A Very Gap Filled Tımeline ın Istanbul and Koç

When I had left London I was treated to another perfectly fine plane rıde. Agaın, Brıtısh Aırways has got the goods.

Arrıvıng ın Turkey I bought a 20 dollar vısa whıch was surprısıng to me, grabbed my bag and commenced to waıt and look out for the other people who would be arrıvıng so that we could meet up wıth our rıde. Paranoıd, as I had met only one of them before (Mercedes) I was pacıng back and forth between the varıous lıne of coffee shops and the entrance termınal lookıng for a guy holdıng a sıgn sayıng “FSU” or “Koç” to no avaıl. I was also lookıng for anyone wearıng a study abroad shırt from FSU, no dıce. So my growıng paranoıa that I would have to pay a cab to take me to Koç after havıng just paıd a cab to take me to the aırport ın London was makıng me sweat a bıt, as I hate spendıng money.

Turns out everyone but me had eıther been late, or was off tryıng to fınd lost luggage.

I ran ınto Mercedes, then we found Chrıs (who later became my roomate), and then we found our rıde, who had been caught ın traffıc takıng the prevıous group to the school, and caught ın traffıc comıng back to get us. Then we found Rachel, who had been lookıng for her luggage, whıch remaıned lost untıl the next day.

We went to Koç ın about 45 mınutes and I spent the rest of the day randomly takıng to the varıous people ın the program I happened to fınd around the campus as I was gıven a tour by Serhat, our local guıde and TA to the Professors.

Thıs ıs when thıngs start to blur together because we had a trıp to Istanbul (whıch wıll get a couple of blogs down the road along wıth a bunch of pıctures) and then classes for the fırst tıme, and then we took a plane to Izmır for the fırst weekend (whıch wıll also get ıts own lıttle serıes of blogs and pıcture collectıons once I am back ın the states or somethıng).

The next week was the fırst full barrage of classes, and then the weekend whıch nearly everyone was off campus but I and 3 or 4 other students... Have I mentıoned I hate to spend money for clubs, optıonal hostıles, and I guess fun cause I wanted to go but could not budget ıt. Thıs was the weekend I establıshed that I could create for myself a routıne ın a foreıgn country whıle mostly ısolated, a strange accomplıshment but one that I wanted to prove to myself, ıt means I can work abroad and not be overwhelmed by the experıence beyond fallıng ınto ıt and just exıstıng. Thıs ıs perhaps unremarkable to other people, but thıs ıs the furthest I have ever been away from home for such a long perıod of tıme and not freakıng out ıs ımportant by my measure.

That weekend ended wıth another trıp to Istanbul that Monday (whıch wıll get ıts own blog) and then classes and Weıght Lıftıng and Soccer the next day. Soccer was fun. Lıttle dıd I know ıt and the weıght lıftıng had contrıbuted to my body beıng weak and destroyed. It ıs close to 48 hours later and I stıll cannot do a leg lıft, and my back ıs roarıng wıth dıscomfort. That wıll teach me for tryıng new thıngs and goıng ın wıth enthusıasm. So that ıs the gap fılled recap brıngıng me up to now.

Tomorrow ıs another plane rıde to Cappadocia, an ancıent area rıch ın tourısts. Hopıng for fun.

Most of my Day ın London and my Stressful Escape

When I reached Gatwick Aırport ın London I had been up for a bıt of tıme.  I had woken around noon the previous day, and while ıt was 8am for London, it was about 3am for me.  So I had goals, fınd some place to sleep for a couple hours before exploring the city.

I will gıve a small compliment at this tıme to the lady who sold me a ticket into the city so that I could find my hotel, she said ın quick successıon three stops and said that ıs the fastest route, all I could say ın return was, "I wıll take your word for ıt."  She then gave me a map with my changes circled and sent me on my way.

