30 thoughts on “September 7, 2018: Kepler’s Still Got A Bit Left In The Tank”
The story of the K2 portion of Kepler's life was already amazing, and now there's more. They're going to milk it for all it's got.
I learned a lot about MRO (Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter) in a recent Astronomy magazine article, most amazing being that it has recorded more data in its lifetime than all other interplanetary missions combined. It also has a program called HiWish where anyone in the public can suggest a target on Mars for MRO's HiRise camera, providing it has a scientific purpose behind it.
Just like Voyager and Akatsuki, I'm amazed at what these engineers can do to keep these things going.
Oh heck, might as well throw in the Mars rovers into the lauds as well -- the engineers have introduced a whole lot of hacks to get around non-rotating wheels, degraded solar power, getting stuck in loose sand, and a whole lot of other fun stuff. It's tough enough to debug software/hardware sitting right in front of you, but to play "guess-and-by-golly" with something millions of miles away, that takes a lot of smart people and good ol' fashion dumb luck.
Oh, that Kepler. I was expecting a Maximum Effort reference. 😒
Arg, I'll be in a different part of St. Paul for a book launch that evening. It sounds like a great event--good luck!
St. Paul has all kinds of great book stuff going on. Sorry I’ll miss you, but perhaps we’ll have another chance further on down the road.
Cool, I work less than a mile from Concordia. I put it on the Calendar. I'll try to stick around, have dinner and check it out.
Awesome! I’d be very happy to see you there (and meet you), free.
I almost sent you an email last week when the email from one of the organizers crossed my desk(top). I haven't seen the draft for today, but this should be in our Friday Digest.
I'll be there and would love to grab a bite (pre-discussion) and/or a beer or two post-discussion.
Also, this reminds me that I need to place my order for #13 and #14. (edit) done
Also, also ... I've been meaning to inquire; is "General Order 5: ..." grounded in a lived experience? Powerful stuff brother.
Glad to know you’ll be there — I’m looking forward to (finally!) meeting you! I’m hoping a bite and/or beer will be in the cards; I haven’t heard yet from our hosts what their plans (if any) are for us before or after. I’m driving up with one of my colleagues, and I suspect we’ll be getting in on the early side. Once I know I can follow up with an email and we’ll see if we can make things happen.
Would you like me to bring up your copies of #13 & #14 that week? I’m happy to do that (we’re bringing up copies, anyway), and I can ensure the shipping costs get refunded to you. If you’d like them sooner, we can get them out this weekend.
As for General Order 5, I’ve shifted a few of the poems around within the structure as others have been written, so at this point I’m not quite sure which was the one you read under that order. (I’m a bit embarrassed to admit I’m foggy on which one might’ve been under GO#5, but there will — insha’Allah — be 36 poems in the full sequence.) What was the theme?
Standing by on an email - I'll keep the evening open.
Bringing them would be appreciated - still working through the back-half of the first dozen issues.
My reference was to the final contribution of Issue 8 - 2011. Theme was PTSD - A road trip morphs into a convoy to [Fallujah, Ramadi, Husaybah] ...
Ah, right. The idea of the General Orders book didn’t exist when I wrote that; it was the first piece. In the final form it will have its own title & be formatted as a prose poem rather than how it appears in that issue. I won’t play the Tim O’Brien truth game, but, yes, grounded in lived experience.
I’ll have your copies with me; we’ll figure out how to exchange once my details are settled. As always, heartfelt thanks for reading.
If possible I’d love to pre dinner too. Or after reading beer. CoC has my contact info.
With the Cleveland win last night, the Tigers were eliminated from the playoffs, and the worst the Clevelands could do is second place. Their magic number is 7.
The BoSox currently have a playoffs magic number of 4, over the Mariners (also 2 over the Rays). When those numbers get to 0, the BoSox are at least guaranteed a Wild-Card spot.
The Twins have a magic number of 28 to finish above the Angels. Their Magic number to win the division is 40.
So you're saying there's a chance?
Have you even looked at this team??
I got an email asking me to fill out a survey for the Twins/Sox game I went to a few weeks back ($6 StHb tickets that magically ended up behind the Twins dugout) and it came with a link for free premium mlb.tv for the rest of the year. Apparently the survey wasn't necessary to redeem.
I got a survey a couple years ago for the game I saw at The Cell Guaranteed Rate, and immensely enjoyed downplaying my experience there and wanting to see more Sox games.
Ravenous Rick update:
Was born at 8lbs 6oz and 21" long. After 3 months, he's up to 16lbs 10oz and 27". What a chunker.
Sheesh, that's impressive
Ravenous doesn't even cover it.
One of the White Sox' top prospects, Michael Kopech, is hurt and likely to have TJ surgery, so probably done for next year as well. How long till they start preemptively doing TJ surgeries on young pro pitchers?
Just came to post the same thing. Sox fans were excited about this guy. Tough news.
Yeah, he certainly had the Twins' number.
Saw a Midland Brown snake while mowing the lawn this afternoon, one of MO's indigenous tiny snakes. Just another of our neighborhood watch. And good God do we have leopard frogs this year
Frogs are bananas at my place this year too. Caught a tiny redbelly snake today, maybe 5-6”. My daughter was super excited and had the thing between the sand table and anice cream pail with a few inches of dirt in the bottom for probably 2 hours. She was very gentle with it and “let it go on accident” by putting it in her flower pot.
Kiriloff made the MLB Pipeline Team of the Year, and some guy named Jo Adell (never heard of him 😉 ) made the second team.
