Reed Me : space

Tough decision. Should I share this with my son?

reedme — Mon, 03 Aug 2009 21:03:24 GMT

This summer, my oldest son (age 9) has been plowing through every book in the library on electronics, robotics and astronomy that he can convince the public library to check out to him. His current fixation is BattleBots, because he hasn’t solved the “Earth orbit is a long way up” problem, yet.

For the amount of money he might be able to earn in a year or three, somebody else is willing to solve it for him beginning in 2010...

Total Price of the TubeSat Kit including a Launch to Orbit is $8,000!

Interorbital Systems – TubeSat Personal Satellite Kit | International Space Fellowship

Not to be critical, but don’t we already have enough junk in orbit? Well, it would be cool to have our own piece of space junk in orbit sponsored by Fort Reed.

I think the operative question isn’t whether or not I tell #1 Son or not... It’s whether he can keep from telling his mother about the secret account that I just created to save up for it.

Heh.

Ooops. Better luck next time!

reedme — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 19:23:00 GMT

Another Tunguska might’ve been fun!

Space rock gives Earth a close shave

Of course, a mass extinction might have been less fun, so let’s not and say we did?

Thank you, Captain Obvious! (@ NASA this time.)

reedme — Thu, 08 Jan 2009 19:30:46 GMT

If there’s not already a medal for stating the obvious, I should start a foundation to present one. Why should the Darwin Awards have all the fun?

There is "something new and interesting going on in the universe," said Alan Kogut of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. Mystery Roar from Faraway Space Detected (space.com)

I’ll admit it’s cool that’s there a loud “roaring” sound in the radio band. I want to know how a radio signal can be equated with a roaring sound, but I’ll bet it’s the subatomic monkeys!

Duh. This is like flipping through the channels and stopping on a channel that you’ve never watched before and being surprised by its programming. “d00d, wow. Check out the weird stuff on this channel! I’ve never seen nuthin’ like that before.” Seriously, NASA?

Or like psychics’ predictions (including all the talking heads on financial news networks)... If they are so psychic and/or so good at picking stocks, why are they hosting TV shows and/or working pay-per-minute telephone lines instead of on the beach in Cabo?

Unless Alan Kogut is the same age as my 4-year-old nephew or my 9-year-old oldest son (to both of whom everything is still new and exciting), he wins the Captain Obvious Award this week.

Excuse me, I believe you have my stapler...

reedme — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 19:56:40 GMT

Being the sweet, considerate guy that he is, Steve Jones sent me an email to remind me of a couple of important things last Friday when he found out that my office was being moved into the basement (of Building 35).

Not necessarily in order of importance, those were:

Always know where your red stapler is.
Get your TPS reports in on time.
Make sure that you're still getting paid.

Thanks for the reminders, Steve. You have no idea how it makes a guy feel to know that you equate him with Milton. Heh. (The sad thing is that he wasn't the only one. *sigh*)

I guess it's time to add a Red Swingline Stapler (thinkgeek.com) to my wish list. I probably should replace the pair of Boston staplers that I was issued that tend to bind up too much...