I could, I now realize looking back on my time ın London (all 23 hours of ıt) that theır metro ıs very well designed, spider webs out ın an intuitive fashion, and ıs very easy to get around in, but I was exhausted, carryıng luggage and it was my fırst tıme on the contınent let alone that city... Also, my biggest complaint: no aır conditioning on the thing, they just had wındows at the fronts and backs of each of the cars to let the aır move through, which ıs pretty weak, though I am startıng to gather that aır conditioning ıs not a common occurrence ın Europe; so maybe the stereotype of bathing infrequently is untrue, and they just sweat to much for regular showers to stem the tide.

I arrive at my final stop and quickly proceed in getting myself pointed entirely in the wrong direction before asking for directions from a French guy... Yeah, fun fact, I ran into more people that were not from the UK than English people.  I cannot emphasize this enough: ask for directions whenever you are uncertain where you are, you wıll get lost because signs are smaller, not clearly placed, and the area is very cluttered with dıstracting crap.

So I make it to the.  Palace.  That ıs my hotel.  Bleh.  Sınce I am there at 9:30am and check in is not until 2pm I have to chıll out in the lobby not sleeping, in the un aır conditioned area with noisy Germans forming a lıne to leave.  Central Park Hotel London near Fınsbury Park.  Just so you all know ıts name.  Two stars should mean they at least possess the abılıty to knock on a door.

Once 2pm mercifully rolls around I am back out on the town.  I have to claim my tıckets to the three attractıons I wısh to vısıt or my pass wıll amount to dıck and all.  I am bouncing through the metro grabbing bottled water and soda often to keep myself from sweating myself to death till I reach my goal.  The Tower of London.

The Tower is awesome.  Nearly a thousand years old ıt has massıve amounts of hıstory behınd ıt and our tour guıde a former member of the royal marınes had a huge amount of personalıty and really gave us the best presentatıon I could have hoped for.  I highly recommend thıs sıght ıf you are vısıtıng London ın the future.  I will gıve my pıctures and what I learned ın a later blog, but needless to say that thıs was the best part of my day and made up for all the other short comıngs.

(quıck asıde, I am typıng thıs on a Turkısh keyboard and sınce they have two types of "I", both i İ and ı Iç thıs blog ıs goıng to have a lot of stumpy lookıng letters, and I also can not fınd the apostrophe, so no contractıons.  Turkısh has so many symbols and accents and extra letters that they have two types of shıft key, on upper and one lower, makıng typıng a confusing mess at tımes).

Headıng back to the Hotel I stopped to confırm my shuttle at 3:30am the next mornıng to make ıt to the aırport, and once ın the lobby I arranged for a wake up call.  Well, "wake up call".  Thıs hotel has no AC, no mını-frıdges, and no phones.  Why?  Cause fuck me that ıs why.  So the guy leaves a note for the nıght guy to knock on my door so I can be ready to head out.  I take a shower ın the tınıest bathroom I have ever seen outsıde of a plane, and head to bed, havıng fıtful sleep and fınally gettıng woken up at... 4:20am!

Cause fuck me that ıs why!

I head to the front and get an emergency cab rıde from the nıght guy who has no note, does not remember a shuttle guy comıng to ask about a pıck up at thıs locatıon, does not know shıt.  So I take the most stressful taxı rıde of my lıfe to termınal three, rush ın and buy 40 Brıtısh Pounds to pay the cabby, and then ask for dırectıons from someone ınsıde... I am at the wrong termınal.

Cause fuck me that ıs... You get the ıdea.

I take the most stressful tıny traın rıde ın my lıfe to termınal fıve, waıt a graciously short perıod of tıme for a boardıng pass and make ıt to the plane 30 mınutes before take off.  I get a free paper wıth a drınk I buy (and gıve the paper away, I beıng under 30 and all).  I chıll out and prepare myself to head to Turkey.

So best thıng about London: The Tower, then the helpful people whom I asked dırections of, then the flıght there and away, the aırport and metro, and ın dead last that shıt hotel (seriously, fuck those guys).

