Tuesday, July 10, 2007

Post-Vacation Conference

With the Enterprise all cleaned up and ready for more trips around the galaxy, I assemble the senior staff for a conference, who have all returned from their various vacations.

I've bought a smart Norwegian sweater and a troll. Someone wanted to sell me a live one from the planet Tvana, but I settled for the usual tourist version.

"Well, I have had a lovely time on my cruise." I inform everybody who are gathered, "Have you all done the same?"

There are various glum sounds from them all.

"No?" I say, "Well what happened?"

"As I mentioned." says Riker, "Deanna and I went to Betazoid to stay with her mother.."



"You were so rude to her, Will" interrupts Deanna.

"Can you blame me, Deanna?" Riker says to her, "A few hours after we got there, Lwaxana took us to a wedding chapel and wanted us to remove our clothes to go through a rehearsal for a traditional Betazed wedding."

"I know my mother is a little pushy, Will.." Deanna replies, "But you should have stayed."

I sigh and turn to Data.

"How about you, Mr Data?" I ask, "Did your trip with Jennifer Baxter to northern England to visit her parents go well?"

"It did not, Captain." he replies, "Mr Baxter was most offended when I said the black pudding interfered with the working of my positronic circuits."

I try not to laugh at his comment, and move on to Geordi.

"Mr LaForge." I ask, "You mentioned that you were taking Trisha Lewis to VacationWorld. Surely nothing could go wrong there?"

"On the contrary, Captain." he tells me sadly, "There was a solar flare from the nearby sun that was there. It caused everything to go haywire. The water from the artificial sea overflowed, the theme park rides were all fusing. In effect, the whole planet was breaking down."

"Sorry to hear that." I tell him, "Now how about you. T'Pol? You went with Ensign Britney to the Raveathon Vacation Complex, with non-stop partying, extra loud music, rowdy activities and no sleep allowed during your stay. Did you two find it all too much for you?"

"Certainly not!" replies T'Pol indignantly, "We were thrown out of the complex though. The authorities said they did not want our type there as we were too noisy for them."

I have to do all I can to stop laughing out loud; there are a few supressed giggles around the table which annoys T'Pol.

"Dr Crusher." I say, "What happened on your visit to Wesley and Karena, the Amazon he is engaged to?"

"That was misery!" comments Beverly, "As soon as I got there, "Karena was ordering me about, telling me that as Wes is now engaged to be her Life Servant, there is no need for her to see my son so often. There were a few cross words said. She used that spear a few times to prod me, as well. never you mind; she had a couple of prods as well!"

"Good for you!" Riker says with a laugh.

"What about the Maquis Convention, Ensign Ro?" I ask "I know I turned a blind eye to it, as it is an anti-Federation organisation."

"It turned out to be very dull." Ro tells us, "The star lecturers couldn't make it, as they had been jailed. As a result, the caterers who made the meals were forced to give lectures on how to make their culinary dishes. We could hardly use them against the Cardassians!"

"Except in a pie fight!" Deanna says with a laugh, to which Ro looks very annoyed.

"Jadzia." I inquire, "You mentioned that you and Mr Worf would be going to your home planet of Trill. Surely that went well?"



"How could it?" wails Jadzia, bursting into tears, "I had no ideas who my relatives were, as they were all in different bodies, "My Aunt Marainne might be the female receptionist in the hotel we stopped at, or it might even be Uncle Javin."

"Well everything must have gone all right with you, Seven." I say to Seven Of Nine, "All you did was visit the Borg Queen and give her a report."

"That did not go well, Locutus." states Seven, "The Borg Queen was in a bad mood and did not wish to speak to me for most of the stay. In the end, she only accepted my report as a cursory gesture at the end, before I was ready to come back."

"Why was that?" I ask, "Did she think you had made an error while on the Enterprise?"

"Negative, Locutus." she replies, "I forgot to send her a card when her birthday came round a few days before I was due on the Cube."

That does it; I laugh out loud to the amazement of the staff. Seven looks piqued.

"Well that's all." I tell them, "It's good to be back..."

"What about me?" says a voice, "You didn't ask how my vacation went?"

Q appears.

Everybody groans.

"Very well, Q." I say with a sigh, "How did your vacation go?"

"I went to the Q Continuum Holiday Resort." he tells us, "The service was dreadful, the theme parks badly run, the shows second rate...."

This cheers the staff up.

"Glad to know that, Q" I say, "Now it's time for you to go."

"Just for now, Jean-Luc." Q says teasingly, "It is far more fun here."

He disappears and we are all ready to fly round the galaxy.

