A Clockwork Vegetarian

I am no longer a vegetarian.

I've been meatless for roughly six years. Back in the day, when I was the fuzzy-headed, over-excited Buddhist of my youth, I tried to force myself off meat over half a dozen times. None of them took. I loved steak, bratwurst, hot dogs, bacon, all of it (except fish), and I'd always go running back to them no matter how much failure and shame I felt. Did I care about animal cruelty? Yeah, of course. Was that the largest motivating factor? No, although at the time I believed it was. I hated PETA (and still do) but non-participation in the killing of animals is a huge part of what was then my new religion/life philosophy, and I wanted to be the perfect Buddhist.

Despite many unsuccessful attempts, one day something finally fell into place. Not only could I resist meat, I found it was repulsing me. The texture came to be the worst--the word "gristle" went from an abstraction to something sickeningly tangible. One night in Phoenix as I sat on my balcony in the still desert air I knew the time had come, and I hadn't gone back. Aside from a couple rookie mistakes (bacon hiding under a thick layer of cheese, the omnipresence of gelatin) I never knowingly strayed.

But as the years went on I found myself tiring of this self-inflicted diet. In my experience it became too limiting, and either my waning youthful energy or dwindling compassion have tipped the scales enough that it just isn't worth the hassle. I'm sure some of this is due to my present environment as Hampton Roads isn't overburdened with meatless reseraunts, although I have good reason to believe much of America is the same. I'm also one of two vegetarians I know and I'm not the kind of asshole that expects others to kowtow to my individual dietary choices. Friends and family make allowances for me, but they don't expect me to eat meat and I don't expect them to forgo it. If I find myself somewhere with many "cruelty-free" restaurants my stance may change, but I'm too fond of convenience and certain fast-food establishments to go full veggie again.

Which is one of the reasons I'm going back. A vegetarian cannot get something on the go without many repeats of the same, unfulfilling items. I love French fries, but I want something more. Ironically I've never been much of a salad person and somehow doubt the drive-thru variety would be very good. I cannot count the number of times I've been in a car redolent of the smell of burgers, chicken sandwiches, and chili dogs while I desultorily munched on paltry fries. It makes sense for these establishments to be short of vegetarian fare, but it doesn't change the fact that it leaves me out, and I'm finally through with it.

Fast food joints aren't the only offenders. Regular sit-down restaurants are also ill-equipped to serve my kind. Unless it happens to be a specialty shop the choices are still sparse, and my aforementioned non-assholishness keeps me from subjecting kith and kin to places they will feel limited, usually paying more for a meal that to them seems lacking. It's odd and counter-intuitive, but natural, flesh-free foods cost more than those which require whole animals to be raised, killed, and processed for consumption. This isn't even taking into account the organic and free-range items usually offered at such places for even higher prices. Vegetarians are then forced into giving special instruction and modifying menu items, which yield mixed results and has the added worry that wait staff will make mistakes or simply disregard the wishes of a customer easily assumed to be nothing but an overly-particular nuisance. Waiters and waitresses have it hard enough, and I strongly dislike feeling like an extra bother.

Worse still, however, is the recent realization that I no longer have a choice to eat meat or not. After more than six years of a meatless diet my body is no longer used to animal protein. Earlier this year I performed a little experiment and ate a small amount of gelatin. "Intestinal gridlock" is how I'd describe the result, and that came from a single packet of Pop-tarts. Imperceptibly I had passed some border and could no longer choose what I wanted to eat. Merriam-Webster defines a vegetarian as "one who believes in or practices vegetarianism" (a little tautonymous, but it is a dictionary after all). If one doesn't have a choice are they truly vegetarian? Is someone who is forced from doing evil truly good? If not, then I haven't truly been vegetarian in some time, ever since I stopped caring and could go along by gastrointestinal coercion alone. Maybe I'm just being spiteful, but this is my biggest reason to return to the omnivorous lifestyle.

Not surprisingly Google has more results for becoming vegetarian than the other way around. (As a side note to all those people who Googled "How do I stop being lazy/shy/gay" enough times to make it the top results: chin up; you're obviously not alone.) "Vegetarian" wasn't anywhere on the instant results list and I found only one article that was useful. The rest of it was pretension and self-righteousness as only the anonymity of the Internet can support, not surprisingly from angry fellow vegetarians and vegans. One person posing the question of safely adding meat back into their diet for health reasons was met only with derision: "Go hunting, then you'll never eat meat again." "All these people who claim they 'need' to eat meat for health reasons are just selfish. Man up and stick to your diet." "Go out and eat a rare steak right away, that will cure you of wanting meat." "Want to stop being vegetarian? Go vegan." Notice the original plea for help--how does one reintroduce meat safely into one's diet--goes completely ignored. It appears these people care deeply for the plight of all animals save one--the human animal.

And it's not just stereotypical PETA zealots that are dickish and rude. When the first vegetarian came into existence so did his antithesis--the heckling carnivore. Meat-eaters seem to love nothing more than a vegan or vegetarian to poke fun at, good-naturedly or otherwise. There have been no end to the comments and remarks at my expense every time the subject is broached, and with every new acquaintance and set of coworkers it begins again. The slights aren't offensive in and of themselves, rather the insult comes from their repetitiveness and their lack of creativity and wit. You can only hear "Hey, wanna go out for some steak? Haw haw haw!" so many times before it becomes unbearably old. Not as bad but still frustrating is the inescapable question of "So, what do you eat then?" in any of its forms and insinuations. In the beginning it was exciting to explain vegetarian diet to the inquisitive, but after so many years the luster has definitely been lost.

The one helpful article confirmed what I had suspected: after years of vegetarianism my body wouldn't be able to handle meat right away, and I'd have to gradually step myself up to full omnivore status. Broths would be first, followed by small portions of fish and white meats like chicken with the skin removed (mentioning skin removal is still a little unsettling), and red meat last, as it is the single most difficult food for the human body to digest, vegetarian or otherwise. In addition to the above advice, the author was also thoughtful enough to add a section on the psychological effects of consuming meat again. She warned of the possible ridicule from veggies and meat-eaters alike, and a sense of failure for abandoning a chosen diet. She suggested letting the insults roll off one's back, along with encouragement and support. It was really quite endearing, as well as refreshing in a sea of haughty jerks on both sides of the food pyramid.

