A thunderstorm mixed with dust at sunset makes for a very interesting sky!
Keep Us Connected.
Last night we sat down and watched the musical episode of “Star Trek: Strange New Worlds”. Entitled “Subspace Rhapsody”, I wasn’t sure how I’d enjoy a musical Star Trek episode. I think I enjoyed it more than the rest of the family; the plot seemed a little convenient but the music and the performances were amazing.
Spoiler ahead.
Musing.
Sometimes I think of my grandparents at my age, which was 50 years or so ago, and I wonder what things were on their mind on a regular basis. One side of the family wasn’t really big on sharing their emotions all that much, the other side of the family was a little more forthcoming but if they were in my shoes today I couldn’t see any of them actually musing about these things in a public forum like this.
A friend from my radio days, who is now a guidance counselor, shared her frustrations with “helicopter” parents. Not only were they doing their child a disservice during their high school years with their parenting, but apparently they’re also an amazing site to see on forums for parents of children off to college. My friend was musing about how society is bound to collapse because when the current college bound generation is the generation in charge of things, many of them are not going to be able to function because their parents are gone and they have no critical thinking skills.
My husband and I were musing the other day about climate change and how it feels like this year it has accelerated and feels more present, especially with the run of excessive heat warning days we’ve experienced here in the Sonoran Desert. We both wondered if we would outlive the habitable period (for humans) here on Earth. So many want to make changes to help deter climate change, but too many think it’s a hoax and that we’ll be just fine because of their religious beliefs.
I wonder what my grandparents would think of that.
Sunshine.
This is Sunshine. She joined our family in late 1976 or early 1977, and lived with us until 1989. She was a puppy when she joined the family; adopted from a litter in the South Park of the small village I grew up in while we kids were at the movies at the Kallet Theatre for a Saturday matinee. My sister originally wanted to name her Flower, but we settled on Sunshine. Per family rules, she spent the vast majority in her area surrounding an elaborate dog house my father built. She originally joined us when we lived in the mobile home, but her house was relocated to a shady spot near the new house when we moved across the street in 1977. When I was big enough we’d occasionally go running around the yard together. She was a really good dog.
I’ve been thinking about Sunshine quite a bit lately, no doubt inspired by Lucky and Jinx living with us today. She crossed the rainbow bridge over 30 years ago but every once in a while I dream about her and she makes me smile. Her memory brings a little sunshine to my life. I have no doubt that when my time comes she’ll be waiting to play again with her happy face.
Coffee.
I didn’t start drinking coffee until I was in my late 40s. Back in the day I didn’t like the taste of it; and it didn’t make sense to me to add a whole bunch of stuff to a beverage to make it taste differently than it tasted without the additions, so I didn’t bother.
But then I rewatched “Star Trek: Voyager” and when Captain Janeway exclaimed, “There’s coffee in that nebula”, I decided to give it another try. Plus, the man cleaning our condo at the time enjoyed coffee and since it was there, I figured it was a good opportunity.
I have since enjoyed a cup or two of black coffee every day. No cream. No sugar. I like black coffee and I regularly employee a Keurig Coffee Maker for the task. I know, it’s not the best way to make coffee, but it works for me and I recycle the pods.
I’ve tried lots of different flavored coffee variations over the years but lately I’ve been focused on just plain black coffee of various strengths. Tomorrow I’m going to try the two pods shown above for the first time. I’m excited to see how much of a kick it gives my Monday.
Peak Aviation.
A lovely desert morning flight with Earl today. We flew to E77 San Manuel and back, though we didn’t land due to density altitude concerns (it was already in the 90s here) around getting out. This was Earl’s first time through Redington Pass in an airplane. He took some great photos. We passed through at 7500′ MSL, with 9500’+ peaks off our left wing and 7000’+ peaks off our right wing.
Shoutout to the Southwest flight that, when told to watch for us as traffic in his vicinity, “watching for the chicken hawk”. That actually made me LOL. For reference, our call sign today was Skyhawk 912LB. KTUS was fairly busy, nearby DM AFB was doing skydiving operations, and the AZ NG had six jets in the air doing impressive things. As you can see below, we did a few extra turns over the city to get sequenced in. I enjoy playing in the sky with the bigger airplanes. This is something my Dad and Grandfather avoided back in their day, heck they didn’t even have radios.
