morrowlife

Here’s another picture of Ron Jon’s. I took those on a beautiful day, and the colors turned out to be really interesting. I’m starting to run out of blog pictures, though, so it’s time to get out there with the camera again.

Another mostly uneventful day. I went over to the launch complex right after lunch for a checkout task, a tower visit, and a meeting. That was pleasantly different. I need to stay in the office tomorrow, though. I have a lot of little things to get done before we get much closer to launch.

I’ve been watching the web broadcast of the JCSAT 9 launch on Sea Launch this evening. I was about to go out to dinner at 7:00 when I remembered the launch was scheduled for 7:30. So I stayed home, cooked a couple of burgers (yum!) and watched the launch on my computer. It looked beautiful. As I write this, the upper stage final burn has completed and they’re about four minutes away from spacecraft separation. That will mean we’re up next!

It was yet another windy, cool day. I think it got only into the mid-70’s. It’s 71 right now. Not that I’m complaining. My sliding glass door is open yet again and the condo feels absolutely great.

Disaster! I’m out of ice cream. What will I do for dessert tonight? I know – I’ll run out to the store and get some more. I’m out of Cocoa Krispies too, so there’s an urgent need to shop. I don’t think I need any other groceries at this point, with only eight more days until our planned launch date. If it ends up going longer, I can always go resupply.

Separation is about a minute and a half away. Keep your fingers crossed.

My hamburgers were on toasted English muffins. They’re really good that way. I recommend the recipe to my loyal readers. No charge (warning: this link has been rated Y for yuckiness).

Spacecraft separation was just confirmed! Congratulations all around! That used to be pretty much the end of the mission for me, back when I was a launch vehicle guy. Now that I’m on the spacecraft side, most of the hard work is ahead of us. We have to get the orbit raising done, make all the deployments, check out the payload, and make it productive for at least twelve years. Fortunately, our folks are pretty good at it.

Happy birthday to my sister Julie! I need to call her on the way to the grocery store.

Well, it’s time to go out and buy that ice cream and cereal, so I’ll just say cheery bye.

Cheery bye.

Whoa, dude. Gnarly. Like, totally awesome. Here’s the cement surfer in front of Ron Jon’s. Far out, man. Sorry about the light pole. I tried to get them to move it in the name of Art, but the Ron Jon dudes turn out to be Philistines. Who would have guessed? I suppose I could Photoshop it out (well, actually Gimp it out), but that would be inconsistent with my Artistic Vision. And inconvenient too.

Had a pretty good day today. I got out of the office at about 6:00 this afternoon, having arrived at 7:00 this morning, which was actually a pretty short work day around here. Had lunch at the NASA KSC Headquarters Building cafeteria with Joe and John. If the food had been just a little bit better it would have been absolutely mediocre. I believe my hamburger was cooked sometime today, but I couldn’t swear to it. On the plus side, I got tater tots. On the other plus side, their ATM was working, so I’m resupplied with cash.

Dinner was on my own tonight. I had Chinese food at Ginseng. They’re owned by the same people who own Yen Yen, and they told me as I was walking out the door that they can make anything you can get on Yen Yen’s much larger (outrageously large!) menu. Maybe they should have mentioned it before I started eating. Maybe I’ll go back. Maybe that’s what they were trying to get me to do.

We had mainly pleasant weather today. It only got up to the mid-seventies, and the wind was still blowing pretty hard, but it felt good to be outside. My sliding glass door is open even as I type this, giving me comfortably warm air and beautiful ocean sounds. Aah, this is the life. If only my family were here, it might be hard to get me to go home. But it might not.

I washed some shirts this evening – they’re drying now. I’m hoping I don’t end up regretting that decision. I could have taken them to the Cape Laundry, of course, and gotten them washed and pressed by Professionals. I suppose if they come out looking terrible, I can just take them over to the Professionals tomorrow morning and have them done again (as opposed to ironing them myself, which is beyond unthinkable). Stay tuned for the exciting conclusion!

I’m listening to the dl.tv (formerly Digital Life TV) podcast from March 16th, featuring Patrick Norton and Robert Heron. It has become one of my very favorite podcasts (right up there with James Lileks, Click and Clack, and Leo’s KFI weekend show. Highly recommended. I’m on podcast number 20 of the 53 shows on my iPod right now, hoping to get through all of them by the time I get home. Then I can load the ‘Pod back up with all the new shows that have arrived during my month-long absence. I can’t catch up!

Time to go. See you tomorrow.

