We will blame this kitten…

…if you don’t come to our show.

Sea Tea Improv

Sunday, July 19, 2009

7:00pm

at

City Steam Brewery

942 Main Street

Hartford, CT 06103

Good beer.  Good improv. Bad kitten.

or we will eat this kitten.

Flying Blind III Performance

FREE show and a cash bar.

Go ahead. Save the kitty.

Sunday, May 31^st

7:00pm

Rehearsal Studio 1

942 Main Street

Hartford, CT 06103

Flying Blind is an Adult Acting Class offered by Hartford Stage Education.
Check out www.hartfordstage.org or call
(860) 520-7206 for more information.

PROLOGUE

Space… the final frontier. But what happens when the final frontier has been secured?… when all but the deepest reaches of space has become as tightly woven as a bright red Starfleet command uniform? Soon life in that space is all too familiar.  The most ambitious crave the thrill of the days when battles between Starfleet and Romulans, Kilngons, or Cardassians were the highlights of Starfleet Command’s weekly subspace reports.

Now there is a tense peace in the galaxy.  The Romulans have not made contact with the Federation in three years Earth standard.  The Cardassians, with their surprisingly successful civilian government, have changed their ways.  When a planet near the Federation/Cardassian border endured a nuclear holocaust, rather than take advantage of a plant perfect for colonization, the Cardassian Council offered to help with the relief efforts to Saev II.

And the Klingons.  Those barbaric war criminals.  The pain their attacks have brought on the thousand worlds of the Federation will never be forgotten, yet some wish for another crack at Klinzhai or the Klingon Armada.  Who could imagine that soon it would be the Federation’s and its Starfleet’s only option?  Survival… the original frontier.

CHAPTER I

“Aaaaaaagh!!!”  The battle cry cut the thick air of Klizhai’s atmosphere like Worf’s latinum-plated bat’tehl had cut into both of his Klingon opponent’s hearts.  When Worf ripped the bat’tehl back out the Klingon’s dark skin, he heard him thank him for letting him die in battle.

Worf jumped at the hiss of the Holosuite doors behind him.  “Since when do you do your battle training with Klingon opponents?”, said Lieutenant Commander Jahdzia Dax while she stared at the bloody Klingon corpse to the left of Worf.

“Computer, freeze program,” began Worf.  “It has come to my attention that since the Klingons have attacked various Cardassian outposts near Federation space, I may be forced to fight one of my own people in a confrontation between a Federation ship and an Armada ship.  I am attempting to de-sensitize myself.”

“Why the Home World background?”

“Ah, you recognize the planet.”  Worf was surprised by her knowledge of his sacred homeland away from homeland.

“Kerzon once spent three Klhinzhai standard years there.  You still haven’t answered my question, Commander.”

The term all but shocked the Klingon officer.  It had been two months since the ceremony on the Defiant when Captain Sisko promoted worf to Commander.  He had barely gotten used to being called Lieutenant Commander Worf.  He longed for the days when Captain Jean-Luc Picard called him Lieutenant on the bridge of the Enterprise.  But those days were gone…

“Commander?…  Commander Worf, are you alright?”  Jahdzia saw him shake his head as he awoke from his trance.

“Adrenalin.”

“Excuse me?”, asked Lt. Cmdr. Dax, quite confused.

“The air of Klinzhai stimulates the adrenal glands of Klingons.  It helps me fight more aggressively.”, replied Worf, sounding suspiciously like his old friend Data.

“Well, let’s see what it does for Trill adrenal glands, eh?  Computer, bat’tehl!  Set difficulty level three!”

Dax grabbed her holographic bat’tehl and Worf stood ready with his now blood covered, latinum-plated one.  As two heavily armed Klingons rushed from either side, the Starfleet officers stood back to back, weapons raised and lips curled in sneers.  The Klingon blood flowed as Dax’s bat’tehl punctured various vital organs of the holographic drone.  As it fell back and vaporized, Dax saw Worf fall to the ground out of the corner of her eye.  With one swing of her weapon, she beheaded the Klingon.  When Jahdzia looked down at Worf, winked at him, and extended her hand, he realized what her husband saw in her and he realized, too, that he loved her.  But he respected Dr. Bashir too much to show it, and he envied him now more than ever.

The comm system came on followed by Captain Sisko’s familiar voice, “Worf, Dax, I need you on the Defiant… now!”