The story of the K2 portion of Kepler's life was already amazing, and now there's more. They're going to milk it for all it's got.
I learned a lot about MRO (Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter) in a recent Astronomy magazine article, most amazing being that it has recorded more data in its lifetime than all other interplanetary missions combined. It also has a program called HiWish where anyone in the public can suggest a target on Mars for MRO's HiRise camera, providing it has a scientific purpose behind it.
Just like Voyager and Akatsuki, I'm amazed at what these engineers can do to keep these things going.
And IMAGE, though too bad lost again, mostly.
Oh heck, might as well throw in the Mars rovers into the lauds as well -- the engineers have introduced a whole lot of hacks to get around non-rotating wheels, degraded solar power, getting stuck in loose sand, and a whole lot of other fun stuff. It's tough enough to debug software/hardware sitting right in front of you, but to play "guess-and-by-golly" with something millions of miles away, that takes a lot of smart people and good ol' fashion dumb luck.
Oh, that Kepler. I was expecting a Maximum Effort reference. 😒
I don't often get to Saint Paul, but I'll be there in ten days to speak on a round table on writing about war, survival, homecoming, & healing.
Arg, I'll be in a different part of St. Paul for a book launch that evening. It sounds like a great event--good luck!
St. Paul has all kinds of great book stuff going on. Sorry I’ll miss you, but perhaps we’ll have another chance further on down the road.
Cool, I work less than a mile from Concordia. I put it on the Calendar. I'll try to stick around, have dinner and check it out.
Awesome! I’d be very happy to see you there (and meet you), free.
I almost sent you an email last week when the email from one of the organizers crossed my desk(top). I haven't seen the draft for today, but this should be in our Friday Digest.
I'll be there and would love to grab a bite (pre-discussion) and/or a beer or two post-discussion.
Also, this reminds me that I need to place my order for #13 and #14. (edit) done
Also, also ... I've been meaning to inquire; is "General Order 5: ..." grounded in a lived experience? Powerful stuff brother.
Glad to know you’ll be there — I’m looking forward to (finally!) meeting you! I’m hoping a bite and/or beer will be in the cards; I haven’t heard yet from our hosts what their plans (if any) are for us before or after. I’m driving up with one of my colleagues, and I suspect we’ll be getting in on the early side. Once I know I can follow up with an email and we’ll see if we can make things happen.
Would you like me to bring up your copies of #13 & #14 that week? I’m happy to do that (we’re bringing up copies, anyway), and I can ensure the shipping costs get refunded to you. If you’d like them sooner, we can get them out this weekend.
As for General Order 5, I’ve shifted a few of the poems around within the structure as others have been written, so at this point I’m not quite sure which was the one you read under that order. (I’m a bit embarrassed to admit I’m foggy on which one might’ve been under GO#5, but there will — insha’Allah — be 36 poems in the full sequence.) What was the theme?
Standing by on an email - I'll keep the evening open.
Bringing them would be appreciated - still working through the back-half of the first dozen issues.
My reference was to the final contribution of Issue 8 - 2011. Theme was PTSD - A road trip morphs into a convoy to [Fallujah, Ramadi, Husaybah] ...
Ah, right. The idea of the General Orders book didn’t exist when I wrote that; it was the first piece. In the final form it will have its own title & be formatted as a prose poem rather than how it appears in that issue. I won’t play the Tim O’Brien truth game, but, yes, grounded in lived experience.
I’ll have your copies with me; we’ll figure out how to exchange once my details are settled. As always, heartfelt thanks for reading.
If possible I’d love to pre dinner too. Or after reading beer. CoC has my contact info.
With the Cleveland win last night, the Tigers were eliminated from the playoffs, and the worst the Clevelands could do is second place. Their magic number is 7.
The BoSox currently have a playoffs magic number of 4, over the Mariners (also 2 over the Rays). When those numbers get to 0, the BoSox are at least guaranteed a Wild-Card spot.
The Twins have a magic number of 28 to finish above the Angels. Their Magic number to win the division is 40.
So you're saying there's a chance?
Have you even looked at this team??
I got an email asking me to fill out a survey for the Twins/Sox game I went to a few weeks back ($6 StHb tickets that magically ended up behind the Twins dugout) and it came with a link for free premium mlb.tv for the rest of the year. Apparently the survey wasn't necessary to redeem.
I got a survey a couple years ago for the game I saw at
The CellGuaranteed Rate, and immensely enjoyed downplaying my experience there and wanting to see more Sox games.Ravenous Rick update:
Was born at 8lbs 6oz and 21" long. After 3 months, he's up to 16lbs 10oz and 27". What a chunker.
Sheesh, that's impressive
Ravenous doesn't even cover it.
One of the White Sox' top prospects, Michael Kopech, is hurt and likely to have TJ surgery, so probably done for next year as well. How long till they start preemptively doing TJ surgeries on young pro pitchers?
Just came to post the same thing. Sox fans were excited about this guy. Tough news.
Yeah, he certainly had the Twins' number.
Saw a Midland Brown snake while mowing the lawn this afternoon, one of MO's indigenous tiny snakes. Just another of our neighborhood watch. And good God do we have leopard frogs this year
Frogs are bananas at my place this year too. Caught a tiny redbelly snake today, maybe 5-6”. My daughter was super excited and had the thing between the sand table and anice cream pail with a few inches of dirt in the bottom for probably 2 hours. She was very gentle with it and “let it go on accident” by putting it in her flower pot.
Kiriloff made the MLB Pipeline Team of the Year, and some guy named Jo Adell (never heard of him 😉 ) made the second team.
Cool!