Technically Incorrect

Updated 2.14pm PST with a correction from Profiles in History

There could be some high-pitched squealing and ethereally egregious excitement afoot when serial number F4200NUM0001 goes up for auction on October 8 and 9.

For this serial number represents the bidding war that is sure to ensue when a certain Apple Macintosh Plus is offered to the public's paddles.

This is no ordinary Macintosh. This was thought to be the first Macintosh Plus ever made. (See correction below) And its owner was Gene Roddenberry. Yes, he whose fingers went where no man had ever gone before.

According to Reuters, an auctioneer of Hollywood bric-a-brac called Profiles in History will offer the cute little square box and keyboard to the highest bidder.

I believe the Macintosh Plus might look a little like this. Before my time, you understand.

(Credit: CC Blakespot/Flickr)

Apparently, this lovable device was offered to Roddenberry, who died in 1991, as a gift, so there is no guarantee that he actually carved some stellar words upon its delicate memory.

However, the price in those long-forgotten days was somewhere around $2,600. Now, the auction house only expects a price of around $800 to $1,200.

I believe that the auction house is being staffed by Klingons.

Surely there will be those who both wish they had oddly pointed ears and wore black sweaters and Levi's who would offer their life savings and all that they can elicit from several banks to be in possession of a machine that symbolizes so much.

There are individuals who believe that Michael Jackson's glove (the sweaty one he wore on the Victory tour), which is being offered at the same capitalistic jamboree, will fetch far more. These people have their drugs supplied by a pharmacy in outer Greenland staffed entirely by elks with tinnitus.

Indeed, Apple and Star Trek together represent veritable star power, and I firmly believe that this technological and sociological artifact will detonate all records and that the bidding will give an entirely new meaning to the word "enterprise."

Correction from Marc Kruskol, publicist for Profiles in History: "This computer, given by Apple to Mr. Roddenberry, is an early production Macintosh 128 (#776), which was then upgraded by Apple for Gene to a Macintosh Plus, thus the model number / serial number / panel that belongs to a Macintosh Plus. The 0001 led us to mistakenly believe that it was the first one off the line."

Whatever your feelings about Sarah Palin, and I defy any sentient being not to have enjoyed some spontaneous reaction at the sight of her, you must admit she is a little different.

Which, to my mind, is the very definition of art.

So I was both moved and unsurprised to discover that her Twitter feed has been deemed to be poetry and set to music.

On NBC's "Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien," Palin's tweets have been given full artistic recognition.

On Wednesday night's show, "Star Trek" legend William Shatner, accompanied by a little percussion and double bass, gave full vocal meaning to the tweeting of the now ex-governor of Alaska.

Never has the phrase "listening to Big and Rich" been given more gravitas.

Then there's perhaps her most Waldo Emerson-esque line: "Consistent rain reminds us- no rain, no rainbow."

Shatner delivers it with a lyricism rarely heard even on the most refined of Broadway stages. I sense a premiere at Carnegie Hall.

On an earlier show, Shatner was called upon to recite her resignation speech.

Technological progress always comes with a hefty price. (Unless it's a PC, I suppose)

So I must admit to feeling a little heartskip at hearing that the search to commune with aliens in the outer beyond will leave humans looking like, well, porky aliens.

According to a report in the Telegraph, scientists believe that long flights into space will not have beautifying effects on the star-crossed trekkers of the future.

In fact, they will make them short, fat, and bald.

I wish I could find more comforting words to describe their fate. Just as I wish that more people would realize that "bald" does not equate to "ugly."

A long time spent up in near zero gravity will mean that humans will not have to make an effort to get off the couch. They won't have to do anything to stay warm either. And no exercise means, well, blubber.

Will these be trekking humans waiting for plastic surgery?

(Credit: CC Jurvetson/Flickr)

The otherworldly atmosphere will also mean that humans won't exactly grow, as muscles and bones will not develop in the way they do here in the gyms of the earth.

Astrobiologist Dr. Lewis Dartnell from University College, London, also said that fluid will pool in humans' skulls and there will be no need for protecting yourself from the cold. Which means your face will bloat and your hair will fall out. Oh, and don't forget that you'll be fat, too.

"With little effort required to move around in microgravity and an environment that is never too hot or cold, future spacemen and women are likely to become pretty chubby," he said.

But here is what Dr. Dartnell did not conceive.

On every future long-haul space flight there will be plastic surgeons ready to nip, tuck, and weave you back to beauty in a perfectly painless, weightless environment. Jowls too puffy? Let's pop that air out. Hair dropping out? Let's graft a little from your other regions.

Yes, it will be not unlike the masseuses on the original Virgin Atlantic Airways.