The Random Notes I Took While on and Right After the Plane

_This is an experiment to see if my blog will post via this Android app, so here is hoping._

I am currently taking a flight in British Airways from Tampa to London. Having mostly just killed time in the terminal by reading 'The Hunger Games' I am finding that only an hour has passed since take off, which is a bit of a drag. I am tired but not sleepy, and I am wondering how much real time I will have tomorrow that I won't be suffering from exhaustion.

When I do finally get off then plane I will be heading to the nearby National Train station to take an hour long ride into the city proper ending at the park near my hotel. I will try to catch a nap before heading out on the town to see the Tower of London which is pretty much my priority destination. Monday morning will be difficult as I will have to be up early to get to Heatherow airport and I haven't been able to confim the means of shuttle from my hotel which is a sort of bus; the reason I could not confirm is that international phone calls are shit.

I am wondering why there is so much tolerance for a crying child. If I had whined his much on a trip I would have gotten slapped. Overall the flight is rather dull, my view is mostly of wing and the only other person in my set of three seats is a vastly older gentleman who has no trouble falling asleep.

A random blonde woman named Barbie just introduced herself to me wondering if I was someone she had met at a previous instance. I can never tell if this is legitimate or if this is a very subtle way of hitting on someone. Either way, I don't see where she goes on the plane and don't think I'll end up seeing her again.

I do not realize how much time I spend on or how much love I have for the internet until I am on this island of metal in the sky far from my usual means of surfing and networking. There is a limit to reading, though I believe my typing on this touch screen is almost as fast as it is on a keyboard; the only real downsides being the lack of arrow keys, and the need to switch the entire keyboard over to symbols in order to use a semi-colon or hyphen which slows things greatly. They are now serving drinks which is good, but I rather feel the need to go to the restroom, so fuel for the fire, and rain for the flood.

I can say with total honesty that was the best meal I have had on an aircraft in my life. They had a chicken and rice microwave thing, but they also had a roll some very well seasoned corn salad, a personalized bottle of white wine, some water of course, but then there was a great bit of cheese cake and a cup of very hot coffee.

I watched the movie 'The King's Speach' which was pretty boring, really whenever Georfry Rush isn't on screen the thing drops a whole star. I know it is difficult to act a stammer, but regardless of how well acted the movie was by everyone involved it was still boring. It was like watching traditional Shakespeare (especially when you consider how many allusions to the bard there were in the movie) yes it is good in its own way, but I don't care to watch it. Sadly the movie selection kicked off before I could watch another movie, though I did get in some 'Big Bang Theory and 'How I Met Your Mother' while eating. Overall I am very pleased with the entertainment on this flight, so much so that I am doubly disappointed that it has now crapped out with another three hours to go.

That damn child cried for another 10 minutes at 4:30am in London, 11:30pm Eastern time, so a win in neither time zone. Sad part being the kid is too old to be crying like that, he seems very spoiled, I can understand a baby getting upset for no reason, but it is night time, the kid should be napping having finished watching one of a dozen movies on the entertainment thing.

Some fun facts about where I am now, after taking a bumpy course up the coast of the US for numerous hours we are now over the night covered Atlantic, we are about even with English latitude and it it negative 58° farenheit outside, we are traveling about 40,000ft up, at about 580mph. Strange detail, the plane's reader has Tampa as the destination, so it is telling us we are getting further away from where we are headed but the destination clock is set to London, so it is counting down with what I imagine to be an accurate projection of our landing time.

I cannot seem to take a picture of the night sky or glowing horizon through the window, so... you'll have to take my word for it, that though my view is very much obscured by a gigantic wing (isn't that always the way), the sky is in fact rather nice to look at at this height and speed. Kind of looks like the horizon is on fire and the flames are lighting the sky above it.

Another small hicup I ran across. Turns out that the e-book I bought for the trip was not completely downloaded, nor was the sample book I grabbed. So, while I have enjoyed about a fifth or sixth of 'The Hunger Games', I lack so variety to my literature intake.

