oh what I would give to get a chance to travel between worlds (even if I wouldn´t be the hero saving the beautiful scientist 🙂 🙂 )
Have a great day now!
Christer.
November 6, 2010 at 1:08 pm
Christer,
I’m another fan of Space 1999. There were two different series, and it was the first which I thought was good, not the second.
I too was hooked on Star Trek and watched every series. I didn’t know about the Force in England. I’ll have to look that one up.
I’d be with you traveling.
November 6, 2010 at 2:29 pm
I´ll pick You up when I leave then 🙂 🙂
But I´m not sure about that name of the religion based upon the Star Wars movies. I have now found it´s called Jediism.
Christer.
November 6, 2010 at 12:47 pm
I can’t remember when I started reading Sci Fi but it was definitely in grammar school. Probably it was Asimov. My first sci fi flick was The Blob. It was green, it was a blob, it came from outer space and it absorbed people like an amoeba eating something. That’s all I remember.
I remember Captain Midnight as a comic book but not as a movie or tv program. We had Major Mudd on Saturday morning. We also had Creature Double Feature on Saturday night, I think. The host, Feep, was the same guy as Major Mudd. Star Trek, the original, was a must see every week. My all time favorites are BBC’s Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy and Red Dwarf.
“Smoke me a kipper I’ll be back for breakfast.” 🙂
November 6, 2010 at 1:16 pm
Caryn,
I was a Major Mudd fan as well, and I loved Creature Double Feature, but I think it was on Saturday afternoons. They brought it back for a weekend last year, and I could hardly wait. I wasn’t disappointed.
I didn’t find Red Dwarf until later and loved it, even bought a season or two.
Captain Midnight was on from 1954-1956.
November 6, 2010 at 2:32 pm
Oh I had forgotten Red Dwarf 🙂 🙂 I hope they will show it here again!
Christer.
November 6, 2010 at 1:17 pm
November 6, 2010 at 2:28 pm
I’m hooked on the Ancient Alien series. The last one was about Aliens taking two chimps and introducing a DNA to create a human chimp they could use as slaves. Then when they were successful, they trained them to build the Pyramids in Egypt and developed other genetic strains in other different areas of Earth which they controlled by sharing the crops harvests by air. No society knew one another and that worked fine for them. The Myans disappeared with no trace whatsoever and it is now believed they went home with the Aliens to Orion. I’m hooked. What can I say? It certainly beats those screamers you watched as a kid on Sci Fi TV.
November 6, 2010 at 3:43 pm
Think crop circles … they’re not all gone.
Cheers
November 6, 2010 at 3:55 pm
Z&Me,
I take umbrage that they beat my screamers. Those aliens just turned us into slaves-no DNA diddling. All that goes back to Chariots of the Gods and all his theories. Stargate SG1 has aliens seeding the universe as its whole premise.
November 6, 2010 at 3:57 pm
Minicapt,
It’s good to know they have found a way to amuse themselves on a slow night.
November 6, 2010 at 5:10 pm
Put me down for a skip on the sci fi unless you would count Dr Who and his “chums” the Daleks which sent a generation of children behind the sofa.
I have abandoned all hope for Big Rick and spent time making sure that the snow blower still works…it does
November 6, 2010 at 5:56 pm
My Dear Hedley,
I too am a Dr. Who fan from all the way back through to the early days.
Exterminate!
November 6, 2010 at 6:55 pm
Obey…obey….
November 6, 2010 at 7:43 pm
The alien movies of the 1950s were a direct response to the cold war era. Nuclear conflagration was brought home each time we practiced duck and cover monthly in elementary school. The aliens were stand in characters for the Bad Soviets. I saw such films as ‘The Creature from the Black Lagoon, The Blob and The Fly’.
I had nightmares for years after seeing the 1954 version of ‘War of the Worlds’. In high school I loved reading Robert Robert Heinlein’s books such as stranger in a strange land and Isaac Assimov.
November 7, 2010 at 10:21 am
Bob,
I knew many of the films were allegories about the A-bomb and its aftermath, especially the classic Japanese movies. The film Invasion of the Body Snatchers was one of those films you’ve referenced. “They’re here. They’re, ” was supposed to refer to Communists.
I’ve read all of Heinlein and most of Asimov-I ever designed and taught a science fiction course for high school students.
November 7, 2010 at 10:06 am
As I recall, Star Trek, the original, also used a master culture seeding itself all through the Galaxy as an explanation for why there were so many human-looking people everywhere. Saved money on costumes, too, I expect.
Thanks for Major Mudd flashback.
November 7, 2010 at 10:16 am
Caryn,
I’d forgotten that about the original Star Trek!
Thanks!!
I liked that TNG had so many aliens.
November 7, 2010 at 11:21 am
Last night I watched a rerun of one of the original Star Trek episodes on TV. They have been digitally remastered and look terrific.
As a college student I had a crush on the woman who played the communications officer. I can’t remember either her character’s name or her real name. I saw her on a TV show a few years ago and she has aged very well and still looked hot.
I am amazed that in 1965 we thought the portable ‘communicators’ and the ship’s computer that the crew used were something that would be common only in the 25th century. Surprise, nearly everyone on earth has a cell phone. Some of them even flip open. We can’t easily talk to our computers, but even having one on my desk and in my pocket (iPhone) is still a miracle that no one in 1965 would have imagined would happen in our lifetime.
We still can’t transport ourselves across space or travel at the speed of light, but these things will always be fun to imagine. Even kissing the very attractive communications officer who wore a 1965 equivalent ‘blue tooth’ headset on her right ear.
November 7, 2010 at 12:36 pm
http://www.uhura.com
Here you go, Bob!
November 7, 2010 at 12:37 pm
Thanks, Sheila!
November 7, 2010 at 12:39 pm
Bob,
I surely wish I could transport. I imagine dinner in an exotic location, shopping in China on a Saturday and on and on. It would be such fun to have the world or even the universe at my fingertips.
I remember the awe when I saw my first portable radio!
November 8, 2010 at 1:18 am
I used to listen to “Tom Corbett, Space Cadet”, just after “Big Jon and Sparkie” on Saturday mornings. Then I found a comic book of it about 1953. And a few years ago, I found that they’d made a whole series of TV shows of it back in the B&W TV days.
The first horror that actually scared me on TV was a doozy called “Science Fiction Theater” in about 1957. The one I remember best was one where there were (about 1.5′ tall) cocoons opening in a jungle and letting out horrific INVISIBLE monsters. They killed folks in awful and deadly ways. They finally got to see one by pouring plaster over it and it was DREADFUL looking. Of course, there was the requisite trio of:
old scientist
beautiful daughter
handsome young hero
November 8, 2010 at 9:10 am
Rick,
It was The House of Wax which sent me running to my parents’ room. I was watching it in mine when the heroine hit the face of Vincent Price and his wax face fell off. He looked horrific and I ran.
November 8, 2010 at 1:23 am
Oh, and for the Trek folks, there’s this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_Star_Trek
November 8, 2010 at 9:08 am
Rick,
This is a great find. I’ll be going through this for a while-Thanks!!