Meeting 3 (8/16/99)

The 3rd Meeting of the Aeryn Sun Interpretation Society Interpretation Society and Widow's and Orphan's Emergency Beer Fund is now in session. The Chair would like to remind the members of our motto: "Peace is our profession. War is just a hobby." The Chair would also like to thank all of those who were at Ginzberg's Irish Pub for our panel discussion, Bialar Crais: Slimebag or scumball? By the way, Mike the bartender, advises me he was stiffed for some drinks, some sort of a bad credit card. He described the perp as a big dude with sort of dreadlocks and dressed like a tourist. I said it didn't ring any bells, but if anyone out there knows this guy, let Mike know.

I'm not sure we're not beating a dead horse here. We have covered just about every military group and/or society, whether here or elsewhereon the bb. Well, not quite. I was working on a little bit on Ethelred the Unready and the Saxon fyrd, but it was, well, unready. UCSBdad knows the joke doesn't work in the original Saxon as he was Ethelred the Redeless, which translates as "badly advised". But I get so few people literate in Saxon on the bb, I thought I'd give it a try.

Anyway, with all our discussions, we still don't know if the PK are some great, clanking intergalactic military society, or the outer space version of Hell's Angels. ( Deep and sincere apologies to Sonny Barger and any of his friends if I have offended.) And of course, we can argueall we want about Aeryn. Was she grown in a test tube, or is there aMr. and Mrs. Sun wondering where there wandering daughter has gotten to? Are they wondering about the new friends she's hanging with? We know we're worried. What is going to happen with John andAeryn? I mean is this what we have to look forward to in episodes to come? Meaningful glances, quasi-meaningful glances, semi-meaningful glances, para-meaningful glances, interspersed with the occasional, non answer to a question? Imagine it.

Episode 39

John: Look what I found, Aeryn. Isn't this a photograph of you, your Mom and Pop, and your dog Bialar?

Aeryn: That's a PKograph, John.

Episode 77

John: (Holding a six pack of icy Dos Eques.) Hi, Querida. Want to go out on the Terrace and fool around?

Aeryn: A Peacekeeper is trained to fight alone and die alone, but if we drink alone, we have a 12 step program.

Episode 209

John: I see UCSBdad has been moved into the locked ward of the National Center for Stressed 'Scapers in Menlo Park.

Aeryn: The walls are very perpendiclular tonight.

This is a good marketing tool, however. I'm sure if they had taken off for Moya's hold in the first arn and made mad, passionate, noisy, love in the back of a classic car, like some characters, we'd not be as concerned about the poor dears. But relationships out here in the real universe either grow or die. I think that most of the membership of the Society and Fund are in favor of resolving the sexual tension. In a tasteful way, of course. So let's hear it. Viva la resolucion. Not of course that the membership is in any way opposed to some mad, passionate, noisy, love between JC and AS. An entire episode could easily......Well, perhaps we won't go there now.

The producers of Farscape will let us know about Aeryn and the PKs, (Wasn't that a group from the Disco Era?) in their own good time and we'll just have put up with it, won't we? Well.....UCSBdad has friends. No, no. No names. Just friends. Good men. Compassionate men. But men whose methods have become unsound. They have been passing me rumors, just rumors, you see. Inexplicable thing are happening onthe northern fringes of the Great Sonoran Desert. You've heard of Groom Lake, right. Brand new roads leading nowhere. Lights, far out in the desert, at night. The local people grown distant and sullen. They say you can see strange markings on the desert floor if you fly over it. They also say you may not want to fly over that desert. I'm not saying someone has located the Secret Lair of the Farscape Writers, I'm just saying we should keep our options open, consider the alternatives, be prepared for any eventuality. If we could just talk to them and explain our position, our desires, our dreams. I mean they're human aren't they? Aren't they? In the meantime, let's just keep this to ourselves. If anyone starts asking questions you just start feeling bad about, like "You have relatives in the old country?" Just tell them "I know nothing, absolutely nothing, about anything." Then again, that's just like telling them you've been hanging around with UCSBdad.

