Looking Forward

SIZING IT UP: Right out of the gate this a.m. I read a Reuters story about a U.S. Department of Education "Naton's Report Card" that half of the nation's fourth graders knew the correct descending order of size: North America, the U.S., California and Los Angeles.

In fact, less than one-third of elementary and high school students showed proficiency in geography, the Education Department said. According to Roger M. Downs, a Pennsylvania State University geography professor, students aren’t learning subjects such as geography and history as teachers spend more time on math and reading to accommodate standardized tests.

Naturally, I couldn't wait to put CeeJ and Bee to the test. I listed the four places on a white board in no particular order and asked them to rank them largest to smallest. It took Bee all of 5 seconds to finish the task with 100 percent accuracy.

CJ took a bit longer, as he wasn't sure how to rank Los Angeles and California. He thought they were both states. :/ I was glad he at least got the continent-country-state hierarchy. I gave him a slightly different menu to choose from (subbing Seattle and Washington for LA and California). When I did that, he nailed it.
REST IN PEACE: My inbox fills with news from NASA each day, and while this isn't the artsiest shot ever, I think it noteworthy. Image: NASA/Kyle Herring
It shows where workers marked in bright red "MLG" at the spot where space shuttle Atlantis' main landing gear came to rest after the vehicle's final return from space. The end.

OPEN FOR BUSINESS: I tuned into NASA TV this afternoon half afraid I'd find it had become something else like "Real Housewives of the Space Coast." ;) I was SO happy to find it was a press conference about the Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) rover Curiosity which will launch later this year and arrive on Mars in August of 2012. That's right, NASA will not go quietly into the night!!!! A NASA spokesperson closed out the press conference by saying, "When it comes to tomorrow, science never sleeps." AMEN! :)

During the press conference, there was an amazing animation of Curiousity flying to and landing on Mars. It involved a capsule, which then opens, revealing a jet-propelled vehicle that carries the rover to near the surface before lowering it by cables, disconnecting the cables and then flying off away from the rover's landing area. My mind is boggled at how these designers are able to pull stuff like this off. Just the selection process that went into narrowing down candidate landing sites is something to behold.

The big news at today's presser was that Gale Crater has been selected as the Curiosity's landing site. The crater is named for Australian astronomer Walter F. Gale.

If you go to this portion of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory's MSL site and you have QuickTime, you can watch the landing animation. In fact, the entire Mars Exploration Program Web site is pretty darn interesting.

Wheel Stop

Photo: NASA
IN THE WEE SMALL HOURS: Last night before going to bed, I set two alarms on my cell phone - one for 2:40, the other for 2:43. I wanted to make sure we were up for the historic 2:50-something landing of Atlantis.

Because I didn't trust those alarms, between 11 and 2:30, I woke up about every 20 minutes, and when I managed to sleep, naturally my dreams were about being in Florida, at the landing site.

When I awoke at 2:30, I decided just to get up and be done with it. I went downstairs and turned on the TV in the kids room.Together, with only the TV as light (don't let the flash photography above fool you), we watched Mission Control track Atlantis over the Gulf of Mexico and then into Florida.I didn't turn the computer on, which almost led to a DISASTER. For you see, the four of us were in the kids' room, in the dark, glued to the NASA TV broadcast of the landing. Atlantis was about 45 seconds to touchdown when the view from the cockpit is replaced by a black screen and the words MONTHLY TEST OF THE EMERGENCY BROADCAST SYSTEM.

OMG!!!!!!!!!!!!! I did NOT get up in the middle of the night to watch a test pattern and miss history being made. Can you believe it?! Christian and I literally dove for our computers hoping to boot up NASA TV online, all the while knowing that it would be too late once they booted up. Thank GOD someone, somewhere must have realized the error of their ways because the EMERGENCY TEST message went away about 15 seconds before touch down. Phew, disaster averted.

George Diller, the voice of NASA liftoffs and landings for years, did a fine job calling the game (so to speak). Only once did I hear his voice catch. It was at the instant Atlantis touched down and Diller noted it was "the final mission of the space shuttle program."

And so, our Shuttle Program is no more. In all, the five remarkable flying machines launched on 135 missions, traveled 542,398,878 miles that spanned 21,152 orbits of the planet, and carried 355 humans and 3.5 million pounds of payloads as the Space Transportation System.

BLUE MOVES: Yesterday, we rented (at the kids' insistence) some Wii game featuring dancing Smurfs. The kids have really enjoyed it, much to my surprise/chagrin.This morning while they were playing along I heard Annabelle say, "I don't care what score I get, I just want to DANCE!!!!" So, I have to give the game points for prompting that. :)
Remembering her comment, this afternoon I cued up a bunch of BeeGees on the PC speakers. That got her moving again, and this time she had a furry friend to disco with.DUST IN THE WIND: This afternoon CJ, from across the room, asked me, "How would a year without rain be?" Would you believe at that VERY moment, I was reading an email from the Library of Congress about using original images, documents and recordings to teach about the Dust Bowl? So, we spent some time looking at Library of Congress resources.