---

I found myself decided. That night I cooked pasta and held a cube of chicken bouillon over the pot; it smelled like concentrated, metallic chicken broth and was very yellow. I dropped it in with the multi-colored spiral noodles and meat-free pasta sauce without ceremony. Crushing the moist cube between the tines of a fork I hoped it would actually dissolve and not just hide in clumps within the sauce, to be discovered during surprise bites of intense chicken flavor. Luckily it did mix and I sat down to my first non-vegetarian meal in over half a decade.

It tasted almost exactly the same as the first half of the pasta I'd prepared a week earlier. I definitely noticed the taste of chicken, however, and would have noticed even if I hadn't known it was there, but it wasn't overpowering. I shared the pasta with my toddler son, the only other vegetarian family member until he started eating solid foods. I liked the way it tasted and kept an internal eye open for any impending stomach pain. None came, and even though I experienced brief images of hens congregating in a sunlit chicken coup and told myself I was eating them, I felt nothing. We finished the big bowl of noodles together and I slept that night, untroubled.

The next day I waited for indigestion that did not come. I went through my normal workday looking forward to lunch, where I'd have chicken-flavored Ramen noodles for the first time in years. I'd eaten the Oriental flavor for some months at the start of my dietary confinement before realizing it wasn't meat-free. Back then I was militant but lazy like many of the young vegans I knew, and couldn't be bothered to read the ingredients until later. I loved the cheap noodles in their warm Styrofoam cups and was excited to enjoy them again. Before Noon the smell of Ramen drifted down to me over the cubicle wall. My neighbor apparently had the same idea for lunch and I took this to be a sign that today was definitely the day. As soon as I caught a break I unwrapped a cup of noodles from the employee break room and filled it with steaming water from the coffee maker, closing the lid and keeping it there with a plastic fork. It smelled fantastic, and I returned to my desk to eagerly await the three minutes of required cooking time.

By the time I was able to get to it something like twelve minutes had gone by, but the cup was still very warm in my hands. The wavy noodles always remind me of permed hair and the broth was the same waxy yellow of the bouillon cube. It tasted as delicious as it smelled, and I can't remember enjoying a lunch at my desk quite as much. I ate three-quarters of it before I realized there were small soggy pieces of actual chicken in it, something I'd forgotten in the intermittent years. "Oh well," I thought with the anticlimactic indifference of a virgin who unexpectedly finds himself deflowered. I'd crossed a threshold but felt no change. Chicken broth was one thing, but actual flesh was another--I was no longer a vegetarian.

The next night I put a small pan on the stove and began cooking half a package of kielbasa for my son's dinner. He has the infuriating habit of eating only part of whatever we make for him (unless we've cooked for ourselves, in which case he wants it all), and I half-planned on trying a bite or two of whatever he didn't finish. As the crescents of sausage began to hiss in the pan I looked at the packaging before wrapping it in tinfoil: "beef kielbasa" it said between the horseshoe shape of the meat. Maybe I wouldn't be scavenging his leftovers. But as the sausage began to brown and crackle in its own delicious-smelling grease I thought maybe a few bites wouldn't hurt. I constructed a plate of mozzarella cheese and French bread slices, adding the seared disks into a small pile and pouring the remaining grease over a few pieces of bread. The smell was tantalizing, and I hardly sat down before eating one of the flavored bread slices. It was fantastic, with a hearty, spicy flavor I hadn't tasted in years, all from a humble piece of bread with sausage drippings. My tongue overrode my trepidation and by the end of the night I'd eaten the majority of the sausage myself. As I ate my first bite of beef--a meat I wasn't planning on eating for some time, if ever--my girlfriend watched my face expectantly for signs of disgust. She saw nothing but enjoyment.

My biggest fear in making the transition has been painful indigestion, but so far there has been nothing. I wouldn't hazard a bucket of KFC but things are progressing surprisingly well, and by this rate the legendary Chick-Fil-A could be in my near future. At this point I plan to stay "mostly vegetarian", a term that would annoy me if I wasn't the one using it. (Just like being pregnant, either you are or your aren't, and I've ranted against too many faux-veggies claiming to be full members to let myself by without comment.) I've come to love certain meat substitutes more than the products they originally replaced and cannot see myself abandoning them when grocery shopping.

Aside from pain my two biggest concerns are health and, unsurprisingly, weight-gain. Accurately or not I consider a meatless diet the main factor in my more-or-less state of thinness during a period of otherwise very poor eating and no exercise. In the two years since Jonas' birth I have had no physical exertion aside from the constant lifting of an ever-expanding child, and somehow have stayed relatively skinny and kept a surprising amount of definition in legs that were carved on two straight years of heavy bicycle riding. While a vegetarian diet can be more healthy than one containing meat, in many cases (mine included) the only difference lay in what it lacks. Candy, soda, junk food, and a constant stream of coffee the approximate color and sweetness of vanilla ice cream have composed my food intake for the past six years--proof that vegetarians are at least as unhealthy as anyone else. Regardless, I do still worry that the added strain of animal fats and flesh will be the monkey wrench to my system that finally brings on the merciless weight gain I'm certain is waiting for me on the eve of my thirties. I could start exercising and use the momentum of this change to enact other, healthier changes in my diet, but I'm not going to. I know myself better now than I ever have, and I just won't be able to muster the energy required.

At the time of this writing I've consumed approximately an entire package of beef sausage on my own to no ill effect, aside from a heaviness after eating that vegans and vegetarians are exempt from experiencing. This morning, however, I packed up my vegetarian rib-lets (one of the many miracles from Morningstar Farms, who will continue to enjoy my patronage even after I've become fully converted) and headed off to work, and will be happy come lunchtime with my meal of meatless magic. But who knows, now that I can accept any lunch invitation from coworkers the possibilities seem endless...