----------------

Author's note:

As you can gather, I'm back from my cruise. Thanks for all your good wishes during the TWQ. Cobh in Ireland was quiet, Iceland was sunny and impressive, Norway was beautiful, Amsterdam in Holland was colourful, and Bruges in Belgium was full of mouthwatering chocolate, as well as being beautiful.

----------

Double Schmoozer Award! :






I have been been given the Schmoozer Award by two different people: SFGirl (Nina) and Lansy My grateful thanks to both for awarding me this!

Awesome Guy Award!




Not only have I got the above, but Lahdeedah has given me this terrific Award. Thanks so much! It's a pleasure to come back to them all!

29 comments:

The Mistress of the Dark said...

Welcome home! You were missed :)

swirly girl said...

I concur with the mistress of the dark.

Glad to hear you didn't opt for the real troll...

susan said...

Glad you had a good time. Welcome home Jean-Luc

Jana said...

Hooray! Welcome back!

MMmmm... Belgian chocolate. I was there 16 years ago and I can still taste it...

The Curmudgeon said...

Welcome back, Jean-Luc. To quote Mr. Spock on another occasion (and to a far more junior officer), "Your absence was keenly felt." (And Bee will be so glad to hear that chocolate was involved.)

I can certainly see how discovering that less than ideal vacations can occur even in the Continuum would cheer up your staff.

Nancy Wu said...

Woopy, glad to see you back sound and well, Captain JeanlucPicard. :) Wander what your sweater looks like.

Jen said...

I'm glad you're back!

They sell real trolls? Maybe I can ship some of the nasties from my forums there and sell them...

It sounds like you had a great time, good for you!

Fab said...

Hey Captain!

Nice to hear from you again. I guess you brought back lots of our delicious chocolat? Bruges has some fine chocolate shops!

I hope you are ready to take control again of the Enterprice? Congrats on the awards. Well deserved.

Orange Palps said...

I once tried to take a vacation, Jean Luc... I got three calls before I hit the ship, and then I had to come back.

Welcome Back, Jean Luc... You were missed.

Linda said...

Welcome back, Captain! Glad to hear that at least you, out of all your staff, had a fine vacation!

Congratulations of your new awards, too. Well deserved!

Anonymous said...

Welcome back Captain, and congratulations on your well earned awards.

Jaime said...

Glad you're back, Captain! And I'm glad Q dropped by, too! :)

I'm jealous about the chocolate, however...

Nepharia said...

I'm jealous about Ireland...but it's good to have you back -- even if you did bring a troll.

eastcoastlife said...

Woot! You're back! You cruised to many places! Wow! Would love to take a cruise too. hmmm.....

Real Life Drama Queen said...

Welcome back! And what a funny way to annouce your return. I need to remind myself to be careful when I take a drink while reading. Sounds like you had a wonderful time. Congrats on your awards.

Anonymous said...

Your cruise sounds awesome, lucky you, hope you had good weather.

Lahdeedah said...

Welcome back.... sounds like a great vacation!

Jean-Luc Picard said...

Thanks for those thoughts.

As you may have guessed, I DID buy a sweater in Norway. It's very thick and feels lovely. The troll is fun as well.

As for the chocolates in Bruges I bought...they are delicious....the best there are!

Anonymous said...

I love Bruges. We would get Leonardies chocolates! I used to fly in go there for the day. As for Amsterdam we loved the homes and like d that everyone rode bikes!

Tawnya Shields said...

Welcome back! It sounds like you had a lovely time as well as the crew. :o)

Empress Bee (of the high sea) said...

you brought me chocolate? thanks!

smiles, bee

FRIDAY'S CHILD said...

It was quite some time you were gone.
Welcome back and thanks for the visit and also for signing my new guestbook.

Anonymous said...

How totally cool to get all those awards while you were gone!! We all missed you very much!

Professor Xavier said...

A cruise must be awefully tame after commanding a starship.

Summer Dawn O'Ciardha said...

Welcome back Captain. I missed you even though I wasn't here either...

Well I was but I wasn't posting.

Did you have fun on your vacation?

And you saw a goth girl... Did you talk to her? Contrary to popular belief, we can be friendly.

M. C. Pearson said...

I'm so glad you had fun on your trip! Trolls huh? Is it for your front porch? er, I mean...hydroponics bay?

Jean-Luc Picard said...

Mrs M, Amsterdam has thousands of bikes around!

Summer, I chatted to the goth girl. She was very pleasant and friendly.

Summer Dawn O'Ciardha said...

Rock on captain!

Nina Munteanu said...

Welcome back, "awesome guy blogger"! Nice to have you back in the blogo-universe :)