Happy Apollo Day.
Tranquility Base here. The Eagle has landed.
- Thread starter hbquikcomjamesl
- Start date
Happy Apollo Day.
^^^ Very cool photo from an amazing time in our history.
I went down to the Kennedy Space Center back in 2010 with my wife and I really had mixed feelings about the old spacecraft that were on display there - massive rocket components, boosters and the like. They were fantastic monuments to the space program of the 50's and 60's, but it was clear that they weren't being taken care of at all. Lots of rust and flaked paint all over these things. Not surprising, considering how gutted NASA's budget has become in the past decade. It felt like this weird silent symbolism at how our efforts to expand our knowledge of space travel had languished and been forgotten. I suppose I should have felt inspired by seeing these great old machines. Instead, I was quite depressed. Not many visitors there, either, but it was off-season in October.
I went down to the Kennedy Space Center back in 2010 with my wife and I really had mixed feelings about the old spacecraft that were on display there - massive rocket components, boosters and the like. They were fantastic monuments to the space program of the 50's and 60's, but it was clear that they weren't being taken care of at all. Lots of rust and flaked paint all over these things. Not surprising, considering how gutted NASA's budget has become in the past decade. It felt like this weird silent symbolism at how our efforts to expand our knowledge of space travel had languished and been forgotten. I suppose I should have felt inspired by seeing these great old machines. Instead, I was quite depressed. Not many visitors there, either, but it was off-season in October.
Forget Breaking Bad - Bryan Cranston will always be Buzz Aldrin in my mind.
[yt]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u1ssw5aJyrk[/yt]
[yt]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u1ssw5aJyrk[/yt]
^ Quite. I think we could get to Mars right now if we wanted. We definitely should have done it long ago. We just don't have the guts. 
^ We raised the money for the Moon, we can do it now for Mars if we want. Like I said - no guts. And no President with the ability to rally the public behind it.
Priorities were different during the Cold War era. Even though there was no real strategic need, it was still a matter of national prestige to land men on the moon before the Russians did. (Although the Soviets never had a real chance of a manned moon mission either before or after Apollo 11.) A pissing contest can be a powerful motivator to do the right thing, even if it's for the wrong reasons.
So I suppose we can hope that China makes a run at it...maybe then we'd get off our fat asses and do it first.
I will never understand how the hell the first Moon landing never became a holiday.
There are holidays observed and created to honor historic events and individuals. What the hell is more historic than going to the Moon for the first time??
Columbus Day, Labor Day, St. Patrick's Day, Veteran's Day, Fourth of July, Thanksgiving Day, New Years... okay, I grant all those. But tell me Apollo Moon Day isn't as worthy as any of those.
There are holidays observed and created to honor historic events and individuals. What the hell is more historic than going to the Moon for the first time??
Columbus Day, Labor Day, St. Patrick's Day, Veteran's Day, Fourth of July, Thanksgiving Day, New Years... okay, I grant all those. But tell me Apollo Moon Day isn't as worthy as any of those.
I think everyone else would be delighted if China takes on Mars. Someone else shelling out that kind of money is always preferable to having to pay yourself. More likely what will happen is a multinational endeavour, since China are way too canny to pay for the whole thing.
July, 1969. 105 Pleasant Street, Dorchester, Massachusetts. An eight-year-old kid who looks upon the universe with wonder sits in a dark living room, points his Polaroid camera at a flickering black-and-white TV screen and clicks the button.
Happy Apollo Day, everyone.
Happy Apollo Day, everyone.
Same here. It's the most amazing accomplishment in Human history.
I was born just three days shy of the nine month anniversary (ironically, the same day Apollo 13 came home), so that gives you an idea of what my parents were doing around that time.
Although they both denied that was the motivator. My idiot father actually told me that the basketball team he bet on won, so in celebration he grabbed my mom.
A fucking basketball game......the moron never did have a clue.
My late mom turned 18 the very day that the Eagle set down on the lunar surface and Armstrong and Aldrin stepped outside. She always liked to talk about how momentous and awesome an 18th birthday it was for her...becoming an adult as well as celebrating man walking on the Moon on the exact same day. Not something that happens on a regular basis to say the least.