I have to think that Rygel was a figurehead. He's said that he didn't know how to use any tools, he had tens of thousands of servants, and the giveaway was his failure to be able to make a speech to his subjects in Jeremiah Crichton. UCSBdad once spent a couple of years replying to Congressional Inquiries. The political class can fill up the available space with words. Come to think of it, so can UCSBdad. Any half way decent policy wonk would have had several hours of nothing to say if put in Rygel's place.

This was how the Shoguns kept the Japanese emperors in line. The emperor and the heirs to the throne get to spend their budget mostly on wine, women and song. The rest they spent foolishly. This also worked in China, India and Europe. Since the decline of the Divine Right of Kings, you don't see much of this anymore. Kim Il Sung and Kim Il Jong of North Korea excepted, of course.

And if Rygel XVI is a problem, you just roll in Rygel XVII. This may be why Rygel was so taken with the locals in JC. They may have been the first people to take the boy seriously.

But think about it. Most of Rygel's 600 billion subjects never met the guy. All they know about him is that the current PK backed government got rid of him. Is Rygel considered the Expected One, the Young Pretender, or L'Aiglon? Do young Hyneerians sing "Bonnie Rygel's Gang Awa"? ( Will ye no come back again, better loved ye can'na be, will ye no come back again) Is the (dis)loyal toast drunk to the King over the water. Or in this case, the Dominar over the atmosphere? Does grafitti go up saying, "Rygel Rules. PKs suck"?

Will our heroes bring Rygel to his adoring subjects? Hyneeria is probably a lot less stable than it looks from the outside. Cortez conquered Mexico with an army of less than a thousand, because he was able to recruit subject people of the Aztec Empire that were ready to revolt. Pizarro overran the Inca Empire because Atahualpa had just finished a civil war against his brother to gain the Incan throne. The list goes on. Consider Russia right now. I wouldn't invest in any Russian IPOs right now. Memo to our heroes. Cortez went back to Spain andlived off of his loot. Pizarro stayed in Peru and tried to run the place. He was assassinated. Think about it.

So imagine. Picture Napoleon I greeting the Old Guard after his escape from Elba. Or Bonnie Prince Charlie raising his standard in the Highlands of Scotland. There is Rygel surrounded by his comrades,who are probably squatting down so as not to upstage his Dominarness.. Or since Hyneeria is a water world, they may be treading water. OH MY GOD!!! Have I just imagined the Holy Grail of the Males of the Species? The Aeryn Sun in a wet tee shirt episode? The mind boggles. Anyway, The Fierce Rygel.....er, the Indomnitable Rygel....er, the Awake Rygel addresses his subjects. If we edge closer we can pick up some of it. I wonder who his speech writer is?

"When in the course of Hyneerian events it becomes necessary"......(loud cheering)..." arise ye prisoners of starvation, you have nothing to lose but your chains"...( loud, prolonged cheering)......."Let Hyneeria long a province be, a Nation once again"... (Chants of Ry-Gel, Ry-Gel, Ry-Gel) "Forward, children of the nation, the day of glory has arrived" ... (Chants of We Numba One, We Numba one) " and that government of the Hyneerians, by the Hyneerians, and for the Hyneerians shall not perish from this universe."

I think you're right. We'll have to have Aeryn or Zhaan kiss him and turn him into a Prince before that scene works. And to quote someone who's been compared with D'Argo, "That'll be the day."

What an episode for Friday the Thirteenth. Even though Aeryn mentioned the liberation (as opposed to the conquest of) of some planet, I really am not seeing the PK as all warm and cuddly. Captain Durka could give psycho lessons to Bruce Dern. One thing. Does it seem that John runs into an awful lot of blondes, and only one non-blonde. Is there a message there? Let us hope so.

So we'll close a little early tonight. I want all of the members to rest up for next week's episode. We have been promised passion for a certain non-blonde Sebacean. We expect a little resolved sexual tension. Perhaps a little fooling around. A short discussion of feelings would beacceptable. At the very least, a couple of simple, factual declaritive sentences from Aeryn. Is that too much to ask for? One lousy factoid?

Oh well. UCSBdad has friends. No, no. No names. Just friends. Good men. Compassionate men. But men whose methods have become unsound.

And remember, be careful out there.

Aeryn Sun Interpretation Society and Widow's and Orphan's Emergency Beer Fund