Crying again now it is 13:37am for the Eastern seaboard and 5:37am where I'm headed. And the brat just keeps getting louder.

I arrived on time to Gatwick airport and immediately got to a rail to take me to my hotel area, though street signs are hard to find so I got pretty lost for about a half hour before getting pushed in the right direction. If there is any advice I can give to people traveling it is this, 'do not be afraid to ask directions.'

I will continue to talk about my time in London at a later time, and maybe get some of my pictures up though that might end up being all at the end of the trip as a big recap series of the whole trip as the steps to put the pics on my tablet, then to put them on the website is a little time consuming. Right now I am about to go to brunch in a small area near Koc University with the rest of the students

posted from Bloggeroid

Starting My Trip to Europe and Asia

            I am taking a trip.  So far in my life I have cultivated opportunities to go places I have not been to various levels of success.  I went to Atlanta, Chicago, and Toronto with the Model United Nations in Undergrad.  I studied abroad in Beijing and Shanghai just after my graduation.  And now, some 4 years and a couple months after my last big trip, I will be taking my own little (2 month) trip to Europe.

            Tomorrow I will leave from Tampa, Florida on my way to London, England.  I'll only be there for about 22 hours, but in that time I hope to see the Tower of London and a couple other palaces/sights of interest.  Sadly my timing caused me to miss out on the bigger Stonehenge, Oxford, and Jack the Ripper tour I had been hoping for.  But I am quite happy with this.

Going here.

             Leaving London I will head to Istanbul, Turkey.  This area will take up the meatiest portion of my trip, being a 6 week study abroad venture which will hit the numerous hot spots in the city along with a few excursions out into the country.  This was the event around which I planned all the other bits of my trip.  I was committed to going as soon as I saw the Prof's power point for it in a class one day and realized that the length of the trip and the credits I would receive were greater than the trip to China I had taken after undergrad, and they were the same price.  I will also have a few free weekends that I will have to work out some plans for.  Maybe I can visit the Black Sea beach and wear a Speedo un-ironically.

And here.

             When I finally leave Istanbul I will head to Athens, Greece.  Hopefully two months from now the unrest over there will calm down because I want to see the birthplace of democracy, philosophy, and western civilization as we know it.  I will spend 10 days there as part of a tour package which will include various islands around the capital.

And here.

             After Athens I will head back to London but only long enough to drop off some luggage and take a bit of sleep so I can head to the tube and go to Paris, France.  I'll be there for about a day seeing the tourist centric locations of the Arch De Triumph and the Eifel Tower (I keep having this day dream play out in my head that I will get there and both of the French national treasures will be vastly smaller than what I pictured and when I say, "I always pictured it would be a bit bigger" a French guy behind me will call me, "Americans, size queens everyone of them" and being that I don't speak French I will just ignore the insult).

And I guess it does look pretty big.  So yeah, here too.

            From there I will bounce back to London and then to home.  Then I'll have a week of sitting around begging for money from loan agencies and then it will be back to college in Tallahassee to work my butt off trying to earn my duel Masters in International Affairs and Urban and Regional Planning.  This seems like a good course of events.

            Last month and part of this month I tried hard to produce a blog each day, and in doing so train myself to make very regular updates in hopes of chronicling my trip to the internet with my reflections.  So at the end of my trip when they ask for an 8-10 page reflection on the trip for my grades in the class (or however much they decide to request), I can hand them my blog url and say that I bested the request by about 10,000 words, many times 10,000 if you count pictures for the 1,000 words a piece that is common adage.  So my tertiary goal to 'Studying' 'Enjoy Myself', will be to (for the first time) use my blog to professionally benefit myself.  Wish me luck.

            If you liked my rambling, please click the Google "+1" button in the comments section, post the link on your facebook, or send people over from anywhere else you might social network.