“Acknowledged”, they replied simultaniously. Worf commanded the computer to end the program and while the red-gray skies of the Klingon Home World faded to the yellow grid on the black walls of the Holosuite, Worf grabbed his bat’tehl and led Lt. Cmdr. Dax out the doors back into Quark’s Bar.  The shifty Ferengi bar-owner approached Worf, not even trying to hide the greed within himself.  “Ah, Commander Worf, how nice to see you.  I was wondering if you…”

“I have no time for this”, snapped Worf while he fished around in his pocket.  “Here,” Worf dropped four slips of latinum in Quark’s seemingly always open hands, “this should cover my Holosuite tab.  You may keep the excess payment for yourself.”

“Thank you very much, Mr. Worf.”  Quark’s face showed such a big smile that his huge Ferengi ears raised almost four centimeters from their normal position.  He sung under his breath as he dropped the latinum slips one by one into his shirt pocket.  “Profit, profit, profit, la, la, la, profit!!!”  He raised his voice so the entire bar could hear, “Come again, Mr. Worf!  Come any time!”  Quark watched the two leave the bar, happy as an Orion heatslug in lava that he had made almost enough latinum from Worf to run the Holosuites for the rest of the year.

“I miss the Holodecks on the Enterprise.  They were free to all Starfleet officers.”  Dax was surprised at Worf’s attempt to make conversation.

“The poor Ferengi’s just trying to make a dishonest living.”  Dax smiled and looked up at the stern Klingon.

“Yes.”, Worf answered smugly, knowing that he could not laugh at the joke the Lt. Cmdr. had made or he might lose his reputation as the strictest officer on Deep Space Nine.  And his only competition had just turned the corner in the corridor where he and Dax were walking.

“Hello, Odo.”

“Ah, Lt. Cmdr. Dax,… and Commander Worf.  Are you heading to the Defiant, too?”

“Why are you going aboard the Defiant?”  Worf’s voice cut the tension between him and Constable Odo like the bat’tehl he carried in his left hand.  Odo smiled at the disgruntled Klingon, and he knew he did not want to push his luck.  Ever since Odo had put Commander Worf in his place when Worf compromised the investigation of a smuggler on the station, there has been a sort of concealed hatred between the two.  Odo knew that Worf was the chief of security on the Enterprise for seven years, but he had felt that it was his duty to show him that the security of the station was Odo’s business and no one else’s.

“The captain informed me that the situation was a matter of the security of the station.”  Worf had heard the constable emphasize the word “security” and that made his Klingon blood heat further.

“Very well.”, said Worf trying to hide his emotions, but almost intentionally did a bad job at it.  “It will be good to have you aboard.”  Dax could almost smell the sarcasm.

“That’s a very nice bat’tehl, Worf.  Did you get that on the Home World?”  Worf knew she would succeed in in calming him down, so he did not resist her first attempt.

“It is from the Home World, but I did not purchase it.  It was a gift.”  Both Dax and Odo thought it, but only Dax had the courage to ask.

“Who gave it to you, Mr. Worf?”

Worf dared not lie, or he would dishonor his name and his son.  Hmm… my son. Worf realized the irony in the fact that his son and the answer to Lt. Cmdr. Dax’s question.  “My… wife gave it to me.”  Worf decided to ignore the shock on Dax’s face and the smirk on Odo’s.  Worf had trusted the Constable with his secret when he gave the mandatory update to his Starfleet resume when he joined DS9’s crew.  They had arrived at the turbolift.  The three filed into the booth one at a time; Worf allowed Dax in first and Constable Odo brought up the rear.  “Boarding Dock 3.”  Worf went on to explain.  “After the Enterprise was destroyed,” Worf swallowed the lump in his throat, “Starfleet granted the crew extended shore leave until they could be reassigned.  Deanna Troi, the ship’s councellor, and I decided to spend some time together.  She wanted to return to Betazed.  We took the next transport ship to Earth to retrieve my son, Alexander.  We thought we could live as a family on Betazed, but…”  Worf paused while the group stepped out of the turbolift.  “I don’t think that this is the appropriate time to discuss this.”

Dax smiled and nodded to the ensigns on either side of the rolling door that led to the bridge of the Defiant, despite her burning anticipation to hear the rest of Worf’s story.  Odo knew that Dax was hiding her feelings.  Like a Vulcan, the changeling thought as he recalled the first time he met a Vulcan.  What was that name?… ah, K’Gal.  Lieutanant K’Gal.  The Lieutenant was Odo’s first insight into the complex behavioral patterns of the humanoid psyche.  This is what led him to study just that.

