Hello, Fellow STFer's,

 

I have had the honor of spending a few hours interviewing Joana Ribero, who is a six-year veteran of the club for this month's Kate's Coffee Corner.   Joana joined the club in 2013 where she was placed on the USS Odin as a fresh-faced science JO.    Over the years she played a multitude of characters that have made us smile, laugh, root for, and get ready to put on our boxing gloves and take out those bad guys alongside her.   

    Here’s a list of her current characters in the club:

Commander	Amelia Manning	Executive Officer	USS Dresden
Captain	Molly Holloway	Chief Intelligence Officer	USS Dresden
Marine Captain	Eleanor “Iron Lady” Carnegie	Recon Squad Leader	USS Chimera

  Here’s a list of characters she has played in the club:

Ensign	Joana Ribeiro	Science	USS Odin
Lieutenant Junior Grade	Lumi Heikkinen	Science	USS Athena
Lieutenant Junior Grade	Lumi Heikkinen	Science	USS Asimov
Lieutenant	Yael Dayan	Chief Security Officer	USS Olympic

Some really fun facts about her characters she has shared with me are as follows:   

Commander Amelia Manning, Executive Officer, USS Dresden  
Amelia Manning was my second ever character in the club. At the time she was named Amelia Nolan and she was an Engineering JO onboard the USS Vanguard (current USS Wolverine). She eventually moved to OED V, then to the USS Manhattan, got married to the love of her life, changed her name to Amelia Manning and was appointed as the Dresden’s XO

Captain Molly Holloway, Chief Intelligence Officer, USS Dresden  
Molly Wright (recently changed to Molly Holloway because backstory), was my third character in the club. She was also the fastest rising character I have ever had in the club. In the course of a year she went from being the COS of the USS Montgomery, to being the Monty’s XO, and finally the USS Turing’s CO (the Turing came after the Montgomery and before the Chimera). She’s now the CIO of the Dresden, that’s why she keeps her rank of Captain.


Now sit back, get some coffee and get ready to learn about one of our amazing writers!

 

 

 

INTERVIEW QUESTIONS

1. What is your favorite food and why?

Oooh, we start off well. Portugal is truly a country of hobbits so we love to eat. My favorite food is Bacalhau com Natas. It means Codfish with Cream. It’s one of the best dishes I’ve ever tried, but I am biased.

2. What is your favorite character you have ever written?

I have been lucky that, of all the characters I’ve written in the club, the two that I currently have active on the Dresden are the ones that I love the most. Amelia and Molly are two of my oldest characters and therefore the ones that have been more developed over the years. There’s so much backstory to them that I feel like they are old friends of mine, and writing them comes very naturally.

3. If you were a potato chip flavor what would it be and why?

Hm… tough question. I am going to go with prosciutto. If nothing else for the fact that it is a typically Portuguese potato chip flavor and the flavor I grew up eating.

4. Which do you prefer? Surf or turf? 

Surf. I grew up on the Atlantic coast one mile away from the beach, so the ocean is a big part of who I am, and the one thing I miss whenever I spend a long time away from home. I never surfed though… but I did do bodyboard… does that count?

5. If you could have any of these four magical items what would you choose and why? Your choices are: Time Turner, Nimbus 2000, Invisibility Cloak, or Remembrall.

The Time Turner. Messing with time can be dangerous, but also incredibly fascinating.

6. If you could write a theme song for one of the ships you are on what would it be? (You don't have to name it if you don't want to :P )

*I Will Survive… I Hope* for the Dresden.

7. If you were in the world of Harry Potter what would your patronis be? (Maybe explain why if someone doesn't know what a partonis is ;) )

Well, this is an incredibly hard question actually. The Patronus charm is used to protect oneself against Dementors (soul-sucking creatures that feed on human happiness, for those who never read Harry Potter). Due to the nature of the spell itself, the animal shape of a corporeal Patronus is connected to the innermost personality of its caster, so while it is “easy” to identify with a particular Hogwarts House, for example, knowing which form one’s Patronus would take requires a much deeper understanding of oneself that I don’t think any of us actually has. That being said, Pottermore tells me mine would be a Marsh Harrier, so I’ll go with that one.

