Suprising Star Trek Fans

A few weeks ago, Linda and I had to travel to Atlanta for the funeral of my aunt Beverly. It was a sad occasion; Beverly had beaten cancer three times, and she died from catching a cold. Still, she and my uncle Jerry had driven 750 miles to bring my grandparents to Miami for Linda's and mine's wedding, and was not going to miss saying goodbye to her, even if it meant a 225 mile drive for us on a rainy morning. You see, family always comes first with me (a theme you can see in many of my stories, especially Chekov's Enterprise).

En route, Linda and I were listening to talk radio, and to Glenn Beck in particular. Beck is not my favorite commentator; I don't share a lot of his views, but he is, at least, quite entertaining. Beck had launched into a global warming tirade with his impression of Al Gore warning us that if global warming doesn't stop, the surface of the Earth will melt and be covered by lava, and soon he was revisiting "The Savage Curtain" with Yarnek and the Excalbians and everything else in between. It was hilarious, quite literally, and Linda and I had something to laugh about. Beck's impersonation of Yarnek was spot-on, and it was quite a spoof of the global warming scenario.

After the funeral, on the long drive back to Albany, Linda and I were reflecting on the fact that Glenn Beck had to be a huge Star Trek fan in order to do such a complete spoof of "The Savage Curtain." And he had to expect that most of his audience would get it. You wouldn't dream of doing that sort of spoof unless you knew your audience had a lot of Trek fans in it. But I just couldn't get over it that Glenn Beck was a Star Trek fan.

As Gomer Pyle would say, "Surprise, surprise, surprise!"

Randy