On the Defiant, Odo seemed completely out of his element.  Worf hurredly showed Odo his seat to the left of Captain Sisko’s command chair and Odo took it just as fast, seeing the Captain’s impatience in his brow.  Worf and Dax sat at their stations and awaited a a briefing which it was obvious Sisko could not wait to give.  “I admit I have given you all leeway in the past as to responding to my comm badge signal and maybe it has spoiled you, but from now on I am going to be running a tight ship.  And Odo, you are going to run the station just as tight.”  Odo nodded in acknowledgement.  “The future of the Federation depends on it and what we are about to do next.  Since the collapse of the old Cardassian government 5 years ago, Gul Dukat and Major Kira have been meeting secretly in the Gamma Quadrant.  They hope to be able to forge an alliance between the Cardassian Empire and Bejor.”

Worf almost jumped out of his chair at the Captain’s disclosure of the situation.  “But Captian, attempting to form an alliance with a non-Federation planet or association is grounds to void a planet’s membership in the Federation.  It is also grounds to void a planet’s application for membership.”

“Mr. Worf!  Might I remind you that quoting Starfleet and Federation regulations to a commanding officer may be interpreted as and act of insubordination!”  Sisko stood his ground as captain of the Defiant and as commander of DS9, but he still couldn’t help but smile at his Chief of Strategic Operations’ failure to see the strategy in the negotiations.

“Commander Worf, the Federation’s ambassadors voted unanimously to continue to honor Bejor’s application for membership.  they feel that the negotiations, and eventually and alliance, will be the stepping stone to the planets of the Cardassian Empire joining the Federation.”  Sisko paused as he sat down in the middle chair, his chair.  “Major Kira and Dukat have been meeting with the Prophets in the wormhole.  After I told the Prophets that I agreed to the negotiations, they agreed to do what they could to help forge the alliance.  Anyway, we are here because the plan backfired.  There was some sort of energy discharge in the wormhole and their two shuttles were blown out of the end of the wormhole in the Gamma Quadrant.  We just received Major Kira’s distress signal at 1100 hours, three days after she left the station.”

Chief Petty Officer Miles O’Brien glanced down at the wrist chronometer he had won from Morn two days ago in a game of darts at Quark’s.  It showed 1141.  “I had Chief O’Brien run 5 separate full sensor sweeps of the wormhole before you got here.  What are your conclusions, Chief?”

The question concerned O’Brien because he did not want to disappoint the captain with his findings.  “Well,” O’Brien cleared his throat, “the sensor readings are… inconclusive.  What I mean is, they may be taken in different ways.  I detected an afterimage of an antimatter flare-up.  This could either be the result of accidental ignition of plasma during ventilaton, or it could be… a warp core breech.”

Sisko did not want to linger on the negative.  “What about the condition of the wormhole; is it safe for travel?”

“That’s what worries me, Captain.  The diameter of the wormhole has decreased be approximately 250 parsecs because of the wormhole’s inverse effect on the explosion and the pull of the explosion of the wormhole iteself.  We know something must have happened to the runabout and the Cardassian shuttle, but I can’t find a thing wrong with travelling into the wormhole.”

Sisko decided to take a chance for the greater good of the future of Cardassia Prime, Bejor, and the Federation.  “Cheif, release docking clamps and swing her around 180 degrees.  Plot a course for the wormhole and prepare to engage at full impulse.  Mr. Worf, be ready for anything in there.  Dominion, Maquis, even the Klingons.  Especially the Klingons.  Dax, go talk to Julian in sickbay about preparing an emergency rescue if it’s necessary.  And, uh, try to keep it strictly business in the there, Old Man.”  Sisko winked at his long time friend and patted her on the back as she headed to the turbolift.  He turned and walked toward his ready room.  “Major Kira, you have the…”  The reality of the situation hit the captain hard for the first time.  His first officer was lost, maybe dead.  The representatives of Bejor and the Cardassian Empire were gone along with hopes of allying two long time enemies.  And where would the fingers point?  To the Federation, Starfleet, and eventually him.  His own hide was on the line, and greedy as it sounded, nothing was going to stand in the way of his dream of retiring form Starfleet as a highly decorated admiral, returning to Earth with Cassidy (Sisko was counting on the fact that they would be married by then) and baby-sitting Jake’s children while Jake is away on Titan finding inspiration for his next best-selling novel.  This is up to me.

