Into the Wild

OVER THE RIVER: This is going to be a short one, as we spent 7 hours in the car today.  The reason for the lengthy drive was a visit to Siletz, Ore, which is just inland of Newport, Ore., which is on the north central Oregon Coast.

It was a full Honda Fit, what with two kids, two dogs, luggage and a few dozen carefully packed custom cookies on board.

I managed to forget the cable that connects my camera to my computer, so this blog post is entirely photo free, which doesn't happen often. My apologies.

But stay tuned, because I took lots of interesting photos today, including a series of shots of a 75-pound pig carcass being butterflied. You know you want to see that! ;) Tomorrow bright and early Petunia is going on a fire pit, poor delicious thing. As CJ said today during the process, "It's not very pleasant seeing the pig getting butchered." He shared that he much prefers just buying meat at the store.  Can't say that I disagree with him, but I think it's very educational to get to see the anatomy of the pig like they did, and to realize that meat doesn't just come from nature wrapped in plastic on Styrofoam trays.

And so we bid you adieu until Monday.  Have a nice weekend.

Ponies and Trekkies

FAMILY PORTRAIT: As I was working on cookies this morning Annabelle was creating a family portrait. She made a pony for each member in the family. I'm "Silver Word" because of my writing. Christian is "Water Works" because of where he works, Annabelle is "Paintbrush" because she likes to do art, and CJ is "Tech" because of his penchant for computers and gaming consoles.

Annabelle told me she made me purple for the Huskies with blue hair, representing the Mariners. Very nice touches. :)

KEEP ON TREKKING: This morning we watched a 90-minute Webcast from the National Air and Space Museum called "Star Trek's Continuing Relevance."

One of the panelists was Margaret Weitekamp of the museum's space history department. She shared some of the Star Trek-related items in the museum's collection, including a large model of the Starship Enterprise used in the original series and some authentic Tribbles. It's kind of amazing this stuff is even still around, because when Star Trek ended it wasn't the juggernaut it is today, with millions of Trekkies/Trekkers, conventions all over the globe, multiple spin off series, successful movie franchise, lucrative merchandising and more. Rather, it was 'just' a failed television series, canceled after three seasons. I'm glad somebodies somewhere thought to hang on to the artifacts, they're true treasures today.

Another panelist was Dan Hendrickson of the Aerospace Industries Association. Hendrickson spearheaded a campaign to get pro-space exploration ads to run before "Star Trek Into Darkness," the newest Star Trek movie, released this week.
Revenue to pay for the ads was raised through a crowdsourcing campaign (asking people who share the passion to demonstrate that with their donations). The group had hoped to raise $30,000, enabling them to screen the promo in a handful of cities. Fortunately, they ended up raising so much money (nearly $53,000), they were able to buy spots in all 50 states.

When I learned about the campaign, I immediately thought, "Well they should just use 'We Are the Explorers,' " a NASA-produced video making a compelling case for continued space exploration. And that's exactly what they did!

Unfortunately, they couldn't afford a 2.5 minute ad, which is the length of the original video, so it was whittled down to 30 seconds. Here's the edited version:

But you really should see the full length-one. :)

Heads Up

Photo credit: NASA - I've always loved this shot of Star Trek creator and cast (sans Bill Shatner, guess he was busy) alongside prototype orbiter Enterprise.

TO BOLDLY GO: All too often I write about neat-o live things only after they happen, giving readers a review of them. For once (or maybe twice), I'm actually remembering to tell you something ahead of time.

