Another milestone on my Ph.D. journey… got my first “Revise and Resubmit” today on a journal article I submitted. Most of the comments are fair and straightforward to address. Some of them are more complicated. I’ll make the changes and we’ll see what happens.
It’s not quite grilling weather, yet… but I still decided to cook out tonight.
Hiked the loop behind our house this morning, but in the opposite direction from our normal routine. It’s strange, but simply reversing the route was a very different experience. Also explored a nature preserve nestled between the old golf course and some subdivisions.
Enjoyed my son’s honors elementary orchestra concert. Pretty amazing these kids have been playing for less than a year.
Sadly, Facebook and Twitter are still very useful to check on friends after mass shootings. Praying for Michigan State.
Beautiful day on campus today.
Tried out a new trail on our Sunday morning walk.
Excited for the big game today… No, not the Super Bowl. #1 South Carolina vs #3 LSU. Last two unbeaten teams in women’s college basketball meet in Columbia in front of a sold out crowd of 18,000. Game tips at 2:00 on ESPN. 🏀
Hey @futuregeek. What do you think?
My five favorite new Star Trek characters
New Star Trek means new characters
Star Trek is all about the characters and relationships on the ship. With all the new series on Paramount+, they’ve introduced a bunch of interesting characters that I’ve grown to love. With Season 3 of Star Trek: Picard starting next week, I figured I’d share five new characters1 who I’m glad are part of the Star Wars Universe.
WARNING: A HANDFUL OF SPOILERS BELOW FOR DISCOVERY, STRANGE NEW WORLDS, PRODIGY AND LOWER DECKS.
Ensign Sylvia Tilly
Played by Mary Wiseman on Star Trek: Discovery. When Star Trek first relaunched with Discovery, Tilly was such a different type of crew member. For all of the great Star Trek characters over the years, very few were quirky and likable.2 Her relationships with Burnham, Stamets and Saru are wonderful. I wasn’t happy how they used her over the last season — eventually shipping her off to Starfleet Academy — but I hope next season includes a healthy dose of Tilly.
Rok-Tahk
Voiced by Rylee Alazraqui on Star Trek: Prodigy. If you haven’t seen Prodigy, you’re missing out. Rok-Tahk is my favorite character from the crew. At first, Rok appears to be a fierce creature, but once the universal translator kicks in, you figure out that despite her intimidating form, she’s actually just a young girl with an interest in science. Her relationship with the Janeway hologram was encouraging and nurturing and I loved every minute of it. I look forward to seeing how she interacts with Admiral Janeway next season.
Christine Chapel
Jes Bush on Star Trek: Strange New Worlds. I know Nurse Chapel appears in the Original Series and a couple of movies, but Jes Bush’s interpretation of the character is so different and distinctive. Chapel is incredibly smart and capable. And yes, she has a crush on Spock, but their relationship is much more nuanced and complex. We know where this character is heading, but I look forward to seeing how this version of Chapel develops.
Ensign Beckett Mariner
Voiced by Tawny Newsome on Star Trek: Lower Decks. Lower Decks has so many great characters, but Mariner is my favorite. She’s a screw up, who also happens to be incredibly capable when she wants to be. Her relationship with her friends, her rivals and her mom are all complex and delightful. Depending on the episode, Beckett may create a massive problem — or she could be the one to save the day. The end of last season was heartbreaking when her mom and friends thought she’d sold out the Cerritos crew. Many of the relationships were patched up in the finale, but I wonder if there will be lasting repercussions.
Captain Saru
Doug Jones on Star Trek: Discovery. Look, I know Captain Michael Burham is the star of the show, but Saru is the captain I’d want to serve under. Intelligent, thoughtful and competent. His personal backstory is wonderful, and I’m really interested to see his relationship with the leader of Vulcan develop. I’m not sure how Doug Jones can express so much emotion through all of that makeup. It’s seriously impressive.
Finally, while it’s not a character, I want to give a shoutout to Lower Deck’s California class ships, especially the U.S.S. Cerritos. The idea that there are some average ships in the fleet is great. Other Star Trek shows focus on the glamorous flagship, but not every ship is the U.S.S. Enterprise.
