Comin' In For A Landing!

Regular readers will know just how much I love space, science fiction, and just about everything involved therein.  When I learned today that the Space X Dragon capsule was returning to Earth from their maiden voyage to the International Space Station, it got me hoping I'd see a little streak crossing the horizon on my lunch break.

This was obviously not to be, as an ocean touchdown has always been the most preferable.  Thankfully, from all reports everything in the mission went smoothly.  As long as things can continue to run this well, we can all look forward to many more spaceflights in the future.

Quick comic and a short post tonight, there's some serious yard work that's been piling up for the groundskeepers of the Estate that I'll need to go manage.  We're burning daylight, people!

Punch it, Chewie!

Artistic Fright

As you can probably tell from tonight's comic, we had the chance to check out a decently large arts festival this weekend a few times.  Even though spirits were obviously elevated to observe our memorial holiday, that didn't make the weather any less hot and sticky.

It was a really good walk though, and the items were really awesome to see all the different ways that people try to be creative with paint, ceramics, wood, cloth and metal.  For us here at the Estate, we followed the lead of a good source to check out the festival more than once before purchasing anything.  After the day or so to mull it over, we did acquire a new piece of art for the East Wing.

It should also be said that for every two or three awesome tents that we ran across, there were still a few oddballs mixed in there.  Even with that though, there was a lot of different tents that absolutely drew us in.  If not for the happy coincidence that it was mostly cash business inside the festival, we'd probably have had a few more 'acquisitions' to report.

So, now we're all back to work (unless you've a glut of vacation or personal time banked up).  Now with Memorial Day in our very recent rear-view though, for me it feels very much like summer is finally here.  That makes leaving in the afternoons that much sweeter as all the plans for weekend getaways are beginning to take shape.

Punch it, Chewie!

The Rocket Man Comet(h)!

As is my custom, I'm two months late to the party on the cool internet stuffs.  In this case, there appeared to be a man claiming he could take flight with his kite-like wings.  Jarno Smeets, the Birdman, achieved flight in his video blog that had an obscene amount of hits for being up for only two months.

If the video itself doesn't get you to drop your jaw, the reality of the situation might push you over that edge.  The lovable Jarno Smeets, labeled the Flying Dutchman, was found out to be a fibber not long afterwards.  It turns out that not only does Jarno Smeets not exist, but neither does the technology he made his videos on.  It was all a filmmaker who was trying to see what kind of interest he could get in his story, but didn't bother to tell anyone it was a work of fiction.  Joke's on us then, as every major media source at the time sucked it in and spit it back out of the 24-hour news machine.

The weird thing for me is that I was able to take this fake journey with the man people were now calling the Lying Dutchman which lasted two months in one five-minute burst.  My wonder and awe at his flight was almost immediately replaced with the standard cynicism we've all got a chunk of inside.

It did make me wonder though, what if it could be done? Does it really matter that this was fake, or I should say fictitious?  I have to hope that there's a piece of me that still wants to believe it could be done.

Punch it, Chewie!

Spacial Ignorance

Space X reached orbit this past weekend! It's just one more notch towards the privatization of 'the last frontier' and I couldn't be more in favor of it. Not only will it lead to me possibly floating weightless outside of the atmosphere, but it should also help progress in our society that I feel has somewhat stalled-out.

The last time that there was a real push in invention and innovation was during the last Space Race against the Russians nearly forty years ago.  I think that once the private sector gets involved, given some mild guidelines, that some really interesting things could come out of it.

What really adds an interesting spin to all of this will be the inclusion of a society now fully in the Digital Age. NASA and governments have been using technology to improve their safety and effectiveness in space, but I'm not sure they've really been able to explore their options outside of government contracts for vendors.  There are plans to mine asteroids to help increase resources as well as provide industry off-planet, so the intellect of the people who can afford to dream is beginning to reach outward more and more...

Shake it off, it's not like I'll be suiting up for launch in a few weeks.  However, daydreaming on it could very well help this week fly by.  Join me!

Punch it, Chewie!

Camer-antics!

Goofy night, hopefully it's clear that's a finger over the shutter/camera phone/whatever.

It won't be a long post tonight, I'm feeling pretty tired after a fairly boring/grueling week of work.  The weekend brings some pretty good stuff though, so I'm completely into celebrating getting through it.

I'm watching Breakout Kings from A&E while I write this up, and it's not completely without merit.  If you're interested in checking it out, don't put your hopes high and it may surprise you.  I love the Dr. turned con turned profiler character, he's pretty complex. That and I remember his as a McPoyle brother from It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia.

Alright, tomorrow brings the end to another one.  Collective sigh of relief, go!

Punch it, Chewie!