Actually, there’s no such episode, but you’d never know from this still from this wardrobe/makeup test footage on the upcoming Star Trek: The Next Generation blu-ray disc set. There are more details in an interview with LeVar “Geordi LaForge” Burton on i09.
And so the Secret Side Trip begins! I can’t divulge too much information about the whys and wheres of this trip, but I can share a little.
With my bags checked in landside, it’s time to take the TPA shuttle airside (all of which is explained in this 1971 film).
Star Alliance Gold status has its privileges: I got myself moved to a bulkhead seat…AWWW YISSSSSS! While this flight was a mere third the length of Cathay Pacific’s Toronto-Hong Kong butt-numb-a-thon, the extra legroom was still welcome.
Let’s get this baby in the air, shall we?
Cruising altitude! I had my copy of Evangelist Marketing (a useful book, if you’re in my line of work) at the ready and had queued up a couple of new-to-me Archer episodes on the iPad, but I was still a little jet lagged from all that jaunting about the Philippines. I ended up dozing off and woke up to this:
You can’t see them in this shot or any of the other shots I took, there’s a lightning storm out there. We flew over a spectacular electrical lightshow that would’ve been great set to some Pink Floyd.
Just past the storm was my first stop.
There’s that gap between the jet and the airport — right in the jetway, by the door where passengers pick up their gate-checked luggage — where you get your first sense of the weather at your destination. At this stop-over airport, I was hit with a blast of heat and thought to myself “wow, nice sunny day”. Then it dawned on me: it was 10:30 p.m..
The sun had long since set, and it was 40 degrees C (104 degrees F) outside. The high tomorrow was expected to hit 47 C (117 F), but I’d miss it — I boarded the flight to my final destination an hour later.
Once I got my luggage (again, hooray for Star Alliance Gold powers — mine came was on the carousel first), it was time to take a cab to my hotel. Judging by the price on the meter, I took the photo above about a third of the way there.
That’s my hotel lobby pictured above.
And here’s what I saw just before I turned out the lights. The funny apparatus with the hose is my CPAP. Although it’s a pain in the ass to bring along on trips, I still function much better when I use it.
Tampa’s airport — where I’m writing this article — is a pretty nice one. It’s easy to navigate, well-organized, has lots of facilities and it’s pretty quick to get around. The passenger reviewers at Skytrax agree with me, having given it a 9/10 rating.
In its honour, I present this blast from the past: a 1971 promotional film documenting the then-new terminal built to accommodate the new larger jets of that era.
I’m in Tampa right now, but I won’t be for long. Later tonight, after a quick bite at the Cheesecake Factory (a guilty pleasure of mine), I’m boarding a US Airways flight and heading…somewhere…until Friday. I’ll go into more detail later, but it should suffice to say that the local climate calls for a hoodie and the trip may or may not be concerned about changing my funemployed status. I’ll be back in Tampa this weekend, when I have a visit to a giraffe farm on the agenda.
I know that life and death really don’t care about how old you are, but I can’t help feeling that Canadian Celebrity chef Anthony Sedlak died too young at the tender age of 29. He got his start in cooking by accident; he wanted to snowboard for free, and the easiest way to do that was to get a job at the restaurant at Grouse Mountain. As a busboy, he liked what he saw in the kitchen and worked towards becoming a chef. A series of sous-chef jobs including one at London’s La Trompette led him to Food Network Canada’s Superstar Chef Challenge in 2005, which he won, landing him his first Food Network show, The Main.
The Main was one of those Food Network shows that was both fun to watch and still useful. It was about main dishes for meals, and none of the dishes he showcased were out of the reach of anyone with even the most basic of kitchen skills. He delivered his message simply and very enthusiastically, with a couple of “I grew up in Vangroovy” trademarks: a west coast accent and a tendency? to? uptalk? I’m one of those people who really believes that when choosing a career, you really have to follow your passion, and watching The Main, it’s clearly evident that Sedlak did just that.
In addition to his TV shows, he’d been busy working on his restaurant, The American Cheesesteak Co., which has some great reviews and some really good-looking food. I’ll have to check it out the next time I’m down Vancouver way. He’d also been in Toronto for the past little while, revamping the menus for the Don Valley Hotel and Suites.
He was a slightly tubby when he got his start on The Main, but in the past couple of years, he’d become more fit after discovering a passion for cycling and lost a fair bit of weight in the process. This and his youth make it a little more surprising that he died on Friday. The reports say that he had an undiagnosed medical condition, but no specifics have been given out as of this writing.
Requiescat in pace, Mr. Sedlak.