On May 16, NASA will broadcast a special program called "Star Trek's Continuing Relevance" from 10 to 11:30 a.m. Pacific time. The event will be held at the National Air and Space Museum in Washington, DC. To watch the Webast, go to this link: http://airandspace.si.edu/events/lectures/webcast/

The program is about how Star Trek has drawn upon real history for its narratives, and how the show influenced space history. The educational panel will include Nancy Reagin, editor of Star Trek and History; Mike Gold, chief counsel for  Bigelow Aerospace; Margaret Weitekamp of the museum's space history department, and Dan Hendrickson, director for Space Systems, Aerospace Industries Association. Hendrickson will be talking about why he spearheaded a crowd-sourced campaign, partnered with the Challenger Center for Space Science Education, to pay for ads promoting human spaceflight to show before the new Star Trek film in theaters right now!

WACKY AXES: Have I mentioned lately that we're taking an Eisensteinian physics class and that it's hard?  We are now just barely into week six of eight, having survived week five, barely. So much material was covered last week, and though we each managed to ace the weekly test, the homework assignment was long and difficult. But every week we learn, and so we're hanging in there.

In fact, the Einstein quotes the professor shared with us this week made us feel a bit better. One was, "The mainspring of scientific thought is not an external goal toward which one must strive, but the pleasure of thinking." The kids and I talked about how sometimes we've struggled to understand concepts in the class, but really an important part of this class for us is not about the finish line, it's about the  journey.

Another quote the professor shared was what Einstein said, in broken English, when he needed more time to ponder a problem: "I vill a little t'ink."  And boy oh boy, we've had to take pause a do a little t'inking, too.

Station to Station

   Image Credit: NASA

PREDECESSOR: Here at MPA we spend a lot of time talking and thinking about the International Space Station. We watch live updates from it, interviews with astronauts on board, and spot it flying over our place in the night sky on a regular basis. 

However, long before the ISS was ever assembled 220 or so miles or so overhead, there was another space station that was also an international effort. 

Skylab was launched on May 13, 1973, 40 years ago today. 

Yesterday, we watched a live, special broadcast about the anniversary of Skylab's launch. 

   Image Credit: NASA

The discussion panel included a couple of Skylab astronauts we've had the pleasure of meeting in person here in Seattle last fall: Gerald Carr and Owen Garriott.

Here's a (pretty bad) photo of the kids with Carr ...

and here's one of astronaut Garriott as a Museum of Flight panel member.

So many great lessons about living in a space outpost were learned on Skylab, and those lessons benefit the ISS astronauts today. (For instance, they didn't bother building a shower on the ISS, because the Skylab one was so ineffective/inefficient. 

Skylab was our the first foray into significant scientific research in microgravity. Three crews lived on station, proving for the first time that humans could live and work in space for (relatively) long durations. 

As the kids and I were reading about Skylab on NASA's Web site, we came across this conceptual drawing. ...

  Image Credit: NASA

The sketch was drawn by George E. Mueller, NASA associate administrator for Manned Space Flight, during a meeting at the Marshall Space Flight Center on Aug. 19, 1966. By 1970, the project had been dubbed Skylab. 

As she listened to the Skylab astronauts last fall, Annabelle came up with this drawing. It's pretty similar to the one above. :)

In all, three crews lived and worked on Skylab: Skylab 2 in May 1973, Skylab 3 in July 1973 and Skylab 4 in November of 1973. They conducted experiments in space and life science, Earth resources and space technology and also oversaw students' projects. 

To be truthful, I think the thing I remember most about Skylab was its orbital decay and its remnants crashing back down to Earth. What a shame. The station was supposed to be refurbished and used again, but when the Space Shuttle program was delayed, those plans were dashed an in 1979, the station fell out of orbit. 

I remember news of this impending doom, and actually worried that it was going to fall on someone(s) and kill them. Fortunately, the debris that survived the re-entry burn landed in a remote area of Western Australia, hurting no one. 

  

HANDS ON: Midday, we took a trip down Interstate 5 to Olympia to meet a friend of mine and her son at the Hands On Children's Museum. 

It's quite a place - a nice big facility, modern and inviting looking. It is also incredibly, terribly loud. Seriously. I don't know how the people who work there keep their sanity. I wanted to run screaming from the building - and that's before I even paid our admission.  Yes, the place was full of kids, but they weren't (for the most part) shrieking or being super loud. There appears to be just waaaay too many hard surfaces and a lack of any kind of acoustic controls in the place. But I digress. 

