Star Trek and alcohol... Trektinis anyone?

What really fueled the Starship Enterprise? Saurian Brandy! 

If I have two great loves in my life, (other than women, dirt bikes, music, video games, NBA basketball, books, professional boxing, movies, memorabilia recovery, muscle cars, older women, and beer....) they will always be (more) beer... And Star Trek. Imagine finding a podcast on Itunes that covers both things.

What I've always admired about podcasts is that, for the most part, these people are recording these podcasts for no money gain. And the folks doing their Podcasts about Star Trek are doing theirs for absolutely ZERO publicity. It's not because the subject is hot right now, or trendy, it's because they love Star Trek. Unlike other geeky ventures you can't really fake Trek love, you either have it or you don't. "Nerd" is chic this decade, and there are all breeds of normal people flirting with nerdiness, buying expensive "geek" glasses when they have 20/20 vision. Pretending to dig D&D and believing that owning a Nintendo WII classifies them as a "gamer". Wearing tight pants, tight t-shirts, knitting tight little hats, or whatever the hell else they can dream up to be dorky enough to be considered clever. But you still can't touch a true Star Trek fan when it comes to pure nerd love. And with Star Trek being so insanely HUGE, practicing Trek-scholars cannot physically hold all that useless information inside. It needs release. Even if it's to every corner of the Earth with the hope that somewhere, someone is into exactly the same weird sh!t you're into, and will listen and maybe even respond back.

I listen to podcasts because, first off they're free, second there's really nothing like them in professional broadcasting. I found Trektinis a few weeks ago. The idea was started by a guy named John and his female friend Jessie over martinis in a bar talking about Star Trek. John's more on the hardcore side of Trek nerdom, Jessie's a bit more softcore. Both like to drink. In fact the reasons I'm using today's movie column to write about a podcast, is that these guys cover all 10 Star Trek films top to bottom, (though we differ greatly in Star Trek the Motion Picture opinion) they're from Iowa, (middle America has a voice!) and it's kind of fun waiting for the drinks they down at the very beginning of the show to "kick in" and drive the podcast into more alcohol-fueled sci-fi philosophy. (John barely lands the plane in Episode 6 covering Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country half-wasted on Romulan Ale...)

Another thing these two get exactly right about running a Star Trek podcast is that they do not preach a self-involved world view on the show. You wouldn't believe how many people use an entertainment podcast as a step-ladder to shout to the world who needs to be worshiped, voted for, saved, hated, impeached... Trektinis is all about the booze and the banter. No excess political fat, and better yet no politically correct bullshyite.

In a time where it seems like the people running theStar Trek Franchise are finding any way possible to screw their devoted fan base out of every last red cent, (check out the official Star Trek magazine if you don't believe me, it's twice the price of every other magazine on the news stand...) it's nice to find real people honoring a cult TV show just because they love it. It's also nice listening to a couple people you've never met get their drink on and romanticize the extreme physical toughness of one James Tiberius Kirk. I plan on covering more Trek-ish corners of our planet occasionally in this column, with the new Abrams movie coming out and all. I thought I'd use this space today to put a tiny little blade of light on that secret world that almost never get's any attention in the media. Podcasting. There are literally thousands of podcasts covering everything from politics to film, to action figure collecting. Anything you're into I promise you there's someone out there producing a weekly podcast about it. I just happen to be into Star Trek so Trektinis is my kind of thing. Plus I believe everyone needs to know the recipe for making a Nuclear Wessel... (4 parts Gin/1 part Ginger Ale/Tonic Water)