Something happened today that took me back about twenty years, and left me there reliving memories which I thought I had long since forgotten. When I was fifteen or sixteen, I saw the movie Stand By Me (coolio BTW). I remember the song, by Ben E King, along with the video, also hit our screens around that time. I can’t remember how many times I watched the film, just that we (my friends, and I) knew the script well enough to quotes snippets of it, at each other, grossing out on-lookers with beauties such as “Shut up!” “I don’t shut up, I grow up, and when I loook at you I throw up!” “and your mum goes round the corner and licks it up!” Euch!!!
It must have been around that time that I developed an unholy crush on Wil Wheaton, WHO? I hear you thinking. Wil Wheaton was one of the ‘child actors’ in Stand By Me (keep up!), along with River Phoenix. I don’t know what was going through my head but it certainly wasn’t the GCSE coursework that I should have been reviewing and studying in preparation for my exams. I used to sit in my room, text books open on the bed, while I patiently plaited and weaved ‘friendship bracelets’ (THE big thing at school, at the time) and sent them to Wil, following the postal address supplied in whatever teenage-idol magazine I had recently purchased. I used to sign the letters from ‘Womble’, because I was from Wimbledon and thought it was a cool pseudonym(?!?). Of course, I never heard anything back, but then I don’t remember ever expecting a reply.
I remember my excitement when, the friendship bracelet-thing had passed, and saw Wil (do you think ti’s OK to refer to someone you don’t know, by their first name?) in Star Trek: TNG, in the role of Wesley Crusher. I remember thinking then, that he was still pleasing to the eye 
LOL!
I don’t remember if I class myself as a fan of ‘Sci-fi’ at that time, but I certainly enjoyed watching the likes of Saphire & Steel, Star Trek, Blakes 7, and Dr Who, when they were on. Perhaps it was during that time, nearing my twenties that I became engrossed in the Terry Pratchet books (and later, bored by them). I simply couldn’t get enough of them, and having read one book, I went back to the book shop and bought the whole series. I think that maybe I just wanted to escape from my life and reading/watching the adventures of people in different worlds really rocked my boat, so to speak.
Although I could never claim to be as much of a Sci-fi fan as Miles (remember his Dr Who ‘thang’ last year?), we do watch an awful lot of it, to the exclusion of most other shows on TV, and I must admit, I love it. It probably started with the original Star Trek, and the following spin-offs, but I’m glad to say I never really got into shows like Babylon 5.
Anyway, I was uncharacteristically watching some daytime TV on Saturday and accidentally rediscovered Star Trek: TNG, and of course, Wil Wheaton. That got me reminiscing and I felt a powerful urge to find out what he was up to these days. It was then that I found his blog or should I say blogs and realised that not only is he quite a prolific writer, but he is also very funny, a self-confessed geek AND looks remarkably like a very young Patrick Duffy - dontcha think?? I laughed and nodded while reading his post on the Star Wars prequels, what a bunch of @£$%^. BTW I hadn’t even watched the orignial films until I found a boyfriend of mine and his best friend, sitting in the orchard after midnight, drinking red wine, smoking cigars and discussing the spiritual signifocance of the series… whah??? I digress… back to Mr Wheaton… he seems to have made a name for himself all over the web, and written a couple of interesting looking books too. I’d never have thought that I could have anything in common with someone I had a crush on twenty years ago!
OK, all this reminiscing made me think about my friends at the time, and I kicked myself for not calling Heg to find out how she’s doing. I checked the clock, and made a mental note to call her when it wasn’t 9am, but obviously, I didn’t kick myself hard enough because I promptly forgot to do anything about it. Imagine my surprise when a few hours later, when she called me from Cal-i-forn-I-A! yayyy!
