Vince Gill plays Duane Allman's 1957 Les Paul Goldtop

Haunting is the only word I can think of.

The FS-1 Flying Sub

One of my favorite TV shows as a kid was “Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea.” It was made in the mid 60s as a futuristic show set in the 70s and later the 80s. The main submarine in the show called the Seaview (billed as the first privately owned nuclear submarine) was cool enough, but when they introduced a mini-sub that could fly in the second season, it turned a lot of heads. There were toy versions and models of it for sale in every department store. They called it the FS-1 (Flying Sub-1), but there was at least one other called the FS-2 (they kept crashing these in the stories, so the following week a new one would show up.)

Obviously most of the footage on the show, especially the underwater scenes were done with miniature models, but what I just found out is that the FS-1 was an actual flying sub made by General Dynamics and Reynolds Metal in 1964-65. It featured a pair of massive solid-fuel turbine engines and really could both fly and submerge. It was used by the Navy until the mid 70s. Here it is:

Some of the flying footage on the show was actually done with the real thing! It was built to look like a stingray, and they succeeded except for the yellow color. But who knew this thing was rea!? And here I was saving all those Bazooka Joe wrappers for the coveted human powered submarine prize thinking it might be as cool as the FS-1 when I got it—not!

Tom Veal's "Stromata"

Just a quick note of praise for Mr. Veal's excellent website and blog. He's probably best known to sci-fi writers (he once served as chairman at the World Science Fiction Convention), but he's a devout Christian who really has his head on straight about most topics, and he muses on almost every subject under the sun. If you have never visited his website, you really should. It's called Stromata.

Stromata

C.S. Lewis Space Trilogy - 1st Editions

(Click to enlarge.)

I found a nice picture of these at Ebay today. Believe it or not, I had never seen the original 1st edition books with their original dust jackets. I really like these. Dust jackets today are so darn busy and flashy, but I find these to be very warm and inviting. They look the way books did when I was a kid going to the library. Simple and understated is better I think.

However, having said that, note that in the upper left corner of Out of the Silent Planet there's a drawing of a planet with a ring around it. The trip in that book was from Earth to Mars and back. Mars has no rings! In fact, only Mars, Earth, and Venus were featured in the three books. No rings around any of them. I bet Lewis wasn't too crazy about that dust jacket design to say the least!

Perelandra shows a drawing of huge castle-like ocean front house. I don't remember there being any houses at all on Venus mentioned in the story except maybe huts, and that's where the ocean was. It was a very primative land on Venus where a new Adam and Eve lived. There was a large country house on Earth toward the beginning of the story, but it wasn't near an ocean. What were the people who designed these dust jackets thinking?

Did I mention that the guy selling these books is asking $3,400 for the lot? I'll never understand the minds of collectors.

Eric John Sawyer - Running In The Dark

My old South African pal Eric doing some blues around the kitchen table the way it ought to be done!

St. Louis Boys Will Always Show You A Good Time

Or at least a good tan.

What possesses people to rip off their clothes in the middle of a crowded stadium? No, it's not the Budweiser. That just gives you the courage. Some old school chums of mine went streaking through the local Dairy Queen wearing jock straps for masks back in the 70s when streaking was the fashionable thing to do. And of course “shooting the moon” (or the “stars” from the ladies) from a moving vehicle was almost a daily occurrence back then. Women taking off their tops while sitting on their boyfriend's shoulders at rock concerts was less fashionable, but it made for a good story at the next beer blast. I very nearly dropped my towel and swam naked at Ballys one day, though it would have only been a good laugh for a few friends in the place. But who on Earth takes off their clothes amid thousands of strangers, and in front of TV cameras, for a few fleeting moments of fame followed by a night in jail and a police record for lewd and lascivious behavior? St. Louis boys! No need to thank us. Just remember us fondly.

The Prophecies Of Saint Malachy

I've always had an interest in world hunger, but my last post was spurred on by James Rollins' novel—The Doomsday Key. This is the third book I've read by Rollins. He's a veterinarian turned novelist who has a great mind for science and history. But besides the hunger and overpopulation scenario played out in his story, he brought up the Prophecies Of Saint Malachy, a 12^th century bishop in Ireland who, while in Rome, was purported to have had a vision of every future pope to the end of time. They number 111 or 112 depending on how you look at things. He simply uttered a symbolic name for each pope while a servant recorded them. Many of those names seem to be very accurate. For instance the late John Paul II he refers to as “De Labore Solis” which seems to mean “from the sun's labors.” As it turns out, John Paul was born on the day of a solar eclipse.

Anyway, many of those mystical names don't seem to have any connection to the popes, but several others do. Some people think the prophecies are a 16^th century forgery because they weren't published until then, supposedly having been found among the Vatican's archives. What's interesting to think about though is that the current pope is the second to last according to these prophecies. The last pope is referred to as Petrus Romanus (Peter the Roman). The prophecy claims that the Church will undergo some kind of persecution during his reign, and that he, “shall feed the sheep amid great tribulations, and when these have passed, the City of the Seven Hills shall be utterly destroyed, and the awful Judge will judge the people.” Of course the Vatican is the City of the 7-hills.

Quite honestly I don't believe in the prophecies at all. Obviously, not being Catholic, I don't think there's anything at all special about the Catholic Church compared to any other sect or see any reason why God would single them out in a prophecy about the end of the world. (I'd like to think that's what us Episcopalians are for!) More importantly, there was not one mention of these prophecies prior to their being “found” 4 centuries after they were written. Even St. Bernard of Clairvaux, who was a friend of St. Malachy and the author of his biography, never said anything about any prophecies coming from his friend.

Still, it is interesting to note that if the next pope is the last one, that the world hunger/population problem will just happen to reach it's doomsday point during his reign.