SpockLock: Origins
Time - the final frontier. These are . . .
Gotcha! Nope, it's not the beginning of the fanfic I have promised (been dragooned into writing?) I'm just having trouble believing that 550 people have started following me because they have read this blog and all the comments about my posts and others' comments. So for the record, this is a little summary of who I am and how I came to be on tunblr to write about the familial relationship between Mr. Spock and the Holmes brothers. I will be repeating stuff spread through my previous entries and the notes and comments. So feel free to skip this. I will probably disappear for a few weeks to find the time to actually WRITE (though I will try to answer questions that come my way).
I am a retired psychologist by profession and like everyone else here, a fan of many personal heroes. Somewhere I have a picture of me at 8 in my Halloween Superman costume - my grandfather bought me every Superman, Superboy, Action, Lois Lane, Jimmy Olsen, etc. comic that existed - at 10 cents each! (Okay, now you have correctly deduced that I'm an Old Fart - I saw The Blob in a movie theater for 25 cents in the late '50's.)
I became a Sherlockian upon reading Baring-Gould's Annotated Sherlock Holmes (instead of working on my doctoral dissertation) back in the mid-'70's, although I did not become involved in organized (so called) Sherlockian activities until the mid-'80's when I moved from Regina, Saskatchewan (Regina rhymes with va. . . never mind - I've been warned about this) and joined my home scion - Men on the Tor in Connecticut.
In 1986 I wanted to celebrate the centenary of the publication of A Study in Scarlet so I became the first person to publish in 1987 an all electronic text version of the Canon on 5 1/4" floppy disks - An Electronic Holmes Companion with programs to play 'literary detective.' Another 10 years of toiling in the vineyard of Sherlock saw me invested as 'the mysterious scientist' in the BSI in 1996. [First person to name the story and identify my proper name in the story without using google or bing or whatever, will get my undying admiration and I will somehow work their name or handle into the story.]
I attended my first fan convention in 1979 in San Francisco - by accident. I was there for the West Coast Computer Faire but passed by a Star Trek convention nearby. Of course I went in and had a brief introduction to fandom as it was then. Although it wasn't known as cosplay back then, I did meet some interesting Klingons as well as multiple Kirks, Spocks, and the real McCoy McCoy. While many things have changed in the intervening years, the intensity of fan excitement and appreciation has not.
My second fancon was 221bCon this year! I didn't know exactly what to expect, but whatever I expected, it wasn't what I got! And that is not a complaint. I thoroughly enjoyed every wild and wonderful minute. Friday evening Dixie from #three-patch invited me to their hospitality suite and suggested that I check out the bathroom in particular (nice job!)
Saturday morning I attended the Baker Street to Holodeck panel. When it was over I asked if any panel members have ever read a fanfic about an idea I had over 30 years ago which I thought explained a lot about Holmes in terms not only of his physiology, intellect, logical mind, but also his lack of emotion and his emotional distance from women - namely that the Enterprise had accidentally gone back in time to the 1850's, gotten stuck, and Spock was going through his 7 year cycle of Vulcan sexual compulsion to mate. He happened to be on Earth, in England, and well, you know, the rest is obvious to the most casual observer of the lowest mean intelligence.
As I finished explaining my idea, Lyndsay Faye (who was on the panel) jumped up and yelled, "I love you, Bob! That's fantastic! Write it up!" I suppose that I could have left the con then - I could live on that alone for years. But a good number of others in the audience also reacted with cheers and words of encouragement. Now I have never written fiction in my life - just dry science articles and one in the BSJ. Me? Write fan fiction? Oh, come on. Not me! I don't know how.
I was telling this story to #christyimnotred and #rejohnson53 when #abundantlyqueer stopped by and heard my idea. Her reaction? "OMG! That's fantastic! Write it up!" Me? Write fan fiction? Oh, come on. Not me! I don't write fiction. "Sure you can. You must. It's a fantastic idea. It explains so much! Write it! Write it! Write it!" #abundantlyqueer came back a few minutes later and looked a bit worried, "What about Mycroft?" she asked. I asked her, " How much older is Mycroft than Sherlock?" She replied, "Seven years." I asked "What is the length of the Vulcan pon farr cycle?" She screamed, "Of course! fantastic! write it up!"
Well, I don't know. Later on I go back to the #three-patch hospitality suite. Almost immediately, someone says, "Aren't you Bob, the famous Bob?" What do you mean? "Didn't you come up with the Spock-Sherlock connection? A bunch of us were out on the balcony talking about this guy Bob who was on the ACD and the Occult panel who had this fantastic idea for a fanfic. Are you that famous Bob?" Well, I guess I am. "OMG! Write it up! Write it up!" is what I hear over squeals of delight. Suddenly I'm a rock star! #mojoflower was kind enough to give me her card and further encourage me to get on tumblr. I gave in to the inevitable and announced to the cheering crowd that I would adopt the handle #famousbob, get a tumblr account and write the story.
I spoke to many other people who all gave me the same encouragement as I began to think more about it. I wish I could thank all by name, so thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, . . . But you know who you are. (And now, even if you didn't see me at the con, you have my permission to lie and tell people that you met #famousbob before he became #famousbob and that it was probably you personally who actually convinced me to write it.) and I also thank everyone who has tried to help me learn tumblr, reblogged me, taught me about 'ships' and why I personally will avoid reading Sherlock fanfic on Fridays (it's a personal choice, and not that there's anything wro . . . oh, I already said that.)
So I will be mostly quiet for a while while I ponder plot elements. untangle Stardates, learn more details of mid-1800's England, and learn to imitate the voices of Spock, Kirk and others. I will try to answer any questions as time allows, so go ahead, stroke my ego and I'll probably reply.
PS - Yeah, I was the guy in the back of the room during one of the fanfic panels who yelled, "I'm available!" [If you didn't read that comment, ask around - I won't embarrass myself further.]
PPS - If there are Trekkies out there who are aware that this story has already been written, I would like to know about it. I will still write my own but I find it hard to believe that it hasn't been thought of before. (Just message me privately please - I got a good thing going here, so don't spoil it!)