For me, this woman - a migrant mother taken by Dorthea Lange in 1936 - is the face of the Dust Bowl. PHOTO: Library of Congress
MATH MANNERS: The (minor) struggles with math continue 'round MPA. We're doing problems where Soandso has $10 and they buy thingamajig, so how much do they have left? As you can see, Annabelle spends more time on the artistic interpretatation of the problems than she does doing the math itself.At one point Bee got stuck, so I offered up CJ as her tutor. Before too long I heard him retort, "I'm not going to help a person with a crappy attitude. You're on your own now, Annabelle."

Harsh, but I have to admit, after hearing her whining and snapping at him, she had it coming.

GET RICH QUICK: CJ's latest idea for striking it rich? "24 hour energy drinks. Why just buy a 5 hour energy drink, when you could have a 24-hour one?" he reasoned.
I suggested that perhaps most people would like to be able to sleep at some point during a 24-hour cycle.
Back to the drawing board for CJ.

ON PATROL: This morning CJ and Annabelle were playing a two-player game of Bubble Bobble and I hear CJ say to his sister, "I'd like it if you use good grammar."

That's right, apparently the grammar police are on patrol even when you're playing a video game. A couple minutes later, he chastized, "Don't talk like a cheap person." Oh, snap! Honestly, I'm not sure what she said to elicit that comment. Maybe talking slang?

HMMM: Last night, from CJ's lips ... "I have a question. Is there a B.B. Queen?"

The End

SPACE CASE: All day long we had NASA TV playing. Today is the very last day there will be a space shuttle orbiting the Earth, so we wanted to soak it up as much as we could.

With scenes from space rolling in the background, the kids and I read a wonderful picture book, "Look to the Stars" by Buzz Aldrin.

We couldn't have had a more perfect book for today. Page by page, the book introduces important figures who factored largely in the eventual space program, reaching all the way back to Copernicus and Galileo, the Wright brothers and Lindberg. We learned about astronomer Edwin Hubble and the father of liquid fueled rockets, Robert Goddard. We were introduced to many of the Mercury, Apollo and Gemini astronauts and learned about Werher von Braun, who developed the Redstone rocket that put the first American into space.

Since today marked the 42nd anniversary of the day the Eagle landed and Neil Armstrong became the first human to set foot on the moon, we watched old CBS news footage of the moon landing. Boy was Walter Cronkite excited!

All day, I couldn't help but grouse a bit that 42 years ago we could put a man on the moon and now, as of July 21, 2011, we can't even get an astronaut to low Earth orbit or the ISS. Heavy sigh. However, in "Look to the Stars," Aldrin included a quote of Goddard's that made me feel better about the end of the Shuttle era. Goddard said, "Just remember-when you think all is lost, the future remains."

Onward, upward!

SHUTTLE SPOTTED OVER SEATTLE: Just hours before being mothballed forever, the space shuttle flew over the Emerald City.Since there was no wind to speak of, CJ and Annabelle had to be the rocket boosters. :) They did a good job getting the shuttle skyward! THE REARVIEW MIRROR: Imagine the thoughts going through the minds of NASA astronauts as the shuttle departed the ISS for the final time. Photo: NASA

This evening, we watched Mission Control send the wakeup call to the astronauts for their final day of the mission. A different song is played every day and, in a tribute to the entire crew and all the men and women who have worked for the shuttle program over the years, the final song chosen was Kate Smith singing "God Bless America." Talk about a classic.

We'll be getting up in the middle of the night to watch Atlantis touch down.

Leftovers

ON THE MOVE: Imagine our surprise tonight when we looked out to Elliott Bay and saw the giant ping pong ball on the move. As we were coming back from yoga and dinner, it was heading away from Harbor Island, out toward the middle of the bay and then westward toward the ocean, no doubt. It was wild seeing it out in the middle of the bay!

Apparently the $27 million worth of repairs have been completed and tonight, the big ball has left its dock and appeared to be ocean bound. I guess we're lucky we saw it yesterday when we did!

IT HURTS! This afternoon I had the kids do some math. You woulda thought I was performing some Wild West type root canals on them. :/

This really hammers home the reality to me that we NEED to do math at least 3 days a week, yes even in (and perhaps ESPECIALLY in) the summertime. Distance does not make the brain grow fonder.

DAY OF INFAMY: April 20th = Hitler's birthday, CJ's birthday and the day of the worst oil spill in the history of the United States. At least ONE good thing happened on this day.

We started to read "Oil Spill! Disaster in the Gulf of Mexico" today. I was curious to see how politicized or not it would be. So far (three chapters in) so good - it seems like a fair account of the really bad Bad BAD things that went down. We'll finish it tomorrow.

PINBALL WIZARDS: We drove down to Columbia City today for yoga class, even tho their usual yoga teacher is in NY. When I returned to the studio after 45 minutes, I saw, through the glass door, that Annabelle was crying and holding her back. When I asked her what the problem was, she sniffled something about "partner poses" and CJ crushing her ear. Who knew yoga could be hazardous?

