[X] My Assistant

[tuvas]

Okay, so there's only a few days till the landing, and I'm just curious, where will you all be? Just trying to keep a similar sounding thread to it's original purpose, that's all.

I am planning as of now to be at the LPL event at the University of Arizona. It should be interesting. I can only be there for about the hour around the landing time, but that's alright.

[elakdawalla]

Neither any celebrities nor Ed Weiler will be in mission control. Celebrities aren't permitted in mission control until after a successful landing, becuase they'd be too distracting. Weiler was supposed to be at Planetfest, actually, but now says he has a more important engagement, meeting with the head of the Canadian space program.

--Emily

[Stu]

Neither any celebrities nor Ed Weiler will be in mission control.

That was actually a joke, Emily Though I'd pay good money to see Paris Hilton in there tomorrow night, complete with yappy little dog peering out of the bling-encrusted bag under her arm, looking utterly bemused by the whole thing...

Quick clip for WEST WING fans... this should bring back some happy memories... Forget that the probe in the series, um, failed... that's not the point... the point is that , for me, this little scene captured the drama and, yes, nobility of space exploration, and whenever I hear Sam reading out this passage I genuinely feel touched.

I miss THE WEST WING so much. So much.

[dvandorn]

Quick clip for WEST WING fans... this should bring back some happy memories... Forget that the probe in the series, um, failed... that's not the point... the point is that , for me, this little scene captured the drama and, yes, nobility of space exploration, and whenever I hear Sam reading out this passage I genuinely feel touched.

That was an excellent episode. However, this clip doesn't contain my favorite exchange from it.

The Galileo V mission being presented is a barely fictionalized version of the MPL debacle, complete with the DS2 penetrators. Someone is explaining to Josh how the penetrators were supposed to work -- falling unrestrained by braking systems to smash into the ground at hundreds of km per hour and penetrating into it, after which they were expected to work perfectly. At which point, Josh says something about how he didn't think NASA spacecraft depended on the Acme school of physics...

I miss THE WEST WING so much. So much.

Me too, Stu. Me, too.

-the other Doug