“Nevermind,” Sisko said to cover his mistake as he did an about-face.  He sat back down in his chair and gave the command that would lead him into his future.  “Engage.”

CHAPTER II

Captain’s Log. Stardate XXXXX.X.  The ship has left DS9 and entered the wormhole.  Commander Worf recommended using the cloaking device for precautionary measures.  I agreed and had Cheif O’Brien activate the device and I also issued a yellow alert.  The ship is carrying a skeleton crew of only 6.   I only hope that we can find Kira and Dukat without and confrontation.  I don’t think she would survive one.

Chief O’Brien’s jaw dropped as he saw the results from his second sensor sweep since entering the wormhole.  His hand trembled as it moved slowly and tapped his comm badge.  “Captain, you’d better come see this.”

Sisko jogged out of his ready room and looked up at the visual display.  O’Brien decided it was best to show the captain what he was talking about.  “Computer, grid.  Magnify section D-10 and enhance.”  O’Brien continued talking, but Sisko couldn’t hear him.  All he cared about was the horror he saw before him on the visual display.  Copernicus. Sisko read the name off the bloody, twisted piece of metal that was once part of the hull of Major Kira Narice’s runabout.  As if he hadn’t seen enough, a disembodied pale arm spun slowly our from behind the debris, its hand clenched in such a tight fist that its long feminine nails punctured the skin of the palm.

Behind him, Constable Odo went limp in his chair.  His changeling body began to lose its form.  Dead. My love… Odo looked at the mess on the floor of the bridge next to Chief O’Brien and realized he would have done the same thing if he had a stomach… or ate.

After what seemed like years, Sisko’s mind became clear.  Dukat’s ship is still out there. “Commander Worf, take the Cheif and Odo to sickbay.”  Sisko tapped his comm badge and Worf had trouble picking up the constable in his liquid state.  “Dax, I need you on the bridge.  The Commander is on his way down to replace you.”

“On my way, Benjamin.”

The bridge was silent now, and Sisko began to mourn the death of his first officer, his friend, Major Kira Narice of the Bejoran Military.  “Computer, Captain’s log, supplimental.  Stardate XXXXX.X.  Today, the crew of Deep Space Nine and the starship Defiant lose more than an officer or a friend.  Today they lose a heroine.  It shall not be forgotten that Major Kira Narice died for the future of Bejor.  For the Federation.  Let it be forever known that Kira Narice was sent forth to the Prophets with the blessing of the Emmisary.  Kira Narice, dead today at the age of 17 years Bejoarn standard.”  Sisko paused to bow his head and say the Bejoran Rite of Passage into Death quietly.  “Computer, end log entry.”

Captain Sisko took the conn of his ship and began the tedious work of cleaning up and salvaging the shuttle and the major’s remains.  To his benefit, O’Brien had had already tied in transporter controls to the conn.  It had been so long since he had been at the helm of any ship, he had forgotten how.  The silence of the bridge had broken with the blip of his comm badge.  “Bridge to sickbay.  Dr. Bashir, how are Odo and the Cheif coming along?”

“O’Brien’s on his way back up there, Captain.  The constable is resting comfortably in a puddle on one of my med tables.”

“Very good, Doctor.  I need you to prepare a temporary… morgue.”

“After Worf told be what happened, I set up a stasis field around med table four.  You can beam Major Kira’s remains directly there.”

“Thank you, Doctor.  I would appreciate your autopsy results by 1300 hours.  Mr. Worf, report to the cargo bay.  I will be tractoring the pieces of the shuttle there after I transport the remains.  You have to find out what happened to the Copernicus.  Sisko out.”  Captain Sisko locked on to all the organic material in the debris and beamed it to the med table in sickbay.

“I… I have received the remains.  Bashir out.”  Even the Doctor was shocked by the gore of it all.  Sisko stood up and walked to his normal chair when he heard Dax walk in.

“Take the helm, Old Man.  I seem to have lost my knack for it.”  Jahdzia half-smiled while she wiped her eye.  “Are you alright?  Because if you need…”

“No.  I need something to do to keep my mind off… it.”

“If you insist.  I need you to tractor the rest of the runabout into the cargo bay for study.  I’ll be in my ready room; you have the bridge,” Sisko stopped to question the hastiness of his next remark, “Number One.”

