Events in my life lately.

Well, I have now connected my other computer to the net now. I bought a router when Circuit City went under. Most people seem to be going in for wireless systems but I got me a wired system. I have the hives about how easy it is to get into a wireless system. Some idiot in a laptop can drive by and hack into your system. I suppose if your firewall and security systems are in place you are supposed to be OK, but I have problems trusting that. So I got me an older school cabled system. Problem is, the cabled system wouldn't set up right. After calling tech support, it was determined by the tech support lady, a very kind lady, that the router is defective and needs to be sent back for replacement. However, an RMA replacement means that I am reponsible for shipping. That is kind of assinine, but I didn't spend too much for it so I guess I absorb some costs. I don't like it though. I should get my new router in three to five days or so.

My next thing is getting the little computer I got fixed. Somehow I have it set where it doesn't read any Mass Storage devices hooked up via USB. So I have to get off my lazy but and get tech support on the line and figure out what I did wrong. All in all, I have had mixed sucess with my computers lately.

I have given some thought to running Ubuntu, when my other system is up and running with the network set up properly. For the unitiated, Ubuntu is a Linux based operating system which resembles Windows on the screen. It is free for all to download, play with, and use. Its not a bad idea, but getting the hang of it is gong to be an interesting experience. We bought a laptop for my nephew, and rather than buying Windows to replace the Operating system on it, we (my brother and I) are going to put Ubuntu on it. So I have to get smart with it so that I can pass the knowledge down to my nephew. Hopefully it will be simple to operate. Keeping my fingers crossed.

I have been lately obsessed with the Apollo Program that sent men to the Moon. I got a rather fascinating documentary entitled "In the Shadow of the Moon." It features fascinating interviews with the men who walked on the moon and their impressions of the experience interspaced with films they took on the trips. It has some very interesting footage that I haven't seen before. The special features are even better than the movie because it has even more sequences they didn't put in the finished film.

There is one fascinating story by Charlie Duke, whose voice you may remember as the CapCom on Apollo 11 when Neil Armstrong landed on the moon. He tells of a dream he had six months before he landed on the moon on Apollo 16. In his dream, he was riding the Lunar Rover on the moon. He and John Young, the mission commander encounter tracks on the surface. They follow them and then come to a rise and behind the rise, the tracks end and before them is another Lunar Rover with two occupants. Duke goes to the rover, lifts the visor of the passenger and he looks upon his own dead face. The other occupant is his companion on the trip is John Young, also dead. He says its the most vivid dream he ever had. I wonder what would have happend if that has actually occoured.

I look at all that was done and what potential there was in the space program. Right now, at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, and at the Johnson Space Center in Houston, there are huge hunks of Saturn V rocket which were built for the last two Apollo flights, Apollo 18 and 19. We had the potential to explore the moon two more times at the very least and we wasted them. It was simply a line item on a budget ledger, but in my mind as long as the flight hardware was procured, it should have been used. Its so sad that those opprotunities were wasted. Schroters Valley, Marius Hills, Tycho or Copernicus Crater were on the short list on the landing sites for the last two missions. I think it likely that if the program was continued, there would have been only one more flight since the other Saturn V would have been needed to launch the Skylab B which now rests in the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum and obviusly never launched. It is estimated that only $42.1 million dollars were saved by deleting the last two flights. It would be roughly $400 million in equivelent dollars today. Still, if the hardware was there, we should have gone and not left these relics to rust in the southern sun.

Well, that's the thoughts for me today. I think I need a vacation.