(no subject)

Here's a good place to check on the accuracy of some of the statements that have been made by officials and other sources regarding the protest in Madison, and about Wisconsin in general. Politifact's staff investigate and analyze such statements, rate them, and explain their ratings in detail. This is the branch specific to Wisconsin.

http://politifact.com/wisconsin/

(no subject)

So the space shuttle Discovery is taking off on her last flight tomorrow, if all goes well. (Please, let it all go well.)

Discovery has, in a way, become 'my' shuttle. It was she whom I had the delight of seeing rocket into space on a column of fire from across the water in Florida last year when my family drove down for STS-131. In a 45 minute long video I found on Youtube of engineering camera footage from shuttle launches, the vast majority of them are from one particular launch of Discovery on an unbelievably perfect day on the cape. There's a scene near the end where a camera with a long lens captures Discovery coming out of her roll program. Her wings cast a shadow across her body until she turns to just the right angle and a sliver of light blazes across her in a line that perfectly lights up her name, there behind and below her cockpit windows. It's as though someone is painting a line across her body with a brush dipped in light, unmistakably telling those watching exactly who she is. It brought tears to my eyes.

It's so strange to me the shuttle program is coming to an end. When I was little, I was enamored with the space shuttles, their symbolism, and the way they grounded science-fiction in reality. I still am. It's an amazing thing when I think about it; to be able to say that I watched a real spaceship take off and leave the planet. I don't quite have an an understanding of what's going to replace them. I hope it will be something worthy of the legacy. But for better and for worse, it will never be the same.



STS-131 In Flight

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