I genuflect at their geekitude

Getting Their Kirk On

Trek fetishists have a new toy:

...Serious Trekkies have long fashioned copies of their favorite costumes and props, and, back in the ’70s and ’80s, a few even put together homemade knockoffs of the captain’s chair, using reference materials like the “Starfleet Technical Manual” and “U.S.S. Enterprise Bridge Blueprints...”

Big deal, who has not done that? But it gets better:

...But lately fans like Mr. Veazie have been building or buying...sophisticated versions of the command module from which James T. Kirk, played by William Shatner, ordered “Ahead, warp factor six.” Moreover, they are making them the centerpiece of their homes, thus conquering what is for them a final frontier of domestic décor...The spread of digital video also helped the cause, allowing hobbyists to freeze-frame shots of the chair and scrutinize it from every angle. On message boards like Dewback Wing A.S.A.P.: A Site About Props, they swap and compare screen grabs, measurements, schematics and spare parts...

Wow! This is weapon-grade time-wasting here! But what good is the chair, some clueless people might think it a useless dust gatherer. Oh Ye of little faith:

...Some watch TV in theirs, or simply loll, and some seem to find the chair an empowering place from which to deal with others. “When we have a little family powwow — I have four children — I sit in it to lay down the law,” said Mr. Boyd, the auto parts manager.

You see, there's a spiritual aspect to all this! And this fellow is really following his bliss:

“...You sit in the chair,” Mike Paugh said, “and you’re watching an episode and pushing buttons and you find yourself saying, Fire photon torpedoes or whatever, and you’re making the sounds yourself because I don’t have the sound effects yet...”

But for some, it's a tougher path. One guy's wife just does not get it:

...To his regret, he must strike those poses in his home office. “My wife is not big on it,” he said. “I’ve actually been threatened with divorce if it comes into the living room...

I can see it now:

"You brought THAT into the living room," she shouts, "It's over! I'm out of this nuthouse!"

"But honey," he says, "if it's over, if you're out of here..."

"I want a DIVORCE!"

"If you're out of here, if it's over...if we GET A DIVORCE...!