Category: Shore Leave Page 3 of 4

Shore Leave #09: Obscure Horns Edition

Shore Leave is the non-Trek culture arm of the Deep Space Spines website, posted every other Tuesday and made possible by donations to the site’s Patreon.


I’ve gotten far enough ahead on Star Trek reading to feel comfortable checking out some other stuff, and first up came Blackfish City by Sam J. Miller. It’s the future, and climate change has wrecked most of the continents, so now people live on these island cities in the Arctic powered by geothermal energy, such as the one in this story, called Qaanaaq. Of course, it’s the same tune with a different beat—there are still those who are obscenely wealthy and those who are unbelievably destitute doing anything they can to scrape by. But then a woman who can step to all comers shows up riding a killer while and shakes up the social order, and several characters from wildly different walks of life find a connection they never realized they had.

Shore Leave #08: Better World Books

Shore Leave is the non-Trek culture arm of the Deep Space Spines website, posted every other Tuesday and made possible by donations to the site’s Patreon.


Well, Spiners—can I call my readers Spiners? Don’t answer that, it was rhetorical—we’re due for another round of Shore Leave, and I haven’t done any of the sort of sort of new and exciting (or even new and boring) thing at any point during the last two weeks that would normally populate this biweekly space. So this week, I’m taking a different tack.

Shore Leave #07: Taco Tuesday

Shore Leave is the non-Trek culture arm of the Deep Space Spines website, posted every other Tuesday and made possible by donations to the site’s Patreon.


Image result for torchy's

I assume Torchy’s has never been sued for ripping off the Harvey Comics character Hot Stuff for their logo, but I’m amazed nonetheless.

My city (Denton, Texas) finally got its own branch of the legendary Austin taco joint Torchy’s, and I was fortunate enough to receive word of mouth in time to RSVP for a spot in their pre-opening stress test. I’d never been to a Torchy’s before, but I’d heard breathless stories from trustworthy sources and had already bought big-time into the hype. Usually I’m more cautious in my optimism for new restaurants, but I’m happy to say it more than lived up to even the grand vision I’d built up in my head.

Shore Leave #06: A Tuf Row to Hoe

Shore Leave is the non-Trek culture arm of the Deep Space Spines website, posted every other Tuesday and made possible by donations to the site’s Patreon.


Image result for tuf voyagingAt the behest of a coworker who’s been trying to convince me to read it since almost the beginning of my current job, I’m slowly chipping away at George R.R. Martin’s Tuf Voyaging, an episodic sci-fi novel published about a decade prior to his Game of Thrones fame explosion. I’m not very good at taking other people up on their recommendations—I almost always have to feel like I discovered something on my own to get into it, and the feeling to want to get into it has to come from me and me alone—but I decided that since I was able to persuade him to check out Oryx and Crake (which he inexplicably and incorrectly disliked), why not return the favor.

Shore Leave #05: Kind of a Big Dill

Shore Leave is the non-Trek culture arm of the Deep Space Spines website, posted every other Tuesday.


Through the good graces of a father with an extra ticket, I went to my first Texas Rangers game in years a few Fridays ago. I grew up in a baseball family, but distanced myself from extreme fandom and emotional investment after the 2011 World Series ended in disaster. (“Nelson Cruz” is still a dirty word in my house.) Since they’re pretty much already out of playoff contention this year, I saved my excitement for Globe Life Park’s newest testament to deep-fried American excess, the Dilly Dog.

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