Boldly Go, Eh?

Just when you think six years of nattering on leaves you with nothing to say, the Internet makes you believe in miracles again.

Come now two Canadians, each expressing a devotion to matters of extraterrestrial life above and beyond that which is seen in most folks.

Star Trek superfan Line Rainville remodeled several rooms in her basement to look like the bridge of the original starship Enterprise from the television series. She wanted a movie viewing room and decided, about a year and $30,000 ago, to give it a theme from the bridge of the ship in the 1960s version of the series. Rainville's gone way past where I would go, and I kind of consider myself a fairly devoted fan. But kudos to her, because it looks pretty cool and she seems to have figured out how to alter some of the original design to fit her space and her needs for what she wanted. Trading Spaces designer goofballs take note: It's possible to be weird in a way that people actually like!

Paul Hellyer, who served as Canada's Minister of Defence (you can tell it's Canadian by the British spelling) during the administratuion of Prime Minister Lester B. Pearson in the 1960s, said in an interview on Russian television that believes extraterrestrials live and walk among us right now, many so humanoid we can't tell the difference. They have been giving us their advanced technology as we have matured socially; our slow progress in that arena is one reason they have held back the higher levels of stuff. This is not as outlandish a scenario as it seems; we could do a lot worse than have ourselves under the watchful eye of Tommy Lee Jones.

A Defence Minister with a...unique...view of exactly what constitutes an "alien immigrant" is certainly not the weirdest thing that PM Pearson left his country. Upon his retirement in 1967, he helped in the selection of Pierre Trudeau as his successor to lead Canada's Liberal Party, and that worthy's ten-plus years of service are generally matched only by a Jerry Brown governorship in bringing the wacky.