Over the next few weekends, we’re going off to visit some of the graduate schools Laura’s considering. We’re going to visit Austin this coming weekend (March 23–25) and Seattle the next (March 29–31). While Laura is visiting the schools, I’ll be wandering around the cities; does anyone have any suggestions for things that would be good to do, see, or eat in Austin or Seattle?

Here in Mountain View, today’s high was 78° F and the low is forecasted at 53°. Less than two weeks ago (February 28), the high was 53° and the low was 37°.

I know daylight savings time is supposed to give us more sun, but this is ridiculous!

Last night, I decided to go to Ramon’s Burrito Real, on Rengstorff, for a taco salad. Imagine my surprise when I pulled up, got out of my car, walked inside, and discovered that while it was still a Mexican restaurant, it was a different Mexican restaurant. Apparently Burrito Real is no longer in business.

I believe Burrito Real was started by the same people who run La Costeña, and the burritos at both are nearly identical (and top-notch), but Burrito Real had a more varied menu, including the Real Salad which I liked and isn’t available at La Costeña.

I didn’t try the new place (“Tapatio’s”) to see if it was any good; there are plenty of Mexican restaurants I know I like already. I usually prefer the taco salad at Buenobueno, but sometimes I’m in the mood for the one at Burrito Real instead, and I will miss it.

“Flashback” was Voyager‘s tribute episode for Star Trek‘s 30th anniversary. Janeway and Tuvok engage a mind meld and relive the events of Star Trek VI through the eyes of Tuvok, who was a junior science office on the Excelsior. This episode is not the best, but it was not nearly as bad as I remembered it being. It aired about the same time as the much-superior Deep Space Nine episode “Trials and Tribble-ations”—where the DS9 crew travel back in time to the original Star trek episode “The Trouble With Tribbles—and I think the Voyager episode paled in comparison.

My recollection of this episode, which I hadn’t seen in over ten years, had been that it did a poor job of honoring the original series. I remember Janeway telling Tuvok he was right to object to Sulu’s command to rescue Kirk and McCoy, and then her speech:

It was a very different time, Mr. Kim. Captain Sulu, Captain Kirk, Dr. McCoy. They all belonged to a different breed of Starfleet officer. Imagine the era they lived in….
It’s not surprising they had to bend the rules a little. They were a little slower to invoke the Prime Directive, and a little quicker to pull their phasers. Of course, the whole bunch of them would be booted out of Starfleet today.

On re-watching, the episode is a little more nostalgic. Janeway finishes with “But I have to admit, I would have loved to ride shotgun at least once with a group of officers like that,” and later expresses satisfaction with Tuvok’s memory and his nostalgia. It’s still not the adoring romp through the past that was “Trials and Tribble-ations,” but perhaps it will do.

The other thing I remember, though, which still holds up ten years later, is that George Takei’s acting seemed off. Sulu seemed very over the top, and while he was always exuberant, this episode seems more like Takei impersonating Sulu rather than playing him. Perhaps it’s just that he’s reproducing scenes from Star Trek VI, the direction is different, and they don’t match up in my head, but it was as jarring to watch this time as it was the first.

Most telling, though, may be that as I was watching “Flashback”, I noticed each time they re-used an effects shot from Star Trek VI, or re-shot a scene with different words, or cut between new and old footage. On the other hand, when I watched “Trials and Tribble-ations,” even though the episode was one giant visual effects trick, I forgot to notice. The story was compelling and natural enough that I actually forgot that they had inserted the DS9 characters into scenes shot thirty years earlier. It wasn’t until I watched the “Making of” special on the bonus disk that I realized I had forgotten they didn’t just go back in time to 1968 to film new scenes with Shatner, Nimoy and the rest. It was that good. The Voyager episode was not up to par, although passable as a standalone piece. I give it a B-.

Haven’t written in a while. Here’s an update: I finished watching Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. I couldn’t quite bring myself to start Voyager right after that, so I took a break and watched season five of The Sopranos. Then I started Voyager; I’ve just started the third season. I always thought I stopped watching Star Trek: Voyager after the second season, but I think I’m still in familiar territory, so it must have been after the third season when I stopped watching.