Saturday, January 3, 2009

Everything I Need to Know I Learned from Doctor Who

I love the new seasons of Doctor Who, but I'm also a long time fan. I even watched all the stunningly boring stuck-on-earth episodes of the 3rd Doctor as a kid. Growing up with Doctor Who taught me everything I need to know:

1. If something scary looking is coming towards you, whatever you do, don't stand there and scream. Doing so is a certain recipe for death, no matter how wimpy or funny looking the thing is. You are always faster than the alien swamp robot. Just run. Don't worry about looking like a coward, a 900 year old time lord does the same thing all the time and the girls are always going after him.

2. Always carry a screwdriver. You never know when you'll have to open locks or fiddle with electronics. Admittedly, a sonic screwdriver is best but, since Sears doesn't have any in stock, anything is better than nothing. 

3. Wear a coat. And I'm not talking about a fluffy nylon wind breaker either. Choose a classy suit coat or long coat. Bring a scarf along if you feel like it. These coats are great for carrying your tools and gadgets around with you or warding off the chill in an antarctic research station. After all, how do you expect lesser civilizations to respect you if you show up in a "I'm with stupid" t-shirt? (Of course, the arrow would point to your traveling companion.)

4. Get a small classic ride with a roomy interior and an impressive engine. If your passengers get in and say, "This is roomier on the inside than it looks on the outside." You're part way to cruising the universe stopping evil-doer robots.

5. Be able to fix anything. Seriously, anything. You never know when you're going to have to manipulate some DNA, rewire a warp drive or reprogram some nano robots. You won't have a chance to look up any information and you must appear to know what your doing at all times to calm the uneducated panicked people around you. 

6. Join a large organization, tick them off, run away, become their unwilling president, run away again, fight for them, everyone dies but you. This is a pretty important step for any one's emotional development while growing up. You need to feel kind of bad about the everyone dies part, especially when someone asks you something you don't want to answer.

7. Have an arch enemy. I know what you're thinking, "Duh, who doesn't have an arch enemy?" But, you have to not hate this arch enemy. This arch enemy must have the same skills as you and must have pretty much the same motivation as you but with a minor twist. You don't like authority? Neither does he. You like to meddle? So does he. Ran away from your home planet? So did he. You like to be in charge? So does he. You would rather not kill innocent life forms if you can help it? He doesn't really care one way or the other. 

8. When everyone else is horrified, be cheerful. Doing so makes others think you know something they don't. They then look to you for leadership if things get really bad. It also helps you not break down into a crying lump of time lord on the 400th time you find a civilization wiped out or whatever.

9. Always have a companion with you in your travels. Companions are helpful and, best of all, expendable! Oh, you have to feel bad for at least a few minutes when your companion dies because you didn't get the power unplugged fast enough on the transmatter beam for the 5th time. But, just don't mention this to your next companion or that the previous 50 or so companions are all dead, depressed or stuck in another dimension. That would spoil the fun of having someone around for you to impress.

10. The prime directive is for pansies. Some advanced civilizations (even your own) think you shouldn't interfere with lesser civilizations. Poppycock! If you see something your moral compass tells you is wrong, change it without delay! Everyone will be happier, even if they don't know it.

3 comments:

QuillandCanvas said...

Hilarious!!! Also, true. I'm linking to this blog IMMEDIATELY.

Also, be careful when dealing with aliens that have the mobility of a small child's tricycle. They may just take over the universe.

Caghs the Cat Lady said...

LOL As a recently converted Doctor Who fan (who watched several seasons including several original episodes in the space of just two weeks because I got so thoroughly hooked so quickly), I loved this!!!

May I 'borrow' it to repost on my blog? (With all due credit, of course)

Gallifrey said...

Sure, reposting with credit is fine.

I'm glad you enjoyed it!