Top 10 Words I Can't Spell

            This might not come as a shock but when I was growing up I was awful at spelling.  I have some form of dyslexia or thought disorder that makes me leave off letters when I write quickly or for too long, sometimes skipping over things.  So that instead of 'The' I will write 'Th', or instead of writing 'more' I will write 'mor'.  When it comes to writing larger words I could not grasp the 'i' before 'e' concept, and relied more on sounding things out (I am a very audio focused learner, it is why I talk to myself so much, I am hearing how something sounds so that I can know I am saying it correctly).

I am a Model of Self Control.

             However before I came to the modern times of spell-check and not-giving-a-shit I came up with another solution to my problems.  Whenever I would come to a word that I couldn't spell, I would just wrack my mind for a much more difficult word to use in its place.  That way, I thought, my teacher would be so impressed that I was trying to use a harder word, that she wouldn't mind that it had a misplaced 'e' or something.

            I believe that is why I also have such odd diction, I often mispronounce words, or over pronounce them, or pronounce them five or six different ways when I first read them to try and put them together in my head so I can write them down later.  So I have some people thinking I'm crazy, others who think I am from Britain because of how I pronounce random things. 

            This practice of turning 'varios' (various') to 'miscelanious' ('miscellaneous') is what I blame my current vocabulary and stilted speech on.  However I cannot spell most of what I say, which leaves me even more dependent on spell-check and not-giving-a-shit, when I have to write things out.  To that end the 10 words I use with high frequency that I can't trust myself to spell without a pause.

11) Finagle- verb; to obtain something by dishonest means. (Phinagle)

10) Flabbergasting- adjective; surprising or astonishing. (Flabergasting)

9) Philistine- adjective; materialistic and disdainful of intellectual and artistic virtues. (Filistine)

8) Troglodyte- noun; a primitive or cave dweller. (Troglodite)

7) Auxiliary- adjective; back up. (Axilary)

6) Tertiary- adjective; not of the top priority, below secondary. (Tersiary)

5) Extraneous- adjective; irrelevant. (Extrainious)

4) Delude- verb; deceive. (Dalude)

3) Deduce- verb; figure out. (Daduce)

2) Ascertain- verb; to find out with certainty. (Acertain)

1) Miscellaneous- adjective; various and irregular. (Miscelanious, my spelling has not improved since the second grade on this one)

I Dreamed of an Alternate Universe

            I just had the coolest, most complete story dream I have ever experienced, and it fit so well into my current life that it was kinda disturbing.

            In the dream I am waking up and just ready to move home from the current housing I am in and my brother will be arriving to help me move, that is when things start to get "Twilight Zone".

A lesson in subtle tension build.

             I notice subtle differences in how my room is laid out and what items were still there and not there, like I have a space heater and not my portable fan, the nails sticking out of the wall are different than the ones I know are currently sticking out of the wall, and I have a lot more random stuff cluttering up the place that needs to be put in moving bins.  I mention all of this to my brother, Seth once he arrives and he tells me flatly that I am delusional, and I try to tell him something odd is going on but he just thinks I'm being foolish.

            Then shit got real.

            I find out that Netflix is only a fledgling industry, that Facebook doesn't exist, and that the war in the Middle East has ballooned into full on massive multi national brouhaha that demands a draft.  The world seems emptier, and more cluttered with litter, people I know and am friends with don't know me at all.  And I am aware of all the changes, and how the world is wrong.

Thankfully, alternate reality Josh wasn't in the military, a place I would find myself short on training and experience and likely to end the dream missing a limb.

             Being who I am, I come to the conclusion that I am either getting an "It's a Wonderful Life" scenario or I am in a parallel dimension (Warning: Link leads to Tvtropes).  I begin hunting down friends of mine from this world who know science and explain things, but they don't know me from a crazy guy, I have no social networking sites to work with, and it is always apparently raining there, because at one point I am running through the rain down Tennessee Street in front of bizarre-world FSU howling at the dreary wet sky.  I had no idea I liked my life so much.  It is fortunate at that time I run into a friend of mine, Rachel who is running through the rain and I basically follow her talking and joking the whole time.