Everyone felt better when we went to Full Tilt for a little old school arcade action afterward. :) WEEKEND REWIND: So, not sure how many of you watched the U.S. take on Japan in the FIFA World Cup soccer match on Sunday morning, but we were glued to our TV here in Seattle.

Annabelle had to don her shinguards for the match. I couldn't help but wonder how many other little girls across the country got their guards on in a display of solidarity. :)The match didn't turn out in the USA's favor, which bummed us out. But that said, I found it impossible to root against Japan given all their struggles of the past several months. Hopefully the victory helps their country heal.

TOUCHDOWN: VERY early Thursday morning space shuttle Atlantis returns to Earth. While we'll be happy to see her safe return, we'll be VERY sad to see the shuttle program come to an end with no 100 percent man-in-space program replacement on its heels.

The shuttle is scheduled to touch down at 2:56 a.m. Pac Coast time. I asked the kids if they wanted me to get them up to see it and they both said yes, so that's what I'll do.

Hometown Tourists

ON THE WATERFRONT: Every once in awhile we take time out to be tourists in our own city. Today was one of those days.

We decided to cash in tickets we'd won for an Argosy tour to Tillicum Village. (We won these by carting a cardboard Elvis all around Seattle Center and taking photos with it/him.)

We went down to the waterfront about a hour before boarding time in order to get a good parking spot, check out the shops, and procure good seats on the boat. We had time to kill, so we took the kids in to Ye Old Curiosity Shop, a crazy, kitschy store that's been here on the Seattle waterfront since 1899.

In the store you'll find shrunken heads, and a couple of mummies, including Sylvester, a miner found buried in the Arizona desert in the mid 1850s.And then there was Sylvia, a 30-something woman found in South America, apparently a victim of TB. Not sure if they were freaked out or indifferent about the mummies; the kids were WAY more interested in the store's plastic toys and trinkets than they were shriveled humans and shrunken heads.

We also visited the Ivar's statue, where Ol' Man Ivar can be seen feeding seagulls a bronze French fry.And they posed next to a really big sea otter named Elliott (after Elliott Bay) outside a t-shirt shop. About 10:30 we made our way back to the Argosy dock.We watched jellyfish blob around in the water while we waited to board Lady Mary. We were sooooo lucky weather wise - the water was glassy, the skies were partially sunny and there was no wind. We decided to sit on the top deck rather than inside the boat. It was a good choice. On our way out, we noticed that Qwest Field has been officially transformed into Century Link Field. I suppose we'll get used to that.We also saw this enormous white ball on Harbor Island. I've been wondering what's up with it since it appeared a few weeks back. Our 'cruise director' told us this white dome is some kind of missile detector - and that from where it is now (Harbor Island, Seattle), it can detect a live missile the size of a softball as far away as Yankee Stadium. I'm not sure I believe that. ... I do believe it is a Sea-Based X Band Radar unit (SBX) that's at Harbor Island for maintenance work. It reportedly belongs to the U.S. Missile Defense Agency.

I found a clip on YouTube with a military man talking about what it does.

We saw, for the first time today, the lighthouse on the westernmost tip of West Seattle/Alki Beach.We also learned that instead of being pronounced Alk-EYE like it is now, it was Al-KEY, until the Prohibition. Interesting. And I was reminded that the settlement there was supposed to be the new New York - but the weather scuttled that idea.

Would you believe aboard Lady Mary they served Fremont Brewing's Interurban IPA on tap? Delish!The putter from the Seattle waterfront to Blake Island took about 50 minutes.

As we approached Blake Island/Tillicum Village, we spied a man in Native American attire awaiting our boat. He would later be one of the performers in the "live" show while we ate lunch.

We were greeted with clams in nectar (no, not a peachy drink, but clam juice). I was happy that Annabelle tried it.CJ would have none of it.

The lunch was salmon cooked old school style (on sticks, by a fire). That probably accounted for the inconsistency in it. The rest was mediocre at best (green salad, a bad bean salad, undercooked stew (stew meat should not be tough) and average store-bought tasting bread. Oh, and a tart cherry cobbler in a paper petri dish was dessert. But other than that, it was good. ;)

The "live" entertainment. Well, what a surprise. It was so odd - our 'cruise director' introduced the show by saying how awesome it was to have this esteemed Native American expert as its host and then ... the VIDEO of him came on. :0 I suppose if I listened more carefully to her, she probably didn't promise he was in the flesh, but geez, why pump him up like that if he's not even there? And the movies continued to roll.

Yes, there were three men who did some Native American dancing, but the majority of it was projected people. :/ We did get to meet the dancers afterward. CJ wanted to try the mask on, but was told it was too heavy, which I'm sure it was. The dancer did let CJ and Annabelle pull the cord that made the beak clack. They got a thrill out of that.After lunch, we had about 15 minutes to poke around the island - not enough time. I would have liked to seen more of it.And then it was back to the boat. We had a lovely ride back to the mainland. Look - here's our neighborhood! And here's a view of the waterfront, including the Seattle Aquarium (it's green).
And the Smith Tower, which was a really big deal until ...The Space Needle came along.