posted 11-18-2003 08:19 PM               

In setting up Dick Gordon's appearance at Phoenix International Raceway, I contacted NASA to get footage of his spaceflights for our licensed show, "Totally NASCAR". Through that process, a VIP tour of Kennedy Space Center was also set up for Ashton Lewis, one of the NASCAR Busch Series drivers I work with. This was the full deal ... a tour that began with Ashton and a photographer spending nearly an hour inside the Space Shuttle Atlantis in the OPF.

I wasn't scheduled to get to go inside ... I'm just a PR guy ... but I did get to stick my head in the hatch and see the toilet. As I talked with one of the NASA administrators who was serving as a guide, we exchanged what seemed like life stories. He expressed an interest in racing, and when I invited him to the weekend's race in Homestead, he accepted.

Then ... then he asks, "Would you like to go inside the shuttle as well?"

Well ... duh. What kind of moron do you think I am? I was thinking it, but I didn't say it. I couldn't get the change and junk out of my pockets fast enough. He had a tech call and get me a bunny suit ... and I was pumped. I was going to go inside Atlantis. I was going to get my picture taken inside Atlantis. I was going to ... I was going to ... I was going to ...

And then I heard somebody knocking on the white room window. It was the bay leader, saying we had to leave, that they had work to do. To sum it up, I didn't get to go inside Atlantis, other than to stick my head in the hatch. On the outside, I tried valiantly to be professional ... "That's OK. I understand." On the inside, though, I was cussing that bay leader for all he was worth. I told him later he was now my mortal enemy.

Meanwhile, Ashton got to sit in the commander's seat on the flight deck and the photographer in the pilot's. I hate them both.

We also visited one of the launch pads, and went up to the 195-foot level where they put the astronauts on board the Space Shuttle that I didn't get to go inside. We went inside the VAB, visited the engine room, visited launch control and went inside and under the crawler.