posted 11-27-2005 10:10 PM               

quote:

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They are grayer, 35 years after the glory days, and their memories are not as keen. But the engineers who landed Americans on the moon are as enthralled as ever by the romance of space travel. And today some find themselves, to their delight, working once again to send humans to the lunar surface.

Now in their 60s or older, veterans of the Apollo program have been called away from their tennis games, their grandchildren and their puttering to pursue President Bush's goal of returning astronauts to the moon by 2020. Some are serving as part-time consultants to NASA or private companies. Others are working full time on the new moon program. All say the work is a joy, not a burden.

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posted 12-02-2005 09:52 PM               

Speaking of that, I met a guy from Cuba today, and he claimed to know the guys who converted a 1951 Buick into an ocean-going vessel and made it to within 7 miles of the Florida Coast before they were nabbed.

Apparently they had done a similar thing two years previously, but in a Ford.

Not only is that the kind of engineering legerdemain NASA is sorely missing - it was probably easier to fly to the Moon than it is to make a Buick float - but these two men brought their entire families. There were two wives, two sets of kids and FOUR sets of grandparents packed into a (floating!) 1951 Buick. And these men were said to actually still be SANE!

We need people like these for exploration of Mars and beyond. They're probably the only ones who can spend 18 months in a space ship without picking up an ax and wiping out the rest of the crew.

posted 12-03-2005 11:27 AM               

Earth will be the scourage of Outer Space, as hordes of Humans descend on other planets in fleets of Studebakers....

Or should I have said "descend, in fleets of Studebakers, on other planets"?