Here’s the model boat on my current condo’s television cabinet. I like it. Not much of a picture, though. Some of these “reality” shots are hard on my reputation as a photographic artiste.

Long day today. In fact, I’m still in the office, although I stopped working almost half an hour ago. I’m kind of waiting around for a couple of the guys to finish what they’re doing so we can go out to dinner together.

Oops – dinner just got postponed again. Those guys may not be going out anywhere tonight. But I am. I’m giving them a few more minutes before I just take off.

Nothing much to blog about tonight. The weekend was fine. I worked a few hours both days and spent a lot of time at home in the condo otherwise. My new condo has a George Foreman barbecue, which I’ve already taken advantage of by cooking a few steaks and hamburgers. Both the living room and the master bedroom face the ocean, giving me a double-wide balcony. There’s a new refrigerator and dishwasher and everything else is in very good shape. And then there’s the nice sailboat model pictured above. The only thing it was missing was a DVD player, so I spent forty-five bucks at WalMart and bought one. I’ll take it home and use it in our bedroom when the campaign is over. I was looking for a good price on a DVD recorder, but the ‘Mart didn’t have any.

The weather was terrible yesterday. It only got up to about 75 degrees, it was cloudy, and the wind was blowing to beat the band. They really need some rain here, but we got about two drops. The good thing was that I kept my sliding glass doors open all day and the condo felt quite comfortable. The wind kept blowing doors shut, but that wasn’t a problem. Saturday was warm and sunny, if a little bit windy. There were plenty of people on the beach Saturday; it was deserted yesterday. Not even the tourists went out there. It was nice again today – not too warm and mostly cloudy, but comfortable. Can’t complain.

Well, that’s about it for today. I’m going to pack up and go get some dinner, friends or no friends. See you tomorrow.

This is another detail from Ron Jon’s. They certainly use interesting colors there.

Had a better day today – no lousy meals at all. The culinary highlight was the barbecued beef brisket for lunch.

I only worked six hours today but that was enough, considering that today was my off Friday. I’m not planning to go to the office on Saturday or Sunday either. My orders are to minimize overtime and I plan to obey my orders. I don’t have any plans for the weekend other than moving to the ocean-facing condo on Saturday and going to church on Sunday. Since tomorrow’s move has to take place between 2:00 and 3:00, I can’t really make any Saturday plans. Maybe I’ll have time to go to the alligator farm.

On the other hand, maybe I’ve seen enough alligators for now. I drove to the base twice yesterday and saw a grand total of eight of the little critters in the various waterways around there. However, I didn’t see a giant non-organic ‘gator. So there’s something to look forward to.

No other news today. I’m watching Forbidden Planet on TCM right now. It’s a sci-fi movie from 1956 and is incredibly entertaining in its goofy 1950’s way. The young Leslie Nielsen is especially entertaining (great ducktail haircut!), as is the predecessor to the Lost in Space Robot (“You bumbling booby!”). Definitely recommended.

Speaking of recommended, I’m continuing to enjoy Psmith in the City (see the book club over there on the right). I’m about three quarters of the way through it. It’s not laughing-out-load funny like Wodehouse’s Jeeves books, but it’s definitely an amusing tale. I still recommend it to my discerning Readers.

Oops, Forbidden Planet just ended, so it must be time for bed. See you on Monday!

As promised yesterday, here’s Tiki guy 2! He’s right next to Number One. (Not Reader Number One, of course; see yesterday’s picture. This guy only vaguely resembles Reader Number One.)

What a lousy dinner tonight! I went to my formerly favorite Japanese restaurant. Got there at about seven, got a table, and ordered some sushi. It turns out I was right behind a party of about ten people, all of whom ordered sushi too. I got my soup and salad, ate them, and waited for my sushi. And waited, and waited, and waited. About fifty minutes later, my food arrived. I ate one piece of shrimp, which tasted like two-day-old fish. Yuck! Called the waitress over and asked if we could just call the whole thing off. She offered to replace the food, of course, but I just didn’t feel like waiting any longer and I certainly didn’t feel like eating any more sushi. I stopped on the way home and picked up a TV dinner, which I just finished. Not my best meal ever. And you can be sure I’m never going back to that restaurant. That wasn’t their first strike with me.

On a brighter note, our campaign is moving along right on schedule. I got over to the Cape this morning, finished my training, and got my safety badge. Some meetings tomorrow and then we transport on Saturday. Keep crossing those fingers!

Nothing else of note today, so I’m done.