It's a neat place, with lots of fun to be had. Here, CJ and Annabelle enjoy a cozy perch.

Everyone enjoyed playing with the 'pin' wall.  

 

There was a little stage to play on. 

 CJ liked running the sound board more than acting. 

 There were a couple of fun attractions involving tubes and suction.  Such fun watching the balls and scarves go 'round and 'round.

 We stopped briefly in the arts and crafts room, just long enough for Annabelle to craft a pipe cleaner bumblebee.

Out on the patio we saw the real thing. 

And the kids had lots of fun in a construction-themed exhibit. Annabelle enjoyed directing traffic.

CJ was very into the gear and he was super disappointed the darn helmet didn't fit him better. 

Starry Skies and Grassy Fields

     Image credit: NASA
UNDER REPAIR: This weekend, we watched as a hasty spacewalk was conducted to fix a rather alarming ammonia leak on the International Space Station.

Normally, spacewalks have weeks - if not months - of advance planning. This event was different, however, when astros on board the ISS noticed 'snow' floating by their station. The flakes were frozen ammonia coolant, leaking from a pump controller box on the stations' far port truss.

NASA astronauts Chris Cassidy (in the photo above) and Tom Marshburn spent 5.5 hours making the repair. Fortunately, it was successful, and a potentially serious situation was averted.

HOMEWARD BOUND: Monday afternoon and early evening we watched coverage of the return of three astronauts to Earth in a Soyuz capsule. On board were NASA's Marshburn, Russia's Roman Romanenko, and Chris Hadfield of the Canadian Space Agency.

Because of his frequent Tweeting, Facebook posts, conferences, amazing photos, downlinks, downloads, musical collaborations, Reddit "Ask Me Anythings" and more, Hadfield has become a superstar during his five months on station. 

Yesterday, Hadfield posted a musical video to YouTube that has already garnered more than 3 million views. It's a poignant, slightly tweaked version of "Space Oddity."  David Bowie himself gave Hadfield permission to use and re-work the song. In fact, Bowie's team and Hadfield's people started working on it even before Hadfield was on board the ISS.

Apparently Mr. Bowie approved of the final product, since he gushed about it on Facebook, reposting it there, and he Tweeted about it IN ALL CAPS, writing: "CHRIS HADFIELD SINGS SPACE ODDITY IN SPACE!"

If you haven't seen it, you should, and if you have seen it, you probably want to watch it again.

It's amazing - and no special effects needed, other than the zero gravity Hadfield had to work with.

Thankfully, the trio of astronauts had a flawless return to Earth,crashing (mostly gently) down to at 7:31 p.m. our time. Here's a screen capture that says "They've landed!" in Cyrillic.

    Photo: NASA
Rather than watching the standard NASA coverage, we fired up the Canadian Space Agency's Web cast. It was definitely a different take on the event and fun to watch. The broadcast was hosted by CSA astronaut David Saint-Jacques and former CSA Astronaut Robert Thirsk. Thirsk did most of the talking, explaining every step of the descent and what would happen after they landed. He knew whereof he spoke, as Thirsk flew aboard Space Shuttle Columbia in 1996, and was the first Canadian astronaut to serve a long duration mission on the ISS (in 2009) 

GAME TIME: We had a lovely Sunday afternoon at Safeco Field for Mother's Day.

Our seats were just 14 rows up from the visitors' dugout, so we got to see the Oakland As pretty darn close up.  We watched them warm up ...

                          
stand at attention for the anthem ...

argue with umpires ...

hit foul balls ...

and give up enough walks and hits to allow the Mariners to win. Hooray!

The grounds crew even put on a show for us, dancing instead of grooming the infield in about the third inning. 

It was a good day. :)