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NASA’s Apollo 11, which was crewed by Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins, was launched on its four day journey to the Moon from Pad 39A at Cape Kennedy by a Saturn V launch vehicle on 16th July 1969.  On arrival in lunar orbit Collins remained in the command module Columbia whilst Armstrong and Aldrin transferred to the lunar module Eagle and descended to the surface of the Moon where they landed at 20:17:39 GMT on 20th July (see NASA’s Apollo 11 Timeline).  Armstrong and Aldrin both walked on the surface of the Moon while Collins remained in lunar orbit.

Another five Apollo missions, namely 12, 14, 15, 16 and 17 successfully followed Apollo 11 to the Moon with two astronauts on the lunar surface on each occasion meaning that during the entire Apollo programme 12 men walked on the Moon.

James Lovell and Fred Haise should have walked on the Moon during Apollo 13 but their lunar landing was aborted after a malfunction.  As Lovell had previously been in lunar orbit on Apollo 8 he is the only person to have been to the Moon twice without landing on it.

Image via Wikipedia

NASA’s Apollo 11, which was crewed by Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins, was launched on its four day journey to the Moon from Pad 39A at Cape Kennedy by a Saturn V launch vehicle on 16th July 1969.  On arrival in lunar orbit Collins remained in the command module Columbia whilst Armstrong and Aldrin transferred to the lunar module Eagle and descended to the surface of the Moon where they landed at 20:17:39 GMT on 20th July (see NASA’s Apollo 11 Timeline).  Armstrong and Aldrin both walked on the surface of the Moon while Collins remained in lunar orbit.

Another five Apollo missions, namely 12, 14, 15, 16 and 17 successfully followed Apollo 11 to the Moon with two astronauts on the lunar surface on each occasion meaning that during the entire Apollo programme 12 men walked on the Moon.

James Lovell and Fred Haise should have walked on the Moon during Apollo 13 but their lunar landing was aborted after a malfunction.  As Lovell had previously been in lunar orbit on Apollo 8 he is the only person to have been to the Moon twice without landing on it.

Image via Wikipedia

I’m watching a NOVA special about NASA’s Apollo program.

On the first mission, during a test, there was a horrible fire. Virgil Grissom, Ed White, and Roger Chaffee are incinerated inside the capsule.

(is this an official Sparky Firepants post? What the hell?)

It was a combination of factors that caused the tragedy, no one person or thing was to blame.

There are two powerful lessons here. (Brought to you by the letters N, A, S, and a documentarily-absorbed artist.)

Immediately after burying his son, Roger Caffee’s father was asked by a reporter if he was angry.

He said no, he wasn’t angry, that “Sometimes progress comes at a high price.”

Wow. That answer stunned me.

I think about how that relates to my life and my business.

For example, if I lament over the fact that my salary is lower than it was when I worked for someone else, it could make me angry.

Soon it will be back up there again, but for a relatively young biz like mine, it takes time. Progress.

I don’t have stellar benefits as an entrepreneur. I could shake my fist at the government, but I would lose sight of the incredible freedom I have to make my own benefits package, to get creative about it. Progress.

It’s amazing how nowadays the impulse tends to be achieving retribution for losses or criminalizing the people who messed up.

Feeling self-righteous is short term.

The other lesson is even simpler. When you screw up so bad that it feels like you got punched in the gut, that’s exactly when you need to stop and think about how to make it right next time. Progress.

I wish these guys didn’t have to die, but as Gene Krantz said, “We wouldn’t have made it to the moon without that incident.”

by Cassie, Publicity Assistant

Happy Friday everyone! We’re sneaking out a bit early to go bowling today, aren’t you jealous? The week will end with beer and bowling balls, which is about as much as you can ask for in a week. I go on vacation next Thursday, so you all will be without me for a little while. Can you pretend to notice so I feel better? Thanks! In the meantime, here are some links to keep you occupied until you sneak out for your own bowling match.

All of us here at OUP send our condolences to Natasha Richardson’s family and friends. There are many touching articles out there about this week’s tragedy, take some time to check some out.

The geek in me really wants one of these, but the practical person tells me it’s probably not very comfortable.

The long lists for the Booker and the Orange prizes have been announced.

I had no idea eavesdropping was so complicated!

It’s a start, at least…some at AIG are paying back their bonuses.

Remember when I posted a link about voting for the next celestial body Hubble studies? (Didn’t I do that? Or was it naming the ISS?) Here’s the winner!

Spacebat, we hardly knew thee.

When Fifth graders have anger management issues.

Sony Reader now offering 500,000 public domain titles.

Put a red bulb in this and you have Sauron’s eye staring at you. Good thing it’s just a concept design!

Putting the pop back in soda (Coke releases a single for its "Open Happiness" campaign featuring members of Gnarls Barkley, Fall Out Boy and Panic at the Disco. Plus, The New York Times asks what "The O.C." treatment will do for indie bands featured... Read the rest of this post

In this show: Stephanie Stockman at PodcampEDU Produced by : Andy Bilodeau

In this show: All about Podcamp EDU 2007 Andy from the Andycast, Gretchen from Mommycast, Stephanie Stockman of Adventures in Earth and Space , Nick Guzman from Red Bloguera, Whitney Hoffman host of LD Podcast Andy Carvin , Joel Mark Witt, PodcampEDU participants Let me know where you are: Click on ‘Join the CLIP Frappr Map’ in the menu [...]

I've been creating lots of illustrations, but can't post any yet, so I figured I'd post an old one. I'm yearning to do more pen and ink renderings of people and animals, children's illustrations rather than buildings. My favorite disposable rapidographs went out of stock....(Why does that always happen?) Maybe it's a good thing...it may force me to face my unreasonable fears of quill pens and return to them.

Whew! It was a busy weekend. Saturday evening, we learned that the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (NASA - http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/) in Pasadena was having their annual open house this weekend. So somewhat spur of the moment, we decided to go. It was pretty interesting although we didn't really get to spend a whole lot of time there as we were planning on going to an art show in the afternoon. Looking through our photos, I'm realizing we don't have any pictures of the rovers! So, the best I can do is the command center and a clean room:












I know the pictures aren't great. Command center was really dark and we were shooting through super thick glass to capture the clean rooms, but it's the best we could do in the circumstances.

The clean rooms were probably the most interesting part to us since it's very much behind-the-scenes sort of thing that you normally wouldn't have a chance to see. Chris (my husband) was in heaven shooting pictures of all the heavy industry on the campus. He works in video-games so having reference photos of all kinds of interesting places is really useful to him. It's always entertaining having to explain to people why he is shooting pictures of fire hydrants and dirty brick walls!

We left JPL around noon and headed down to Beverly Hills for the "Affaire in the Gardens Art Show." I'm intrigued by art shows where the artist actually sells physical art since this is something I've never really done before. I'm so tempted to try this sometime, but then I wince when I think about the over-head involved in such an endeavor. Not only would I have to produce prints and merchandise, but I'd also have to fork out some cash for the display boards and tent. And then if I didn't sell enough... well, that would be disheartening to say the least. I guess it must be profitable for some artists, but certainly not all artists, right? One thing that I do notice when I attend art shows is that there really aren't any children's artists present. Would that be a good thing or a bad thing? My work would certainly be unique in an environment sans other children's artists, but that still doesn't mean it would sell. Just something to consider for the future I suppose....

I'll put in a plug for my two favorite displays:

Gabe Leonard - beautiful paintings (http://www.gabeleonard.com)
Vicki Banks - very cool and clever animal sculptures - lots of ravens. She doesn't appear to have a website... Read the rest of this post