Root Canal

"...About as much fun as a root canal." This is one of those old, sarcastic jokes I've known my whole life but can never remember hearing outside of movies from the 80's.

Until recently I really hated brushing my teeth. I just couldn't motivate myself to do it. The two minutes spent standing in front of the sink felt like hours of wasted time. Wasted, because my teeth felt fine: no pain, no sensitivity to hot or cold, no problems. They weren't sparkling-white like one of Meyer's vampires but I didn't look like I had scurvy either, which was good enough for me. So I maintained a minimal brushing routine.

That is until the pain started. It began as all things do, as something small: just a little sensitivity to extreme temperatures, which I treated by covering the afflicted tooth with the inside of my cheek, shielding it during those first few drinks of a fresh cup of coffee or a newly opened can of pop. But the sensitivity grew into a subtle background tinge that never went away. I stepped up the brushing a little but soon fell back into old habits.

Eventually the tooth was screaming instead of whining, and one night in August I couldn't sleep because of the pain. I lay in bed trying every mental trick I knew but my entire body tensed and shuddered as waves of pain emanated from my mouth. I tried not to think about how effective dental torture must be. The next morning I opted out of work and Googled dentists in my area. I called one based not only on its extreme proximity but also the quality of the website and the glowing testimonials found there. Miraculously they were able to see me for an emergency appointment, and at 9am I sat in a brand new office on the third floor of a brand new building a short walk from my apartment. When I stepped off the elevator a picture of the dentist shaking President Obama's hand greeted me. Already I was impressed.

I was led to a room almost immediately and only had a few minutes worth of reading before the dentist came in. He took the time to be warm and friendly even though I could tell he was busy. I didn't mind at all; I was grateful they'd been able to squeeze me into what looked like a full day. He asked about the problem and had me open wide. He had barely craned his head to peer into my mouth when he said, "Oh yeah, I see what's going on there." The night before even my bleary eyes had seen it in the harsh light of the bathroom mirror--a dark, gaping cavity in the molar farthest back in my mouth. I felt a little better knowing I hadn't been overreacting.

He had a dental assistant with a charming smile and fantastic dreadlocks do a series of X-rays while he attended to his other patients. When he came back to inspect the panoramic, monochromatic map the many X-rays had created my fears were confirmed: the molar needed a root canal, and there were a couple cavities besides. I had mentally prepared myself for this, but it was still hard news to hear. They ran my insurance and the woman behind the front desk (named Sparkles) exclaimed over a stack of forms that I had very good coverage. They worked out a plan to get the root canal completely taken care of, which would max out my coverage for the year. The rest would have to wait but they had that all planned out, too. Even with my fantastic dental insurance I'd still be paying $445 out of pocket. We set an appointment date for after my next non-rent payday and I left the office with three prescriptions, two for pain and one for penicillin.

The penicillin did wonders, as did the generic Ibuprofen that Walmart uses. The third prescription had more warning labels and seemed to be the serious one. I held off taking those until the other two weren't cutting it. Unfortunately I learned too late that the generic Codeine does jack shit against even the tamest pains. One particularly terrible night I tripled up on Tylenol PM and two of these "hardcore" pain pills and nothing happened. Finally I just became so exhausted I fell asleep curled up in the fetal position. I had to push the root canal back a month for financial reasons, and the week I spent without penicillin while I waited for a refill was the worst.

The day eventually came and I woke up early to eat breakfast for once. I didn't want to pass out from pain and low blood-sugar, something that had happened before when I failed to eat before a tattoo. I'd felt a little light-headed and slipped in slow-motion to the bare cement floor looking for the water cooler, waking up to the tattoo artist offering Skittles and smiling at me like I was an idiot. A single parfait is all I wanted or had time for, and it would have to do. I dressed, packed my bag, and woke my sleeping girlfriend for a kiss goodbye. She whispered admonishments to contact someone for a ride afterwards if I needed, which I good-naturedly protested. With fifteen minutes until my appointment began I set off down the street, reading as I walked through the breezy morning air. Traffic flowed into my neighborhood towards the rising sun at my back and garbage trucks stopped to dump dumpsters into their metal holds.

At 8am the waiting room already had four or five people reading magazines in the comfy red chairs. The TV over the large, half-circle fish tank blared the "news". All of it was pre-anniversary 9-11 dramatics. I did my best to ignore it and focus on my book, and I was called back shortly. The room was small, clean, and welcoming. Almost the entire facing wall was filled by a square window that looked out into blue sky and white clouds. I watched a man in t-shirt and jean shorts exit the building opposite and enjoy a cigarette before climbing into a white van and entering tunnel traffic. I read and tried to relax while an assistant got everything ready on trays behind me. The dentist came in and we exchanged chitchat while he washed his hands and put on fresh blue latex gloves. His daughter had just started pre-K and he seemed excited to have her in school.

We talked briefly about our kids but all too soon it was time to get to work. My chair was slowly reclined and a big wad of numbing gel was placed between my cheek and gums. Despite the large amount, the shots of anesthetic still hurt worse than I remembered and I winced visibly, gripping tight the arms of the chair all five or six times the needle stabbed deep into my gums. The dentist apologized and I tried to grunt that it was okay. I was left alone to allow the chemicals to take affect while they tended to other patients.

He came back presently and started in without a word. The assistant had already clamped the tooth off and stretched a dental dam over what felt like half my face. He took a small drill from the tray behind my head and began right way. From the informative video they had me watch on the root canal process during my last visit, I assume this is when he ground the molar down to a round stump and started the large bore hole down into the pulp. Only once during this part of the procedure did I feel anything, jumping sideways away from the low rumble of the drill, and the dentist was quick to shoot some more of the good stuff directly into the tooth with a tiny, angled needle. Afterward he regularly injected anesthetic between bouts of drilling. I knew from that same instructional yet unsettling video (despite all obvious efforts to the contrary) what the large, triangle-shaped drill was doing: hollowing out my tooth of its tender pulp, right down to the roots. I made the mistake of opening my safety-glassed eyes to see the drill covered with red and white bits and a large white suction tube fill red with my blood.

