notes.husk.org

iamdanw: Computers of NASA - 1960s (by luridplanet) The vector...

Fri, 10 May 2013 20:10:43 +0100

Computers of NASA - 1960s (by luridplanet)

The vector graphics starting at 7’12” are yelling for an animated GIF treatment.

Berlin at night from space, with the old west and east still...

Mon, 22 Apr 2013 18:26:05 +0100

Berlin at night from space, with the old west and east still visible:

“Berlin was divided into two parts for over 40 years,” explains Christa Mientus-Schirmer of Berlin’s city government. “And although we’ve made a lot of progress in the 20 years since the wall fell, we haven’t had the money we would have liked to equalise the two parts of the city.”

Daniela Augenstine, of the city’s street furniture department, says: “In the eastern part there are sodium-vapour lamps with a yellower colour. And in the western parts there are fluorescent lamps – mercury arc lamps and gas lamps – which all produce a whiter colour.” The western Federal Republic of Germany long favoured non-sodium lamps on the grounds of cost, maintenance and carbon emissions, she says.

Guardian quote via chriswoebken.

Archive: Apollo Astronauts At Marshall Space Flight Center by...

Sat, 20 Apr 2013 10:12:12 +0100

Archive: Apollo Astronauts At Marshall Space Flight Center by NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center on Flickr.

The Colour Of Space

Mon, 25 Mar 2013 00:53:12 +0000

Fletcher: And this color, red, it doesn’t make much sense to me.
Low: What would be better?
Fletcher: Blue makes more sense… Space is blue.
Low: No Dr. Fletcher, Space is black!

"Whenever NASA has a shuttle go down, or any airliner goes down, investigators find all the missing..."

Fri, 15 Mar 2013 00:51:00 +0000

“Whenever NASA has a shuttle go down, or any airliner goes down, investigators find all the missing pieces and catalog every screw that was in that shuttle or airplane. We’re saying, ‘Okay, let’s look at every piece of glass [or china] we have in our facility, let’s look at every piece of wood that can come off and let’s look at every screw that might fall into a drink. Let’s make sure we know [in advance] what can happen and where something can come from.”

- Bill Moore, “director of safety and security”: Eat’n Park makes food safer from foreign objects. Again, via Today in QSRs.

Comet Pan-STARRS as seen by one of the two NASA Stereo solar...

Tue, 12 Mar 2013 22:17:23 +0000

Comet Pan-STARRS as seen by one of the two NASA Stereo solar observation probes, about six hours ago (via)

"They’re planning on going to the Moon, and some people say, oh, we’ve got to get to the Moon, we’ve..."

Fri, 28 Sep 2012 05:41:16 +0100

“They’re planning on going to the Moon, and some people say, oh, we’ve got to get to the Moon, we’ve got to get there in a hurry to prove we can get there before China. It’s like, guys, we were there a long time ago, all right?”

- Mitt Romney on China’s space programme and a return to the moon, quoted in Jeff Foust’s article in The Space Review: Shedding a little more light on space policy.

The whole thing is well worth a read, particularly for noting that, while Presidents and candidates love to talk about NASA, it’s the legislative branch (responding to the Office of Management and Budget’s requests) that shares responsibility for the year-to-year funding of the agency.

"kids build LEGO spaceships and plan to fly to the stars almost as a matter of course before their..."

Fri, 28 Sep 2012 05:37:00 +0100

“kids build LEGO spaceships and plan to fly to the stars almost as a matter of course before their interest in science and math is beaten out of them by a stale educational system focused on rote memorization.”

- Lee Hutchinson for Ars Technica: Presidents—and would-be presidents—can’t resist meddling with NASA

"British sculptor Cornelia Parker has big plans. “I’d love to do something like put a..."

Wed, 29 Aug 2012 05:07:52 +0100

“British sculptor Cornelia Parker has big plans.
“I’d love to do something like put a piece of moon rock on Mars and a piece of Mars on the moon, a sort of reverse archaeology,” she said while in San Francisco recently to install her two-work show at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts. No land artist or found-object sculptor has thought this big before. And, in Texas eight years ago on an artist’s residency, Parker got as far as interesting NASA in her proposal to send a meteor back into space.
“They seemed very enthusiastic,” she said, “but I think they had a lot of political problems around that time, there was all this anti-NASA stuff. Then I got back to London, and tried to do it long-distance, and it was much harder. And there was all this talk about why are we spending American tax dollars supporting a British artist. It got a lot more problematic. So I thought about approaching the Russians.” A ripple of laughter announced that that move never got beyond the thinking stage.”

- Kenneth Baker quoting artist Cornelia Parker in Parker doesn’t stop with lightning and fire — she’s even eyed outer space, from the SF Chronicle in December 2005.

This evening I am mainly cursing 2003 me for not buying the one...

Sun, 01 Jul 2012 04:22:00 +0100

This evening I am mainly cursing 2003 me for not buying the one set LEGO ever sold with an Apollo astronaut minifigure.

Edit: wait. From Brickset:

RRP: £89.99 / US$40
Price per piece: 19.865p / 8.830c

That might explain it….