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Recent News... Just for Pope Gregory... |
2001-09-18 - 9:00 a.m. Finding my balance So I'm a sheep, but I had to find out my pirate name: Captain Jenny Kidd. [Even though there's no legal rank on a pirate ship, everyone recognizes you're the one in charge. Even though you're not always the traditional swaggering gallant, your steadiness and planning make you a fine, reliable pirate. Arr!] In light of past flamingo raids, I find this freakingly accurate. I did once spend my spare time dressing flamingoes in full Elizabethan and sneaking them into the Trayned Bands encampment at Pennsic. They awoke to Flamingoes planted in the middle of the pike stand. I had been careful to use non-descript fabric (nothing people would associate with my garb) and they were blaming everyone in the world, except me - closest they got to figuring it out was Thjora. I would've gotten away clean except Genevieve, one of my accompliances, had to rat us out to Grace. Do those flamingoes still live with Genie and Jeremy? I bet Pavla would be good at things like this. It's always the quiet ones. Now I really want to know Isobel's pirate name, having once watched her play a very convincing, conniving cabin boy. Gen, in my car last night on the way back from dinner: You know, I don't think you should be listening to Les Miserables at this point in your psyche. Points to the CD player. It's not that I don't love Les Mis, but, really, you should probably switch. So I switched to gospel music. I love good gospel and it always clears my head. Rob helped Alan move Gen's newly acquired couch. I was useful by holding the door. It was tight fit, but it wasn't the worst I've ever seen. My roommates Ellen, Brad and I once moved a couch with two car jacks, four cinderblocks, tinfoil, a fire entinguisher and half a pound of butter. The neighbors complained about Brad doing push-ups off the ceiling (their floor), but we did get the couch around the tight corner and into the back room. After the couch was placed, we had a lovely relaxing dinner at Harry's. Gen bought Rob dinner (fruits of his labor and all) but she even sprung for me too. Excellent - all I did was hold the door. Very easy considering the last two moving adventure were Roland's anvil and my sewing room furniture. Our waitress was dangerously perky and Alan looked at her like a yappy puppy that might just bite. Gen asked them to trade her completely flat Diet Coke for something with fizz and the waitress said Oh, our diet coke is soooo gross here. Completely nasty. I think her ponytail was too tight. I hear Byrom has a ponytail. Yesterday morning was spent wading through email and posts and too many messages. The afternoon was spent in meetings and testing. Four hours phasing the digital sun sensor on the spacecraft we'll probably never launch. Phasing a sensor is pretty simple. If I shine the light on the left side, does the software tell me the sun is on the left side? It's easy to mess up this sort of polarity. One reversed pair of wires, one flip in the datawords, one error in the software signs, and your spacecraft will look at the world upside down. Spacecraft has been lost over polarity mistakes - zigging when they should've zagged and losing all power - so we always test the hell out of it, checking every reading from the sensor head to the final software display on the ground. This time, it was all correct. The first time we did this phasing test, the readings were exactly backwards. I eventually traced the problem to an undocumented assumption made in the software we were re-using, an assumption that was no longer true for our newest spacecraft even though we were assured this was well tested code and we should use it without question. It's actually kind of expected. The sun or magnetic sensors are always wired backwards at least once on each spacecraft - that's what testing is for. Yes, Galmr, I spent another afternoon dressed like a bleached bunny with no ears, shining a photographers light at a spacecraft. Devil Duckie made a cameo appearance at the spacecraft clean room. He was in my backpack, for the commute from home, where he'd been terrifying my cat, back to my monitor. He proved quite disturbing, but was eventually embraced by the team to the point I had to make them stop squeaking the darn thing. Gen gave me a flag last night. It won't quite fit over my car antenna, so I have to figure out another way. I'm actually feeling normal today, which is a triumph, getting my balance back. Terrorists may rattle America, but we will not be stopped. Life must go on. If it doesn't, what's the point of fighting for the American Way? � � � 
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