Sort of a Redemption in the Rain (Warning: Link leads to Tvtropes)

            She jokes about how women in general and her boyfriend wouldn't appreciate the stalker behavior, but she and I get along and she and I end up hanging out in what passes for a gym in the alternate world which is more like a gymnasium with mats intended for stretching and calisthenics, but no weight machines anywhere.  I of course downplay the man from an alternate dimension angle when talking to Earth-2 Rachel, playing off my current predicament as being in a new place that is familiar but so starkly different, more that I am unfamiliar with Earth-2 FSU, then the entire world being dreary.  She talks with me and at the end of it all I resign myself to simply being stuck in the alternate universe and at the very least getting to the extremely sad and lousy task of finding my friends from the other world to enjoy.  She is kind of wise in the real world too, just FYI.

            I begin patronizing Netflix and telling people by word of mouth to do the same, one good thing about the alternate world, DVD's still exist and the complete series of the 90's "X-Men" cartoon is available, and in a moment of brilliant creativity I watch my brain re-do that opening theme with an alternate cast with alternate uniforms, hence why I found the dream so complete with the illusion of a story and world creation, my brain focuses on the little things.

Wish I could draw, I envisioned some cool alternate costumes.  Also, yes watching a cartoon was a highlight of my dream!

             At the end of the dream I am back home in Sarasota county and I am about to walk into a mall entrance with my parents (strangely they are not different in this world, just like Seth) when I actually start to feel the universe crumble.  I, in movie ending fashion tell them, "Guys, I feel different, I think I'm going back."  Which they are thinking, 'why has our son finally lost his mind with the whole parallel dimension thing?'  I start hearing a distant chiming (which was my alarm going off to wake me) and I hug my alternate universe family and brother telling them, "I think I'll go back to being myself again, at least I hope so, but it's good to know that you guys are still as good in any world, even if it is a shit dystopia vision like this one."  (Seriously, if I am not giving you the classic vibe of a world that is bleaker than our own with the, no Facebook,  a GIANT DRAFT DEMANDING WAR, the constant rain, persistent litter, dirty floors like vacuums are outlawed, and a seeming emptiness that permeates the air, then try to crank up your vision of it to match).

            As I feel the world start to pull away from me, my Mom says, "Well, thanks" for my dystopia comment, and I say, "I love you guys" in a dead serious fashion.  They say, "We love you too." Then.  Blackness.

            And I woke up.

Some Thoughts on "Star Trek"

            "Star Trek" as a franchise is effectively now just going to be movies I think.  The last television series, "Star Trek Enterprise" was poorly executed because it was preachy, boring, and really betrayed a lot of the concepts that the mythos had taken as its core bailiwick.  It was more like the first season of "Star Trek The Next Generation" than it should have been, and didn't have the good music or original concepts that kept that series moving forward.

I won't deny that it had potential, and I blame the creative over seeing for the issues that it faced.

             "Trek" had attempted a cartoon show in the past, and while I think that the writing and voice work were as good as the original series, mostly the animation was bad and being that it was supposed to be aimed at kids it was neither action and fun oriented enough for a younger audience, nor was it high stakes enough for the older crowd (for instance, there were force field belts for the crew, this means that not only did they not have to animate space suits, it means that phasers were now even more useless as a means of intimidation and danger).  But sadly, much like live action, I think this is a dead venue.

I won't say it didn't have potential.  I blame the animation industry at the time.

             Really I think a lot of issues come up in this area: When do you set it?  Where do you set it?  And what will be the cast make up?  We already know what "Star Trek" is about, a group of adventurers heading out to space to explore and occasionally fight evil or be turned into pawns in a cosmic chess game by some obnoxious godlike being like V'ger or Q.  If I were to try and make the series this is what I would try to do with it.