Now, I'm not squeamish. At all. I love gory movies and it takes nothing short of real-life horrific trauma to make me look away. That being said, I nearly fainted. I blanched at the very least. I felt pinpricks of sweat all over my body and tried not to wonder what would happen if I threw up at this point in the procedure. Even though I felt nothing that was being done to me, at some level my body knew that blood belonged to it and didn't like that one bit. It took a few minutes of slow, deep breathing to calm down while he drilled on.

From there everything was amazingly smooth. While my new tooth-well dried the dread-locked assistant turned on the TV and I found a "Law & Order: SVU" marathon, my favorite. The only other pain came during the filing and shaping of my temporary crown, when the dentist accidentally pinched my lip sharply against the edge of my lower teeth. My stay was also slightly extended due to sickness on the part of three-quarters of the staff, leaving only the dentist and the one assistant for a whole suite full of patients. I didn't care, SVU was on and nothing hurt. I put my arms behind my head in the dental chair and enjoyed some hassle-free TV watching, something of a rarity at home.

After a few tries the temporary crown stayed on and was shorn down so my bite (or "occlusion" as they say in the field) didn't feel wrong. I shook the dentist's hand, thanking him for everything and refusing his apologies for the delay. The dental assistant held up a mirror so I could check myself before going out into public, joking that I'd be mad if she let me go outside looking a mess. I used a wet paper towel to clear a couple stubborn drops of dried bonding agent from my cheek and nose. I thanked her for all her help and she told me I was a real joy to have.

As I paid my dues to Sparkles at the front desk she had me write down the name of the book I'd been reading (which is "The Terror" by the way, and it is amazing) while she ran my card. No prescriptions were given and I didn't expect any. Even though I was still very numb in the bottom-left quadrant of my face I felt surprisingly fine. More than I would have allowed myself to hope for earlier that day. I decided against a ride home and easily walked the few blocks under my own power. Which, to be honest, was a little disappointing; that part of me that loves ridiculous experiences had been looking forward to stumbling home through pain and the fog of medication.

As it was I made it home easily, tonguing the foreign crown all the way. It felt rough and out of place in a mouth I'd become very acquainted with since my first appointment, unable to stop exploring the cavity with my tongue and dental floss. I'd received no instruction on when it was safe to eat solid foods but I didn't want to risk it. Luckily my girlfriend's mom was able to bring over vegetarian soups and my favorite thing of all: French bread. While I waited for my food to arrive I was reminded just how much comfort I derive from eating. I kept getting up to look in the kitchen for some kind of relief. Also I hadn't eaten all day and was starving.

After a bowl of tomato soup and a miniature loaf of bread I felt very contented. Enough in fact to curl up on the couch to a bad horror movie and sleep for the next four hours. When I finally woke up the anesthetic had worn off, and my tongue hurt. At first I thought a sharp protrusion on the crown had rubbed it raw, but after inspecting a long bleeding gash in the mirror I realized it must have been bitten while still numb. It was the only thing in my mouth that gave me any trouble all night. The pain was enough to cure me of any lingering curiosity towards have my tongue pierced, however.

Maybe advances in dentistry have come a long way in the ten-plus years since I've been, or maybe Idahoan dentists are cruel, but this dreaded root canal ended up being the best dental procedure I can remember. I wouldn't want to do it again, as much to avoid the pain of the needles as shelling out over $400, but I can say now that root canals really aren't so bad. Hell, if this is what root canals are like I can't imagine how easy plain old cavities are now. Technology, am I right?

And Doctor Holland, if you're reading this, you the man. Even without that picture of you shaking Obama's hand.

Doctor Who (actual) Review - Night Terrors

I'm back with another review! The previous one I'm chalking up to learning experience; I realize it was very lengthy and more of an overview than a review. So fear not, you readers of little time and attention span, this one should be more concise and more recognizable as a general review than a play-by-play recap.

Last weekend's episode of Doctor Who is about an adorable little British ginger kid in the cutest little striped pajamas who's afraid of everything. In fact he's so afraid that not only are his beleaguered parents participating in some of his borderline OCD rituals, but his call for help is heard across space and time to reach the Doctor via the psychic paper (which is my favorite Doctor Who invention). The last time someone called out to him this way it was River before she was kind of annoying, and David Tennant was gracing us with his toothy grin and Converse sneakers.

"Haven't done this in a while," the Doctor says as he runs around the TARDIS console, moving levers and making noise. "Done what? What are you doing?" Amy asks. "Making a house call." Queue the title sequence! Which, incidentally, sounds very "X-Files" since season five began. I'm used to it now but I like the original better--just like a lot of things since Moffat took the reigns.

Rory, Amy, and the Doctor search a humongous, boxy, interesting-looking apartment building that makes me think of Oldboy. The whole episode has a very clean, slightly surreal look to it that I really enjoy. Almost everything takes place inside of the apartment complex but the set designers or location scouts did a great job. Ever since season five began they've had high production values but something about this episode in particular stands out.

The Doctor accidentally passes himself off as being from Social Services and sits down for a cuppa with the dad, who explains the problem:

"Now it's got completely out ov hand. I mean he's scared to deaf of everyfing," he says.
"Pantophobia," the Doctor replies from his nonchalant position on the couch.
"Wot?"
"That's what it's called: pantophobia. Not a fear of pants though, if that's what you're thinking, it's a fear of everything. ...Including pants I suppose, in that case. Sorry, go on."

The kid's dad has probably my most favorite accent, the lower-class English accent; I could listen to it all day. Besides the accent the dad is very likable and thankfully spends a lot of time in front of the camera. As the parent of a two year old I identify with this character, who's just a worn out guy trying to help his kid and get his life under control. Rory and Amy become separated from the Doctor in a "It's a Good Life" kinda way and find themselves in what appears to be an abandoned mansion, so this guy gets to be the Doctor's sidekick throughout the episode.