Caturday.
Truman is insistent on going out on the roof around 9:00 PM every night. I have to accompany him out there, or else when it’s time to get back in he’ll start scratching at the door and weatherstripping and since we haven’t paid for those things yet, we probably shouldn’t let kitty destroy them.
I have noticed Truman is more insistent on going outside when there’s moonlight. I don’t know if it gives his night vision an extra kick or what, but he likes to just go outside and bask in the moonlight. I go out with him and we look at the stars together.
22.
My very first blog entry was written 22 years ago today. I didn’t know the word “blog” at the time; instead I was just writing an online journal. I originally wrote the entry using Microsoft Frontpage; it was be a year or two before I adopted the word “blog” and moved to a blogging platform. My first officially blogging platform was Blogger. In 2005 I moved to Movable Type and then a year or two later I moved to WordPress, where the blog continues to live today.
My first blog entry talks about flying with my Dad in his newly built AcroSport II bi-plane for the first time and mentions that “someday I’ll be a private pilot”. It’s good to know I achieved at least one goal in those 22 years.
In the earlier years of this blog and before social media really took hold I tended to share opinions and thoughts on a somewhat regular basis. That content moved to social media once the chaos relocated to those parts, especially after the 2016 election season was underway, though I did do a fair share of griping about George W Bush’s presidency at the time. To this day I still wish we had a better choices on all sides of the aisle. I want to vote for someone, not against someone else. I’ll leave it at that.
Every once in a while I’ll go back and read a smattering of entries to get a feel for my attitude and feelings at a certain stage of my life, and that’s a good thing to do from time to time. In many ways I have changed and in many other ways I am who I have always been.
That’s a good balance.
As a little bit of a hoot, here’s my first image posted to the site. It was taken with a webcam that was state of the art at the time. I was growing a beard and wanted to share a progress photo.
I find it comical that it’s a gif and not a jpg.
Inspiration.
Ever since I was a young lad and first discovered reruns of “Star Trek” (The Original Series) on CKWS, to be enjoyed after school, I have loved the series. As a Trekker, I have a Starfleet uniform, an outfit I call my “Starfleet Shore Leave” wear, and I have followed along with most of the various series.
“Star Trek: Strange New Worlds” is one of my favorite series, and probably my absolute favorites of the “NuTrek” universe. “Star Trek: Lower Decks” is also a series I look forward to and I’m looking forward to season four coming out later this year.
There was recently a crossover between SNW and LD and I was really looking forward to seeing what that was all about. We sat down to watch the episode last night and I thoroughly enjoyed it.
I won’t go into details of the episode and my only review is that it is an awesome experience, but there is one element from the show that I had to integrate into my daily life. You see, the structure of Starfleet, and the mind set of most of the characters on the show, is something I work toward. As a kid I hoped I’d see a more “Star Trek” type of society come to fruition with the arrival of the 21st century. I knew we wouldn’t have transporters and the like, but I was hoping we’d start figuring out the homeless and food shortage issues and all try harder to get along. Unfortunately the 21st century has swung us in the wrong direction and sometimes I get mired in the chaos and I find it brings me down.
A fellow fan of the show recreated a Starfleet recruitment poster spotted on the recent Strange New Worlds / Lower Deck episode (entitled “Those Old Scientists”) and I was delighted to find it was in high enough quality to print in a decent size.
The picture frame is ordered and scheduled to arrive tomorrow. I look forward to hanging this in my office, as a daily source of inspiration, before the end of the week.
Ad Astra Per Aspera.
The Stars.
So last night was a full moon so it wasn’t the best night for stargazing. I still wanted to take the telescope out and see what it could do, and since Mother Nature wasn’t bringing us any storms, I set the telescope up in the driveway and took it for a test spin.
The iPhone app that is used in tandem with the Celestron StarSense Explorer DX 130AZ telescope is awesome. It helps you pinpoint what you’re looking for, with a bullseye that turns green when you’ve located the celestial object you want to gaze at.
Even though the sky was saturated with moonlight, I was able to get a good view at Altair through the eyepiece and it was right where it was suppose to be.
I also took a peek at the Moon and it looked awesome, with its lines and craters and little bright spots. I now need to read up on capturing photos with this telescope.
I’m looking forward to taking it out during the New Moon in two weeks.