“Benjamin, Commander Worf is much more qualified…”

Sisko spun around looking somewhat psychotic.  “Listen, Lieutenant Commander.  My decision is final.  If you wish to step down from the first officer position, send a subspace message back to Deep Space Nine and I’ll read it when we get back.  But for now, you will be my first officer.  Now you get that shuttle in the cargo bay and take us into the Gamma Quadrant.”  The doors to his ready room flew open as if they were sensitive to his rage.  In his ready room, Sisko sat in the second-most comfortable chair on the Defiant, his hand nervously playing with his prized baseball.  He stood up and began pacing back and forth, back and forth, his pace increasing each time.  His anger intensified as he felt it gather around the ball in his hand.  Then, with the passion and fury of a Klingon warrior in battle, Sisko screamed a scream that echoed through the entire ship and hurled that baseball through the personal access display device on his desk.

With fragments of glass, plastic, and isolinear chips flying in what seemed like slow motion; Sisko realized what he had to do.   “I will find whoever did this and I swear by whatever gods there are that I will destroy the very souls of those bastards!!!“  Sisko’s eyes rolled back in his head and the air from his lungs escaped as he collapsed face-first to the floor.  His communicator chirped as it made contact with the tritanium surface.  Sisko couldn’t hear in his unconcious state, nonetheless Dac’s voice cried out from the communicator.

“Captain?  Captain?  Chief, watch the bridge.  I’m going to check on Benjamin.”  Dax walked calmly toward the captain’s ready room.  It’s probably just a problem with the comm system again. Sisko had engineers back on DS9 working on a way to compensate for the static distortion effect of the Bejoran wormhole that caused the inter-ship communications to malfunction of often at this very moment.  With the whoosh of the doors, Dax expected to see the captain sitting behind his desk, but instead she saw the displayless base of Sisko’s PADD.  As she looked down to see the expected pieces of the terminal, she saw the captain’s lifeless body.  “Oh, my gods!”  She listened to the echo of her voice in the room because Sisko’s comm badge hadn’t stopped transmitting it.  She yelled through the still-open doors of the ready room, “Chief, lock on to the captain’s communicator and beam him to sickbay, now!”  While she watched her captain dematerialize, Dax had to know his fate.  “O’Brien, get me down there, too.”

The ready room disappeared as sickbay materialized around her.  The smell of sterility reminded Dax of when her past host, Kerzon, had to visit his dying friends in medical facilities almost every day in his old age.

“Cortical stimulator.”  Doctor Julian Bashir let his training from the Starfleet Medical Academy take over as he attempted to revive Sisko.  Odo was already up and around and helping the good doctor.  The constable handed the tiny device to Bashir, who then placed it on the captain’s forehead.  Using his medical tricorder as a remote control, Bashir activated the device.  Sisko’s chest heaved as the electrical current ran through his body.

Bashir kept this up for twenty minutes before Dax put up her hand on husband’s shoulder and said, “He’s gone.  Julian.  Call it.”

“Time of death, 1313 hours.”  Bashir finally saw a reason for triscodekaphobia.

The shipwide comm system came on followed be Chief O’Brien’s voice.  “There’s an unidentified probe on an intercept course with us.  ETA is 8 minutes.  I need the CO, whoever they are, down here soon.”

“Well, Mr. Worf is the highest ranking officer, so…”

“Actually, Odo, Benjamin appointed me first officer before… the accident.”

“Well, you had better get up there, Jahdzia.  Odo and I can handle things here.”  Bashir kissed her and whispered “good luck” in her ear.

“Red alert!  First Officer Dax is on the way to the bridge, Chief,” said the joined Trill into her communicator, trying to forget about what she had just seen in sickbay.

“Scan the probe.”  Lt. Cmdr. Dax stood with her hand behind her back on the bridge of her ship watching the threat to her ship get closer.

“Lt. Cmdr., the probe is Cardassian and… sir, I mean, ma’am…”

“‘Sir’ will be fine.”

“The probe is hailing us, sir.”

“On screen.”

It’s a recorded message from the Turikanda and there is a visual distortion in the playback.

Dukat’s ship! “Patch it through anyway.”  The display went from the visual of the green probe in the foreground of the purple electric wormhole to a scrambled picture of Gul Dukat and a one-armed Major Kira.

CHAPTER III

“I just don’t get it, Garak.”