Which is completely fine by me. These stand-alone (sometimes arguably throw-away) episodes give us a much needed rest from the loud barrage of "epic" events Moffat has been assaulting us with. It's become tiring and tedious, and I'm very nearly sick of them. These more classic episodes place the focus back on the Doctor where it should be, which is another thing I miss from the previous seasons.

And seriously, how can you move focus away from the Doctor? Especially when he's being played as energetically and charismatically as he is by Matt Smith. He's not as pretty as David Tennant (who will always be my Doctor) and he doesn't pull out glasses whenever he reads a computer screen (which I dearly miss), but I think he's blowing all expectations away, even with the mistakes Moffat is making in the show. Every rapid syllable, every joke that goes by almost too fast to catch, every flurried movement and hurried explanation is just a joy to watch. Much more enjoyable than Rory's (hopefully ended) waffling or Amy's cliche hot-/thick-headedness.

Moffat stated in an interview that the "real story" is all about Amy and her journey after coming into contact with the Doctor. At the time I heard it (sometime back near the middle of season five) I was mostly in agreement, however he has since taken it to extremes. The Doctor has been relegated almost to a plot device for Amy and Rory's Story, which is, excuse my language, fucking sacrilegious. In the days of Russell T. Davies due attention was paid to the companions and their developments after meeting the Doctor, however the overall focus was much more on how the companions, the current monster-of-the-week, and his haunted past were affecting him. The Doctor was always the center of our attentions.

In the same interview Moffat said the Doctor is basically a fixed character, meaning he's set in his ways, he's not changing, no story there. Which would explain the direction (or lack thereof) Moffat is taking with him. It's a grievous mistake to consider any character--especially what should be the main one--as stagnant, and blasphemous at the very least.

Luckily this episode is mostly free from the multiple seasons-wide story arcs Moffat has setup (and has less than five episodes to resolve or I'm going to coordinate a revolt) and can just be spooky fun. There's some great speeches from the Doctor and in the character of the kid's dad we get a temporary companion that isn't a pain in the ass. All of the wonder and stupefied looks with none of the bossiness and short skirts. The villains of the episode are creepy and the special affects associated with them are great. As I've mentioned the little boy and his dad are very likable and at the end of the episode they totally get me misty-eyed. Just an all around well put-together, light-hearted, fun episode.

Sort of like the Lodger episode from Smith's early days: you could show it to your friends or Doctor Who fans who haven't caught up to the Twelfth Doctor yet and very little would need explaining or be spoiled. A fellow fan and coworker told me this episode was originally slated for a different air date and I can totally see it. Of course they have to tie it in with at least one of the major story arcs, so at the end they spliced in a short clip of the view screen back on the TARDIS with the same date-of-death fact sheet we saw three times in the previous episode, which is my one and only complaint about Night Terrors.

I realize Steven Moffat is known for his writing skills and complex plots, but Night Terrors really made me miss the days of Russell T. Davies and episodes that stood on their own and weren't overly preoccupied with the companions--companions with an inherent shelf-life that won't outlast the Doctor or his fans.

Doctor Who Review - Let's Kill Hitler

I'm a week behind, but for some of you this may still be full of spoilers. I basically do a rundown of the entire episode.

I love me some Doctor Who. I haven't seen any of the Pre-Eccleston stuff but I'm more than familiar from 2005 on. I have the soundtracks, a couple of sonic screwdrivers, and have had a couple my Doctor Who Reddit submissions hit the top of the hot list. Am I the world's biggest Doctor Who fan? Not by a very long shot. But I'm more than just a passive viewer: I'm attached to The Doctor and have very strong opinions about this show.

For some retarded unknown reason, this season has been split in two. We had seven episodes before a three month break and the weekend before last started the second half off with an episode entitled "Let's Kill Hitler". Steven Moffat is the man behind some of the best Doctor Who episodes since it started back up in 2005, and has been in charge since season five. His other awesome TV show, Sherlock, has also been broken in two. I kind of understand the theory behind these two-part seasons, but I think it's a bad idea. It feels like too much waiting. That could just be me, however; this is the first time since I've started watching Doctor Who that I've been caught up and have had to wait for new episodes. Three months is a long time when you're used to watching entire seasons at a time.

Obviously there was a lot of build up for this episode. Online conjecture from fans, trailers, teasers, and major cliff hangers all added to the suspense. And who knows, maybe the wait did what it was intended to do--if Hurricane Irene hadn't knocked out the power I would have been right there on Saturday watching along with the world.

I'm sorry to report that I was mostly let down. I've come to expect a certain calibre of writing and wit from Doctor Who, even if it is a show about a time-traveling alien in a police box getting into adventures through space and time. Steven Moffat has written some amazing episodes with touching and complex plot lines. He makes full use of time travel to do some fantastic and dramatic things and has displayed an almost Whedon-esque ability to plan ahead.

Which is why the first seven minutes are so annoying. A character named "Mels" is introduced as the life-long and bestest friend of Amy, the second main character after the Doctor himself. We've never heard of Mels before. Ever. No passing mentions, no photos lurking in the background, nothing. We're subjected to a montage of Amy and Mels growing up together, in which Mels is obsessed with the Doctor and always gets herself into trouble because of it and Amy is always bailing her out. Even if she wasn't being shoe-horned into the story I'd still hater her--she's the type of two-dimensional "bad girl/boy" character (complete with black leather) that's so prevalent and so insulting in scripts these days.

We first see her barreling through a wheat field in a stolen Stingray (in England!) and skidding to a stop inches away from the Doctor and his TARDIS, police sirens close behind. She then nearly dry humps the TARDIS before pulling a gun (in England!) on the Doctor and delivers the line from which the episode takes its name: "You've got a time machine, I've got a gun. What the hell, let's kill Hitler." No reason is ever given or inferred. I hate to agree with my girlfriend on this point but the entire Hitler thing seems to be entirely for shock value. Later in the episode Hitler gets shoved into a closet and entirely forgotten, never to be mentioned again.