8. If you choose your superpower out of flight, strength, speed, telepathy, or invisibility what would you pick and why?

Definitely invisibility. I am a bit of an anxious person when it comes to social situations. So being able to disappear from sight at will would be a huge help on a daily basis.

9. Who would win in a fight? The Doctor (Doctor Who), Captain Kirk (Star Trek), Han Solo (Star Wars), Kara "Starbuck" Thrace (Battlestar Galactica), or Malcolm "Mal" Reynolds (Firefly)

The Doctor. The Doctor always wins.

10. What is immediately behind as you write your answer to this question? Describe it in detail.

A puffy, fluffy material enveloped in a bag of cloth. It is red and has the drawing of a cat on it (a.k.a. a pillow).

11. What Star Trek series is your favorite to watch?

Voyager. What I love in Star Trek is the exploration part of the series, and in Voyager the crew has no other option but to explore as they go along. And they are forced to do so with limited resources which I find much more interesting. Not to mention, Katherine Janeway. So what’s not to like?

12. What's the most exotic place you have ever visited? What exotic place do you never want to go back to?

I haven’t exactly been to anywhere particularly exotic. If we think exotic to mean “tropical like”, the most exotic place I’ve been to was probably the Azores. If we think exotic to mean “different than what I’m used to” I would have to say Santa Fe, New Mexico. I’ve honestly never been to a place, exotic or not, that I didn’t want to go back to!

13. Solve for x, 2x2 + 5x + 3 = 0 ? (FYI, I am not sure how you are going to solve this or even right the answer :) ) 

I must say, this question made me laugh. This is a quadratic equation, so using the [Quadratic Formula](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quadratic_formula), with a=2, b=5, and c=3, one gets x=-1 or x=-1.5. I’m going to be honest, I used an online quadratic formula solver because I’m lazy and didn’t want to do the calculations by hand. Having two final values for x is expected, since this is a quadratic equation (there’s an x^2 present) the polynomial has two roots (when plotted it crosses the y=0 line in two points). In this case, those points are x=-1 and x=-1.5

14. Are you a morning or night person?

Both? I’m the kind of person that wants to stay up late at night and get up early in the morning. Funnily enough that never seems to work!

15. What kind of pet would you prefer? A Sehlat (Star Trek) or Crookshanks (Harry Potter)?

I really just want a cat… so I’d pick Crookshanks. Even though Crookshanks is actually half Kneazle.

16. What is your favorite Star Trek villain?

The Borg. I found them absolutely fascinating.

17. What was your favorite musical group/band as a teenager?

Muse. Not only was my favorite music group as a teen, but it is also still my favorite one today!

18. Do your characters usually share quirks, hobbies or other general traits with you?

Most of the time yes. I find it easier to write if I can connect to the character on some level. I guess that’s the same with everyone. I generally try not to make myself as a character but I usually give them something I can relate to. Amelia (the Dresden’s XO) was my first Engineering character, but given the fact that I am not an Engineer and was afraid that would show through, she shares my background in pure mathematics and my passion for rowing. Molly (the Dresden’s CIO) shares my general social awkwardness and standoffishness, as well as my upbringing in a Catholic community.

19. What’s the farthest you’ve ever traveled in one trip and where did you go?

When I was 18, me and my parents drove all the way from Lisbon to Vienna, Austria, and Prague, Czech Republic. It took us almost a week of constant driving to get there, but it was so worth it, we did it again the following year. Although the absolute farthest I’ve been from home was Santa Fe, NM, but the fact that I flew there made the trip itself far less interesting.

20. Any traveling adventures worth of notice?

There’s plenty. Almost every time I travel there’s a story about something that happened. But the one that stands out the most to me was being in Heathrow the day the 2006 transatlantic aircraft plot (the event that caused liquid containers over 100ml to be forbidden in airplane cabins) was foiled. It was not comfortable and it made TSA screenings look nice. But in the end, it just became another story to tell.

Thank you so much Joana for taking the time to answer the questions and we look forward to RPing with you.

 ~ Kate