That’s all I had written, but I made a very ambitious outline of the rest of the story to come:

1. Issues in “All Good Things…” that must be addressed.
   1. rebirth of the “D”
   2. death of Troi
   3. Picard: irremodic syndrome, marriage to Crusher, Ambassador to Earth
   4. Worf on Klingon High Council
   5. Klingons take over Romulan Star Empire
   6. Riker: Admiral
   7. Data: Cambridge, success of his emotions
   8. Crusher: Her own ship, marriage to Picard
   9. LaForge: no VISOR (Data makes false eyes?)
2. Resolutions
   1. Borg invade Veridian III; “D” heads Borg fleet; Riker wins it back in battle
   2. dies on Intrepid; hosility w/ Worf & Riker
   3. “White” causes syndrome; proposed on Ticonderoga; knowledge of Gamma Quadrant gets him Ambassadorial spot
   4. Fights w/ Gowron and kills him; High Council thanks him and makes him councilman and Ambassador
   5. Klingons cut a deal with RSE to fight FED; RSE fleet leads into battle; KE fleet destroys most of RSE fleet leaving Empire up for grabs.

1) After destruction of the “D” crew goes in different directions.

Picard: gets temporary captainship of the USS Ticonderoga, a Defiant class starship.

Riker: gets captainship of the USS Intrepid, the original and last Intrepid class starship

Data: goes to Cambridge University and becomes a cyberneticist in Soong’s footsteps

LaForge: serves as second officer and chief engineering officer on the Ticonderoga.

Worf: serves on DS9 after going to Earth with Troi.

Crusher: serves as cheif medical officer of the Ticonderoga.

Troi: lives on Earth with Alexander Roshenko.

2) Treaty of Alliance is formed between Cardassian Union and Bejor

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

WAR!

Sword of Kahless destroys Intrepid

WAR! ensues.

Klingons attack the Union with help of Alliance.

Federation defense is initiated.

Empire takes advantage of new Borg offensive on the Romulan Star Empire by offering protection

Dominion offers to assist Federation if they denounce Cardassian alliance.

Fed. conquers one Empire ally, Alliance, as the Powers join the Empire.

“E” is built.

Powers defeated.

Empire is on its last legs when Borg and Maquis reach the Federation.

Dream Team of “E”, “D”, Voyager and Defiant eliminate Borg and send Maquis into the Gamma Quadrant

Sword of Kahless and the Armada follow Star Empire’s fleet into battle and attack them from behind leaving Star Empire defenseless.

Empire conquers Star Empire.

Neutral Zone collapses with battlegrounds.

“E” is destroyed/

Defiant is used to handicap Armada be rigging for explosion and drifting in their path.

Sword of Kahless is captured.

Weak Empire surrenders.

Billions are dead.

Picard is shown by Q how the Founders tricked the Federation into attacking their enemies (Klingons) with shipful of changelings.  Klingons also destroy Cardassians, the Dominion’s other enemies.

Drive for Change

I wanted to get a bunch of my friends together on a Get on the Bus style road trip to New Hampshire to volunteer for Barack Obama. That’s what I wanted anyway. I invited everyone close to me that I thought had both the inclination for Obama and the interest enough in politics to volunteer.

I had canvassed Scranton, PA for Obama back on April 12th during the primary. I also wanted to get some people to go then, but I end up going solo the day after news of the “bitter” comment broke, getting paired with a Scientologist that tried to convert me, and getting a speeding ticket on the way back in Fishkill, NY, all in the name of NOT delivering PA for Obama.

I livetwittered my PA volunteering:
18 |
17 |
16 |
15 |
14 |
13 |
12 |
11 |
10 |
9 |
8 |
7 |
6 |
5 |
4 |
3 |
2 |
1

Despite my adventures in canvassing, I noticed I was having trouble recruiting for this venture. Eager to leverage the power of the web, I posted an event on the facebook:

I sent it out to all my Obama-minded friends, and got some interest, but nothing stuck. People just had other things to do. I was disappointed, to be sure, but I understand. Luckily, one man, my friend and roommate committed and was able to come with me up to New Hampshire. We stopped at Burger King on our way out of town for breakfast and headed up to Rochester, guided by my iPhone’s GPS. On the road: 10AMish.