We cut from the the title sequence back to the TARDIS flying out of control, filled with lots of smoke and yelling. Mels has shot the TARDIS. Why? Because the Doctor said she wouldn't be able to. What a rebel. They careen through blue skies and presumably time towards Berlin, 1938, where we see a cheap SyFy channel Star Trek knock-off of a crew piloting a robo-ship that looks like a janitor. The ship itself is pretty crap, and not in the trademark everyday-odds-and-ends way of the Doctor's TARDIS (which actually has a reason behind it) or the lovably-cheap overall look of the previous seasons before the obvious increase of production capital came in. Everything about it seems poorly designed, e.g., a woman from the ship's art department travels to one of the robot's eyes to physically verify a target's skin color (because the last time they relied on the sensors it came out green) and we see the ship is riddled with robotic antibodies set into the floor so that one must step over or around them every two steps.

The robo-ship stalks a Nazi into his office and begins to slowly change its appearance to mimic his, with mechanical sounds and everything. Apparently it can't mimic glasses, so it steals them from the stupefied Nazi (which makes a metal scraping noise as they slide over its temples) before beaming him on-board with a miniaturization ray. The poor, nearly-sightless German stumbles down the catwalks for a moment before being menaced by blurry floating objects with some pretty good lines: "Remain calm while your life is extinguished." "You will experience a tingling sensation and then death." "It is normal to experience fear during your incineration." They look like robotic jellyfish with tazers and are the best things about the ship. "Who is he?" the captain asks. "Just some dude, guilty of some hate crimes and stuff." "Okay, let the antibodies have him." So they just kidnap people without any idea who they are? Way to be cautious with time travel there, guys.

The mechanical doppelganger makes his way to Hitler's enormous marble-floored office where the man himself is doing paperwork. The robo-ship declares Hitler guilty and announces "justice mode activated" before a bright light shines from its mouth to presumably kill der Fuhrer for his crimes against humanity. Just then one of the pseudo-Trekkies goes, "Oops, wait. Wrong year guys, we're too early!" Who the hell gave these guys a time machine? You'd think someone would have checked the year before Operation Smite Hitler claimed one life (a Nazi life, but still) and announced itself to the target. It's amateur hour on the S.S. Craptastic, apparently.

Luckily for Hitler the wounded, out of control TARDIS crashes through the window, knocking the robo-ship down and saving his life. As the Doctor and pals pile out and stand agape at having saved Hitler the robo-ship gets up (slowly) from the floor behind them. Hitler pulls his 1930's Luger from its holster and pops some caps in its metallic ass, apparently doing significant damage to the ship as we see sparks showering the tiny crew while they throw themselves around inside.

Rory (who looks better this episode than ever before) stands up and clocks Hitler in the face, turns his own gun on him, and tells him to sit down and shut up. Go Rory! He's awesome during the entire episode, cold-cocking another Nazi for his motorcycle and thankfully, finally, getting into the full swing of hanging with the Doctor. It's taken him long enough--he's been a hesitant, complaining, dumb-struck pansy for too long. (Rory the Roman notwithstanding. His toughness never felt believable to me, and all of that was erased in the universe reboot anyway.) There's nothing wrong with being overwhelmed at first by the Doctor's shenanigans but it gets old fast, and Rory has been wearing it thin for almost two seasons now.

Hitler got off a few wild shots before Rory decked him and put him in the closet, and an errant bullet hit Mels in the stomach. Woo! I was rooting for her exit the moment she opened her mouth. But to my dismay she begins to to glow with the signature FX of a Time Lord regenerating after being mortally wounded. I couldn't believe it. Seriously, Moffat? "Mels" is really Melody Pond\River Song, Rory and Amy's missing baby and a major reoccurring character since season three? I've come to expect more from you.

Done another way--a better way--Amy finding out that she grew up with her own child as her best friend (and naming her daughter after what turns out to be her daughter) would have been fantastic. As it happened though, the execution was forced and so rushed that it feels like a hasty afterthought. Had Mels been in the show longer than literally eighteen minutes it could have had so much emotional force. Instead it comes across as annoying and more than a little insulting.

The freshly regenerated Melody\River now stands before them as the character we've been curious about since Tennant's reign. She explores her new looks giddy as a hyperactive fourteen year old. "That's... Melody." Amy says in disbelief as she runs around the room annoyingly. I feel you Amy, I feel you. The only joy I got out of this young Melody\River is when she says she'll gradually make herself look younger to freak people out, a nice reference to the fact that we first saw her character when the actress was three years younger. Alex Kingston always looks fantastic, though. While Mels lay dying the crew of the clanky robo-ship discovered her true identity, and that her crimes make Hitler's almost inconsequential by comparison. "Melody Pond," Captain Jerk says as the camera zooms on his face dramatically, "the woman that kills the Doctor." Dun dun dunnn!

After Melody\River is finished excitedly checking out her hair, her teeth, and her new butt we're finally treated to something enjoyable: she gets down to the business of trying to kill the Doctor. What follows is a fun series of gags where Melody\River pulls a gun on the Doctor and fires, but wait! When everyone was distracted he'd taken all the bullets out. River was expecting that so she goes to pull a second gun out of the leather vest, only to find the Doctor has switched it with a banana(r). She finds the real gun but ha! The Doctor already removed the clip. It's a very well timed game of I know that you know that I know that you know that I know that you know the gun isn't loaded. If this is what it's like when Time Lords duel it's a shame there aren't more around.

In the end Melody\River gets the upper hand, sweetly planting a poisonous peck on the Doctor's lips in a move he should have anticipated given her past/future history (past for us, future for her). River stands on the ledge of the broken window, looks out over Berlin on the eve of war, and decides to go shopping. She warns Rory and Amy not to follow and disappears out the high window like Batman in a flowing leopard-print shirt.

Thus poisoned, the Doctor sends Rory and Amy after Melody\River while he drags his rapidly failing body into his wounded TARDIS. He collapses on the floor, unable to reach the console. Activating the ship's (heretofore unknown) voice interface he's presented with the holograms of his past companions from Rose Tyler on. Sadly each is just a still image that the Doctor rejects as the ship's visual representation after only a few seconds on screen. It would have been fantastic to have Billie Piper or Catherine Tate come back to the show even for five minutes. The Doctor asks for someone he isn't filled with guilt over and Amelia Pond, the young version of Amy, appears before him. I really like the little Scottish girl they got for this character, which I like probably more than the adult Amy.