- Well… Five new and one reimagined.
- You could argue that Barclay was quirky, but he was intentionally annoying. Neelix was intended to be quirky, but he was really just creepy.
Bob Wertz is a creative director, type designer, Ph.D. student and researcher living in Columbia, South Carolina.
Just stumbled across a video of the commencement address from when I graduated from the University of South Carolina in 1997, given by lengedary author Pat Conroy. I’ve long said my graduation speaker was the best. Now I have video evidence.
Just saw a picture of me from six years ago today… wearing the exact same shirt that I’m wearing today.
I’m excited about the new Canon R50. I’ve wanted to buy a mirrorless Canon for a while, but the M-series were clearly a dead end and the R-series were a little too expensive. I think this probably hits the sweet spot for me. Also, weird to see all the sample images in this DP Review post were taken in Charleston.
Saw a Mercedes EQS 450 on the road this afternoon. Beautiful electric car. Tesla has some serious competition on the luxury side of the EV market.
My daughter bought a bag of Brach’s Wisecracks “End the Conversation” Hearts with messages like “NOPE,” “FRND ZONE” and “4 NEVER” printed on the candy hearts.
I knew I’d gotten out of the habit of writing regularly over the last year, but I realized tonight that I also haven’t been sketching, either. The last entry in my sketchbook — prior to tonight - was from August. I need to make time for exploring ideas with pencil and paper.
Adding a "now" page
I decided to add a now page to my site. My challenge was deciding what to include on the page. I already had a pretty complete about page. After looking at a collection of now pages, I realized that there isn’t a single formula or approach. So for my first attempt, here’s what I decided to add.
- What I’m working on
- Recently written
- Recent media favorites
- Active websites and profiles
- Social media accounts
I also moved the status of the fish in the header to this page. The fish changes from time to time based on my mood so that explanation makes more sense on my “now” page.
I’m sure my approach will change over time. Everything needs to be manually updated and I’m thinking I’ll update every month or so.
Bob Wertz is a creative director, type designer, Ph.D. student and researcher living in Columbia, South Carolina.
I missed Twitter today during the South Carolina/UConn women’s basketball game so I went over to Twitter to check out the chatter. (Gamecock ‘Fams’ are notoriously active on Twitter during games.) Instead, Twitter kept serving up tweets from yesterday’s men’s game… almost a day old. Eventually I gave up. It’s not the same.
Big win on the road, though. #1 South Carolina came from behind to beat #5 UConn. 🏀
Medium length posts
I feel like I always write things that are either “tweet” length or “long.” I don’t feel like I ever post anything in between. This tendency isn’t new… I’ve always written that way and I’m not sure why. Most of my favorite online writers routinely share posts of various lengths, but I’ve never changed my approach. As I try to get back in the rhythm of writing, I think I need to embrace the middle ground. Opting to post reflections more than complete essays. Questions instead of answers. Paragraphs instead of pages. We’ll see how it goes.
Bob Wertz is a creative director, type designer, Ph.D. student and researcher living in Columbia, South Carolina.
Just picked up The Cruel Stars by John Birmingham from the library. I’ve been reading a lot of non-fiction lately. Ready to read some sci-fi. 📚
I think this “Baby Space Scooter” is my favorite of Dana’s baby space Lego series.
A friend is building a “baby-scale” homage to Classic Lego Space and posting pictures to Instagram. They are absolutely amazing.
CNN reports that the Chinese surveillance balloon just passed over Asheville, North Carolina near the Biltmore Estate. Maybe they are just scouting excellent vacation locations in the US. 🤣
Since I stopped using Twitter, I’ve been following a handful of Twitter users that I care about with Feedbin. It’s worked well, but I assume that feature in Feedbin will go away with the new API costs and restrictions.
I wrote a review of Four Shades of Gray: The Amazon Kindle Platform for New Media & Society. It’s just a short review, but it’s my first bit of academic publishing.