The Obama people had asked us if we could try to make it there by 10:00, but that seemed to be just out of our grasp. Fueled by breakfast sausage, Genius playlists and block-letter HOPE, we hit the Mass Pike at an eighty mile-per-hour clip. Just two and a half hours and $5.00 in tolls later, we found ourselves in Rochester, NH, a place neither of us had been before, but a place not unlike any other New England town with a historic downtown. We were struck by the incredible number of yard signs that were planted along every median, corner and public greenspace like glossy, partisan geraniums. Here is the picture we didn’t take of that incredible sight:

We were told by the Out-of-State Obama people that the campaign headquarters was on 28 Main St, in Rochester, NH, which is on a tiny, residential street, about 2 miles from 28 North Main St., where the Strafford County Democrats office actually is. Who to blame: Google Maps for not “did you mean?”-ing me?, the Out-of-State Obama people who didn’t know that Main St. and North Main St. were completely different, separated streets, or us for not doing a map reality check and flying by the seat of my iPhone’s pants? The world may never know.

We found free, available public parking in downtown Rochester; a nice accommodation. Upon arrival at the Dem HQ, we were actually directed down the block to a canvassing staging area by a tiny woman name Valerie. After a few minutes of not being greeted, Paul hit the head, and I put my hands in my pockets. I sauntered over to the young(er than me, at least) lad with the Obama button, whose position behind a table was the closest thing to a position of authority. Turns out, that’s the guy. We got the canvassing script, some stickers, and tons of campaign literature (complete with sample ballot!!!). We also saw that Bill Clinton, the real one, not some Clinton impersonator, was appearing in the very same Rochester, NH that we WERE ALREADY IN ON THAT VERY DAY! At noon. It was 1. We missed him; we missed this:

Paul and I zoomed out to to the addresses on our sheet, stopping first for some soul-and-hand-warming Dunkin Donuts. We overshot our target neighborhood at first, ending up in Maine. We didn’t even know we were that close to the place where Paul got stitches just a few months ago.

My “OBAMA”-stickered ‘93 Subaru got parked on Autumn Lane, and we got to walking. No luck at the first 3 houses. At the fourth house, after a single courteous ringing of the doorbell, we hear, unmistakably, from inside: “Oh GOD! LEAVE ME ALONE!”. Paul and I exchange a panicked glance but remain firm in our spot on the steps. The voice’s body approaches the door and a middle aged woman in a Patriots sweatshirt answers. She’s had enough of it; all of it. She explained that she’d had more unwelcome visitors in the last couple of days than Ebenezer Scrooge on Christmas Eve (*cough*). She told us that she was undecided, apparently not knowing that by insisting on this status, she’ll be subject to harassment from all sides right up until the polls close. I asked, out of duty, if she’d like a piece of our campaign literature (complete with SAMPLE BALLOT!!!) and, to our surprise, she sighed, “Yes…”.

That first woman was one of 9 people we actually got to say whether they were even voting out of about 50 houses. Most people weren’t home, and everyone we talked to had been hit up multiple times, some even that same day. I noticed that our list was dated 10/31, and I can imagine that a two-day old list at this stage of the campaign could be very out-of-date. Paul suggested that by this point, the lists consist only of the bottom of the barrel; the people that avoid all callers, remain stubbornly undecided, or have yet to be reached at all. This was not the feel good, last minute, get-out-the-vote effort that I hoped it would be.

Most people were at the end of their ropes with the entire process. We told a few to “hang in there” and “only 2 more days”. Even the Obama supporters couldn’t be bothered with us. I felt that the campaign office had set us up to fail with a 2 day old list that someone had already gone through just ahead of us. We came up to New Hampshire from our solid blue state of CT to be relevant to this election, and I can’t say that we did that. If NH goes for Obama, we can pretend our effort mattered, if not, we can feel like we did more harm than good.

We returned our tallies to base, and left after an unsatisfactory chat with several overcaffeinated staffers that were more interested in hearing themselves talk than our information that our people were feeling harassed and overwhelmed. Before the long haul back to Vernon, CT we reflected on our day over some excellent bison burgers at Wild Willy’s in Rochester. The burgers were great.

To understand cloud computing, one must first understand the term “cloud” as used in this context. The cloud is a data and information stored on the internet, and not on a user’s computer. The cloud can be accessed from a user’s computer, but is not limited to one computer, location or device. The cloud can be accessed by many applications and can allow for data sharing and integration.