In an adorable but slightly computerized voice young Amelia Pond informs the Doctor that he has thirty-two minutes to live. She repeats the line, "In thirty-two minutes you will be dead," with characteristic computer-stubbornness through the Doctor's quick-fire banter. He can't regenerate (surprise, surprise; any self-respecting fan knows Matt Smith is signed on for another season and they already cheated to keep the same actor once) and there is no cure for the Judas Tree poison in his system. The Doctor is upbeat as always, and just needs something for the pain so he can use his thirty-one minutes of remaining life to the fullest. The hologram has nothing to offer him on this. He begs, "Amelia, listen to me. I can be brave for you, but you have to tell me how. Please, help me..." He begins to pass out when we hear Amelia--not the subtly electronic voice of the hologram--say, "Fish fingers and custard." The Doctor's eyes snap open and the music rises. "What did you say?" But the hologram is silent. It took me re-watching the episode with headphones to verify the differences in voices, but it's there. This is the kind of subtle clue Moffat excels at, and I'd bet my favorite pen this comes back later in the season. "Fish fingers and custard!" the Doctor laughs as he pulls himself up and gets the TARDIS going... somewhere\when.

Speaking of subtle clues, the Doctor wears a new coat at the beginning of the episode and comes back from (presumably) getting himself some fish fingers and custard in a tux. Any time he changes clothes I'm suspicious, as Moffat has used this in the past to signify characters from a different point in their time steam. What one initially takes to be a continuity error or a meaningless wardrobe change actually turns out to be significant later on. I'm hoping the sudden and unexplained change into a tuxedo comes back around to be the kind of timey-wimey awesomeness I love Doctor Who for.

While the Doctor is off self-medicating, River has been busy toying with Nazis and brandishing machine guns at an entire resteraunt full of Germans, ordering them to disrobe so she can get some new clothes. Rory and Amy are in hot pursuit on a motorcycle taken from the second Nazi Rory clocked in his continuing out-of-character awesomeness. "Can you even ride a motorbike?" Amy asks. "I suppose so," he says, "it's been that sort of a day." You go, Rory Pond! Keep this kind of thing up and I may actually be sad to see you go.

But wait! The Nazi was actually the robo-ship in a new disguise. If a skinny Brit can take this thing down with one punch I'm thoroughly convinced it's a piece of crap. The robo-ship gets up, constructs its own motorcycle, and follows the Ponds. When it catches up to them at the restaurant of fleeing Germans in their unmentionables it looks exactly like Amy, and turns its head (slowly) towards them with a mechanical clicking noise you'd think wouldn't happen with technology capable of time travel. Cut to Melody\River playing dress-up in front of the mirror when "Amy" walks in, stone faced. Meanwhile Rory and Amy wake up on board the S.S. Craptastic and get chased by the antibodies before one of the crew members arrives. He slaps on electronic ID bracelets which signifies them as "authorized" and stops the attack.

Dopple-Amy accuses Melody\River of killing the Doctor and hits her with the same beam of light from its mouth that was going to kill Hitler. Just then the Doctor appears, upright and in tails, top hat and everything, leaning against his TARDIS dramatically. The robo-ship shuts off the beam and everyone turns to look at him. "You're dying," Melody\River exclaims, "and you stopped to change?" He spins around flourishing a stylish cane, "Oh, you should always waste time when you don't have any. Time is not the boss of you. Rule four-hundred and eight." The cane opens at the top to reveal his trademark green sonic technology and he scans robo-Amy. "Sonic cane," he says with a grin. "Are you serious?" Melody\River asks. "Never knowingly. Never knowingly be serious, rule twenty-seven. You might want to write these down." It appears he has begun mentoring her already, something fans have suspected for awhile now.

The Doctor's body is still shutting down despite his unflagging excitement, and he cries out in pain between jokes as his legs become unresponsive. Melody\River tries to run but is caught in a force field by robo-Amy and screams in pain as she is punished for her crimes. The Doctor yells at them to stop and engages Captain Jerk in a conversation that explains their purpose: They travel through time to extract those who've never been punished for their atrocities and "give them hell" (which we figured out like twenty minutes ago.) If it wasn't for their British accents I'd say these guys were Americans. The Doctor gains access to his own data sheet aboard the robo-ship and the audience is given some information on the overall story arc concerning his apparent death. None of it is shocking or exciting and does nothing but confirms the time and place, which we've already seen and he probably knows.

Finally the Doctor begins to succumb to his fatal poisoning, writhing and yelling in pain, barely able to move. A member of the S.S. Craptastic declares him finished and resumes punishing Melody\River, the force-field around her turning red and appearing to burn her. The Doctor implores Amy (still aboard the robo-ship) to stop them any way she can as he crawls along the floor. Amy uses the sonic screwdriver to disable all of the electronic ID bracelets and the antibodies come out of the floors to kill everybody. The crew abandons ship by "beaming up" (tossers) and Melody\River is released.

Rory and Amy are trapped in the ship however, and hordes of the antibodies are coming for them. Amy has the microphone that allows her to speak through the robo-ship and yells for the Doctor's help even though he's dying himself. I really liked the concept of Amy trapped inside a robot of her own likeness, calling for help through her mimicked voice as it stands inert.

The Doctor forces himself to stand painfully, falling again as he tries to make it to his TARDIS while Amy yells a few feet away. He begs River for help, barely able to move. Melody\River doesn't yet know who that is and wants information first. The Doctor pleads, "GRRAH JUST! ...help me," his teary eyes right up in the camera. I know he's not going to die, but I still nearly cry at this point every time. Matt Smith just gets better and better as the Doctor and his acting here is very powerful.

