that vision thang

Don't I wish I had the money and babysitters to go to some of these. One day, I guess, long after the Flowers have gone through school and gotten married.............

Current Mood: geeky

Geeking out again. My snow day has led to some internet browsing, and I found out about this great sounding traveling Star Trek exhibit. Only the first stop in forty cities is on-line right now, but I will certainly be checking back for some place near us. I can't wait!

Current Mood: geeky

Last night was geek night. SisIL got Hubby and I tickets to the Star Wars (Where Science Meets Imagination) exhibit at the Franklin Institute for a joint birthday present (his was yesterday, mine is in seven weeks). We had been to the Institute just this summer for the pretty cool King Tut exhibit, too, which ended up being a bit expensive for a night out, once we factored dinner in. So when I saw this exhibit, I thought it was neat but that we probably wouldn't go. Then tickets arrived via e-mail, and I got to geek out.

I have to say, the geek factor was pretty high. Not that I was put off much by that; I was more annoyed because I wanted to get my picture taken with the costumes, too, and people kept getting in my way. I forgot my camera, because I forget everything, but luckily had we had our new cell phones with us, and I've finally learned how to operate a cell phone camera without deleting the pictures as I take them (don't ask- lost a bunch of X-mas tree farm pictures this year because of it). The exhibit was actually light on the science, fine with me because I was there as fan-girl. The coolest parts weren't even the costumes on display (two Episode 1/2/3 wookies, jedi robes, wampa, snow trooper, storm trooper, jawa, sand people, Han and Chewie, and Vader), or the props (lots of blasters and light sabers, the various sized-models used for filming of Luke's land speeder, X-wing, an Imperial Star Destroyer, the Millenium Falcon, the interrogator droid with needle extended, various robots, Luke's mechanical hand, etc). The coolest parts were the videos explaining how they made the movies.

Maybe this info is out there already somewhere, and I;m not fan-girl geek enough to know it, but I found it fascinating. Using World War II models for aircraft; how the scenes were shot before CGI; the sounds gathered, tested, manipulated, and eventually used for the film; the weird, wacky, and creative ways everyday items were transformed into the props; and the problems encountered during production due to how something was supposed to look vs. it having to function. On the R2/C3PO section, the video had Grant Imahara speaking; I sometimes forget that he did work on the franchise, watching Mythbusters (little weird fan-girl crush there. I don't even understand it myself.) The funniest thing, though, was the fact that the tail end thrusters for the Imperial Star Destroyers were half of L'Eggs containers from the seventies. (Those were my mom's brand, and I remember playing with the egg containers when I was little.)

The gift shop was quite disappointing, however. The general collection of the usual-- large standing cut-outs of characters, magnets, kids costumes. No adult sized t-shirts, and no Leia in the slave girl outfits on anything but a sticker (and that was in the main gift shop, not the exhibit gift shop.) I just decorated my own laptop with the Elder Flower recently, so I passed on the stickers (probably should have bought some and out them away for when my supergirl ones peel off.) Of course they had light sabers-- overpriced (and I know because I keep an eye out on-line)-- and masks. But nothing really....

COOL. That part was disappointing.

Then there was the half-hour in line for the Millenium Falcon ride. It's a model of the Falcon's cockpit, and uses sound and projection to make you feel like you are traveling by hyperdrive out to the edges of the universe, where they use actual pictures of OUR space. And at the end, a formation of X-wings fly up and then pull away, and it really feels like they are there. Kinda cool- except that my feet were killing me (I know, heels were a bad idea, but we were going out afterward, and there were heels I wore a bunch of times before comfortably) and since we were at the end of our small group (only seven at a time) which had kids in it, we didn't get to sit in the front seats. I'm just a kid- I hate to wait in lines, and I wanna sit up front. No photography is allowed on the ride, though, so I've got nothing to share but my words.

Then I got to go to my first IMAX movie. A dinosaur one; don't remember the name, but it was narrated by Michael Douglas (which I found amusing because I just spent three days using the movie The American President in Civics class) and was interesting but nauseating. I don't like the simulated real world motion crap. Made me feel like my eyes were spinning around in random directions in my head. It just felt funny, and made them hurt.

The night was finished up with a trip to the best sushi restaurant in Philadelphia, Jannie. We got a Spider Roll, which I've never had because the idea of eating soft-shell crabs freaks me out a little. I prefer my crabs de-shelled; eating the exoskeleton on makes me think I'm eating bugs. It wasn't bad, but I didn't want the end with the legs sticking out. We also had a spicy tuna roll, which I normally don't like but this one wasn't too spicy, and a grilled eel with tempura lobster roll that I adored. Plus, I found another drink I like, the Zombie. Those could be dangerous. Very fruity, and you don' t much taste the alcohol. Those ate the drinks that usually get me in trouble.

Once we got home, Hubby taught me how to send picture messages and e-mail pictures to myself. Something else that could be dangerous. I only get 250 messages a month-- so I need to watch myself. I do tend to get carried away with a new toy. I got my pictures for this blog entry that way, and then started trying to e-mail myself pictures for photo-id. Had some returned as undeliverable; I need to figure out what happened with that today. But my phone is now an extension of my geek girl side-- my interior wall paper is a sexy shot of Katee Sackhoff, looking very un-Starbuck, and I tried to make Lynda Carter as Wonder Woman my outer wall paper, but the banners cut her head off. Gotta work around that this morning, too, before we go pick our littles kiddies up from Mom-mom.

I'm just amazed at how geeky I can be, when the opportunity presents itself. And how technologically illiterate as well. Isn't that a slight contradiction, when you're a sci-fi geek?

Current Location: Imperial March
Current Mood: geeky