We must never think negatively about technological progress. Science will always find a way to keep us just as beautiful as we are today. I mean, what else do we need science for?

You have probably noticed that there's a new Star Trek movie.

You may not have noticed that a new Kingon (yes, Kingon) life form has descended upon our earth, ready to do strange things to us via our underwear. And our nipples.

Might I therefore familiarize you with just the first step in, no doubt, many, to avoid the Warp-Five Wedgie and Neon Nurple. To name just two debilitating, Gitmoesque forms of torture.

Yes, this is all part of a wonderfully batty new campaign for Burger King. Sheer genius, if you ask me. Even greater genius when you compare it with the painful bilge of the Red House furniture store.

Please, as you head into a new week, beware of any Kingons in your midst.

I was unaware that there is a company that specializes in licensed science fiction jewelry and perfumes.

Until I discovered the Planet Genki.

Genki Wear, a company with copious imagination, would like you to know that, in complete coincidence with an impending new Star Trek movie, it is launching three bold new fragrances especially for the more mature Trekkie.

First there's Tiberius, which has a very fetching image of a younger Priceline spokesperson on its packaging. Now I hope no one will be writing in to ask why this, of all perfumes, is called Tiberius.

So let's move straight along to the hard sell. Tiberius cologne is, apparently, "difficult to define and impossible to refuse." It smells nothing like any cast member of "Boston Legal." But it will have the desired effect on anyone with universal tendencies.

I wonder if there will also be a New Starship smell.

(Credit: CC Alex Kerhead)

Then we have Red Shirt. Now Red Shirt is clearly for those Trekkies who live for the moment. Its tagline is "Because Tomorrow May Never Come." And as you wander into your night club, or comic book convention, you can feel confident that women are looking at you because your smell honors the sacrifices of the nameless crew of the USS Enterprise.

But perhaps the boldest of the range is Pon Farr. Many of you will remember Pon Farr. This is the mating ritual favored by Spock and other Vulcans in an episode called "Amok Time."

Now the thing about Pon Farr is that the Vulcan men only went into heat every seven years. So I am not sure how long a bottle of this stuff might last. My best guess is that Pon Farr is targeted at the ladies, as it appears to promise to "drive him wild", and specifically at the ladies who prefer to have sex only once every seven years.

Genki believes that these fragrances can challenge the best that the likes of Cartier and Chanel can toss at the universe. Oddly, however, there appears to be a small movement that objects to these smells.

However, with enterprise such as Genki's, I am hoping that these products will be a massive success.

Because then we might look forward to colognes redolent of "Grey's Anatomy","Prison Break" and, who knows, "Top Chef".

Star Trek fans, you'd better sit down.

Because there are scientists out there, out there in Texas, to be precise, who believe that you will soon be able to propel yourselves at warp speed.

Alright, I'm not going to put a time frame on the 'soon'. Because, well, what is time anyway? Merely one dimension of our truly warped lives.

But here's the idea that Dr. Gerald Cleaver, Associate Professor of Physics at Baylor and his Associate Associate, Richard Obousy (I have not located a picture of this man, but he is reputed to have elongated ears) have proposed.

They reckon that you or Richard Branson could zip up to the vast Up There in your spaceship and, well, shrink the space that is in front of you and expand the space behind you.

To me this sounds a little like plastic surgery.

However, there is apparently a force out there (no, not from that other sci-fi movie) which essentially works against gravity. Scientists refer to this force as dark energy.

There is hope, people. There is hope.

(Credit: CC Scragz)

And they believe (if that is not too emotional a concept for a scientist) that dark energy has, over the history of everything that's out there, driven our universe to expand at speeds that are faster than the zippiness of light.

Apparently, space can move at limitless pace.

The theory is that you get your spaceship to hang in a bubble of space, a bubble that happens to be moving at faster than the speed of light. We need to get some of that dark energy in your hip flask to do it.

But, if we manage it, we make the dark energy in front of your spaceship negative, and therefore that space will simply contract. (I really wanted to use the word 'simply' in that sentence.)

These Baylor boffins are, apparently, rather fond of string theory. Which I have heard of. However, I wasn't aware that the Stringies believe there are rather more than the four dimensions in which I suffer- time, width, height and length.

And the whole warp drive effort would require the altering of the 10th spatial dimension ahead of your spaceship.

By now, you might have guessed that I have already shoved my head in a bucket of cold water in order to prevent it from spatially overheating. Please therefore enjoy this link, one that will unquestionably enlighten you more than I can.

However, I have great faith in the work of these Baylor scientists.

I now firmly believe that anything can happen as I have just returned from witnessing Tom Cruise being seriously, brilliantly funny in Tropic Thunder.

If Tom Cruise can be funny, then warp drive is a very possible mission indeed.