Powerful enough even for the psychotic Melody\River to help him, piloting he TARDIS just in time to save her parents (Rory and Amy) from the antibodies. She takes them all back to the Doctor, who's dying on the marble stairs of the Nazi restaurant. He asks to speak to Melody\River and tells her to find River Song and tell her something, which he whispers into her ear. She moves away from his face to reveal that he has died. Melody\River asks Amy who River Song is, and Amy has the abandoned robo-ship show her. It begins to change, turning into Melody Pond\River Song, who is so affected that she walks to the Doctor's body, hands aglow with regeneration energy, placing them on either side of his face and bringing him back to life. "River no," he starts but she leans down and delivers her signature line: "Hello, Sweetie," and kisses him. No poison this time.

Bright light fades in and we see a weak River in the hospital. We learn she used up all of her regenerations (Time Lords only get twelve usually) saving the Doctor's life. "She'll be absolutely fine," the nurse says. "No she won't," the Doctor replies, "she'll be amazing," placing a new TARDIS-design diary next to her bed. The same diary future versions of herself have been sporting since River's first episode in 2008.

Back in the TARDIS we see the Doctor has downloaded the S.S. Craptastic's records on himself and now definitely knows the place and time of his death, down to the minute. Rory and Amy ask, "The River that we know, in the future, is in prison for murder. Who's murder?" The Doctor turns towards his view screen with his own picture on display but looking at Rory (significantly?) before smiling and turning it off, saying nothing as he fritters around the ship's console. "Will we ever see her again?" Amy asks. "Oh, she'll come looking for us." "Yeah but how?" "Oh Pond, haven't you figured that out yet?"

Cut to the Lunar University, year 5123. "Why do you want to study archeology?" a professor in a bow tie asks an unseen person. River leans into view and says, "Well to be perfectly honest Professor, I'm looking for a good man." I can't help but mentally add: TO KILL.

And so ends the mixed-bag premier episode of the 2nd half of the season. I can only hope the rest of the episodes turn out better than the 50/50 awesome-to-annoying ration of this one. A word of advice to Moffat and his team: more Doctor, less Pond. Companions come and go, but the Doctor is for ever.

Slow Down

I'm almost positive my ADD is back in full force. As a child I was diagnosed and prescribed Ritalin (which was horrible for a grade-school kid) until we found a homeopathic alternative and I eventually grew out of it. Or as I'm thinking now, just figured out how to work around it. Listening to music, multitasking, and other tricks allowed my brain to jump from one thing to another while still keeping it on somewhat of a leash. I learned a method to the madness and stopped needing medication.

Jonas, my son, has thrown me into relapse. It has been impossible to concentrate on anything for longer than five minutes for over two years now. All of my tricks are useless--a toddler is a force of nature that cannot be reasoned with or controlled. Unless he's asleep it's his world and we're just living in it, the tempos of our lives set to his frenetic toddler beat.

His influence extends even to the relative calm of my cubicle walls. My brain has adapted itself to match his attention span in what can only be an attempt at self-preservation. It automatically changes focus, sometimes several times a minute, from work to reading to writing to I'm hungry to maybe I should clean out my bag to I want a new song and back through the list, repeat ad nauseum. Even under the best circumstances and with no outside distractions I cannot easily force myself to stay on one task. It is counterproductive to any endeavor and frustrating in the extreme.

Recently I have discovered one new trick that seems to work. I suspect this is due to some neurological change that comes with being a parent and constantly listening out for signs of distress or destruction, but whatever the reason auditory distractions have become the most powerful and constant offenders of my concentration. The TV, the dog's breathing, neighbors upstairs moving around, any noise instantly jerks my attention away. Even well-known music can be too distracting if I'm really trying to focus, which is a pity as good music not only blocks out the noise of the world but creates one of its own where you are the only inhabitant--the perfect situation to get solid work done.

Thankfully I have PaulStretch. PaulStretch is a free program that slows down and stretches music files while keeping the notes intact. The music keeps its tone or pitch or what have you (I'm not a musically technical person) but the song becomes so much longer. Drum beats become the sounds of waves crashing, words are lost and become abstract notes spanning many seconds, your favorite songs become ambient, dream-like versions of themselves. It's quite interesting and can yield some amazing pieces of music that at once sound familiar and brand new.

To get an idea of what I mean here are some of my favorite stretched songs:
Ave Maria
Jurassic Park Theme (I did not make this one)
Clair de Lune
Kanada's Death (from the movie Sunshine)

The best part for me is the length (shut it) and beautiful yet unobtrusive music I can create with a few simple steps. My stretched songs have become a lifesaver. I can once again enter a place isolated from the everyday noises that derail my trains of thought like sticks of dynamite on the tracks.

If you want to create your own stretched songs start by downloading PaulStrech here. It's an executable file so there is nothing to install. Run the program and browse to the desired file. It only accepts MP3s and WAVs so you'll have to convert any other file types (I use Free MP3 WMA OGG Converter) before it will accept them. Now as I've said, I'm not a technical person when it comes to music. PaulStretch has a ton of other features I do not understand and therefore do not fool with, so go here if you want more information on what it can do.

Once you have chosen your music file, look at the slider near the top of the window that says Stretch next to it. This is where you chose how "long" to stretch the song. I usually do 7x but 8x is default; it all depends on how you want it to sound. To hear your song click the play button at the bottom of the window. This is the preview before you render it, so experiment with the settings until you get something you like. I'm lazy and simply set it to 7x and give it a quick listen to see how it sounds.

This is a good time to mention that some songs sound horrible stretched out. Usually the more simple the song the better; too many parts can make the end product sound like like a lot of harsh, chaotic noises instead of music. If you like what you hear click on the "Write to file" tab near the top of the window. Next to the large "Render selection" button you'll see two boxes with percent signs. This is where you can crop the song down if you like by entering a range. Otherwise just hit the render button to start saving your file. Browse to where you want to save it, pick .wav or .ogg for the file type (.wav is probably best) and click "Render".

Done! All that's left is to find your file and enjoy. Convert the file back to MP3 if you need to and put it on your favorite portable music device for a private music seclusion on the go.

Now please excuse me as I cloister myself within the Doctor Who theme slowed down by 700% so I can get some work done.