Perhaps the most common example of cloud computing is webmail. Whether using AOL.com to get AOL mail, Microsoft’s Outlook Web Access to remotely access email on an Exchange server, or using free webmail like Yahoo! Mail or Gmail, this is cloud computing. Compare it to using Microsoft Exchange on a computer: With Exchange, your computer holds all the emails, does word processing functions in the composing of the email and sends of the email to the server, to be mailed. In webmail, the emails sit on a remote server, accessible through the internet and are never stored on your computer. The word processing functions are shared between your computer in the browser and the server. Your webmail can be accessed from any number of places or devices. You can get your Gmail on your cell phone, your AOL mail at a friend’s house or your Yahoo! Mail at work. Webmail is not tied to any one device or location, and is thus part of the cloud.

Another emerging part of cloud computing is Microsoft Office-style document creation and editing. Google has created Google Docs (formerly known as Writely, and for a while Google Docs and Spreadsheets), a cloud-based word processing/spreadsheet/presentation suite that competes directly with Microsoft’s Word, Excel and PowerPoint, respectively. Google has created a solution the problem that occurs when one has a computer, but doesn’t have access to Office-type software. All a user needs is an internet connection, a supported web browser and a free Google account. Documents can then be created and stored online, whether the user has a Windows-based PC, a Mac, or other operating system. Taking Office one step further, users can easily share documents, either by emailing them, sending links to a version of the document published online or by downloading the document to their computers just like a file produced by Office. The documents can be collaborated on by other users and allow for versioning (tracking of changes and rolling back to previous versions). The files are stored in the cloud, and much of the processing is shred between the user’s browser and the online server.

Lately as trends have moved toward cloud computing, it has become evident that a user’s choice of operating system is becoming less relevant to a user’s computing experience. Computer manufacturers have begun manufacturing what they call “netbooks.” These netbooks have significantly less substantial hardware specifications than standard laptops or desktop computers. They run on a version of the UNIX operating system (a free, open source OS) rather than Windows, a move that saves the manufacturers many dollars per machine in licensing costs. Also, netbooks are delivered with little to no software aside from the operating system and a free web browser, like Mozilla’s Firefox. The reduced hardware and bare-bones software allow manufacturers to keep costs way down and prices as well. Netbook users don’t miss the accelerated computing hardware, since most of their computer usage on a netbook is cloud computing where the processing is shared with a remote server. Users also don’t miss software like Microsoft Office because they have access to cloud computing alternatives like Google Docs.

Steve Ballmer of Microsoft has just announced plans for Windows Cloud, an OS based heavily on cloud computing, most likely designed for use on netbooks. Microsoft, as a seller of both operating systems and software that stands to lose market share to cloud computing, wants to create a lightweight, cheaper OS to stay in the netbook market.

There are more than a few downsides to cloud computing, especially at this stage of its development. First, and most important, cloud computing relies heavily on the benevolence of massive corporations like Google, Yahoo!, Apple and Microsoft. All of these players and more offer gigabytes of free online storage to users with free accounts. This storage holds emails, documents, contacts, personal information and more. Users are expected to implicitly trust these companies, not only as holders of their data, but as providers of secure access to that data. Should these systems become compromised, many users’ data could be stolen, and should they fail, many users’ data could be lost. These corporations tend to be leaders in the field of internet security, and they also have tons of redundant storage, so this type of loss is unlikely, yet possible.

Cloud computing as depends heavily on ubiquitous internet access. There are many places in the world that do not yet have internet access and those that do rarely offer it for free. While most cloud computing occupations are free to use, there are costs associated with internet access and those should be considered when calculating the savings of a netbook. Having data stored in the internet cloud requires internet access to retrieve that data. Google offers a solution to this called Google Gears that allows users to keep their documents synced with their local computers for access even when not connected to the internet. This offers the very un-cloud-like position of tying a user to a certain computer that has been synched with the cloud.

Cloud computing clearly represents the near-future of internet-based computing. As more and more applications are moved inside the web browser, software that sits on a user’s local computer becomes obsolete. Photoshop-like image editing software is already beginning to make its way into the cloud, and YouTube and Google Video could soon be the place to go for video editing. Practical use for cloud computer increases directly with increases in internet access. In higher education, where students are becoming required to have computers than access the internet, cloud computing applications like Blackboard are becoming a dependable space to users to access classroom materials from anywhere, any time. Cloud computing is increasingly removing the concept of the personalized personal computer, where what makes a user’s internet experience is what lies in their online accounts. Cloud computing even allows for new kinds of computing that have no parallel in the non-cloud era, such as social networking, like facebook. Expect cloud computing to be a part of every computer user’s daily life, and expect computers without integrated dependence on access to the cloud to disappear.