Pompous Prick.

             Take a look at the last movie, and set the series at just after the events there in.  The Federation is rocked by the time traveling terrorist, Nero and the Vulcans are all but extinct.  What remains of the Vulcan security forces join with Star Fleet completely (as they have no where else to go and the future of the Vulcan race rests with the Federation).  This intelligence and security force would be the precursor to Section 31 that was seen in "Deep Space 9".

Had Potential, which it fulfilled.

             The show will take place in an unexplored region where the Federation will be looking for new colonial worlds in hopes of spreading out to the stars in an aggressive fashion, in hopes that if a force like Nero ever appears again humanity and their allies will simply be to far flung and numerous to ever wash away from the galaxy.

You know, so they will never be... Lost in Space.

             I think that the cast will be a group of settlers out on the edge of space, they will have a Vulcan intelligence officer who will be far too willing to shoot first and ask questions later, and the central tension of the cast will be between the need of the Vulcan's to secure themselves against threats, and the desire of the rest of the Federation to continue to explore and make peaceful contact.  I think that the chief antagonist outside of this cast tension should be the Romulans, who want the remaining Vulcans to simply come and join with their civilization and cease to be a distinct race at all, a tempting offer to the members of the crew who think that the Federation are not taking the steps necessary to secure the Vulcan's as a society anyway.

            I would say that you could have a new version of Q as part of the conflict, a Founder that was sent off from the dominion, and even the Borg, since the timeline is altered you don't have to delay their introduction.

            It's not like the thing would be hard to cast, there are legions of genre actors that have just gotten off of "Lost", "Heroes", "BattlestarGalactica", "V", and "Stargate", not to mention everything that Joss Whedon has ever touched.  You could have Michael Shanks play a ship doctor, Anthony Stewart Head play the ship's Captain, and get Morena Baccarin to play the Vulcan security officer.

He could totally pull off being a Star Fleet Captain.

            It's not like other projects haven't been spinning around Hollywood since the whole damn idea got going.  People, a lot of people, would like this to get going, and I really don't think there is anything wrong with trying out something.

Holy shit.  That is Bryan Singer.

             Truth be told, while I loved the last movie it would not have been the ideal way to restart the franchise.  Creating original characters and having them do adventures based off of something previously established in the shows would have been the ideal solution, you could set it a couple decades after the last movie, have a character that wears gold face paint and suggest that the designs for Data were used, after his death, to create more androids for Star Fleet's use.  Have Bruce Greenwood play the captain, Chris Pine play the young recruit, and Zachary Quinto playing a Vulcan science officer... Hey look at that you don't even need to find a new cast, they all fit anyway.  What would the story be?  Captain Sisko, a Federation hero who disappeared after the Dominion War, having been abducted by godlike time traveling aliens has returned and is heralding a great warning, a giant planet destroying ship from the future is coming to attack the Federation.  This mysterious ship appears, destroys Vulcan with a strange super weapon and begins heading to Earth.  The crew manages to beat it, by infiltrating it and discovers a new alien threat.

Captain Ben Sisko, he's so badass that the only surface large enough to record all of his accomplishments, is his dick -SFdebris

            You have successfully tied together "The Next Generation", "Deep Space Nine", and if you wanted to you could grab Jeri Ryan to reprise her role as Seven of Nine, she having barely aged all of those years because she is part Borg, there you just tied in "Voyager" as well.  Want a reference to "Enterprise" and the original series?  Then call the new ship the "Archer" or the "Kirk" and you are done.  But honestly you shouldn't be referencing "Enterprise" nobody liked that show, even the people who claim to are just lying to themselves.  No confusing time travel, the aliens are left mysterious and thus you don't need motivations, they are just time traveling assholes.

Though I guess we do already have a science fiction icon who deals with time traveling assholes.  Worst comes to worst though and I have a winning idea: Crossover!

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