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viewing from the sidelines
Jan. 16th, 2010 09:45 am1. As all his friends know, ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
davidlevine is on Mars. That is to say, he is serving a hitch with a crew of this Mars habitat research station in the Utah desert, road-testing the sort of procedures and equipment that would be needed on an actual Mars base, and blogging about it. Living in cramped quarters, eating reconstituted food, fixing balky equipment all day, and zipping up a space suit (imitation, in this case) whenever you want to go outside is exactly the sort of thing that appeals to me least about space travel, imitation or real - as a kid I followed the Moon program and admired the ingenuity of the equipment, but never felt the urge to shut myself up in the front seat of a Volkswagen and pretend it was a Gemini, or to eat the freeze-dried ice cream and drink the Tang - but DL has the techy gene to do the work and is reveling in it. It's not my idea of a good time, but for him it's a dream come true, and I can vicariously enjoy his pleasure.
2. I've been following with interest this trial going on in San Francisco on a suit to overturn the same-sex marriage ban. Here's a detailed liveblog and a newspaper following suit. Again this is a vicarious interest. I have no personal stake in this trial, as the bigots have nothing against my marriage (actually, as it's interfaith, maybe they would), but my empathy for other couples seeking to be legally wed is intense. One thing the trial has shown so far is how personally hurtful the ban has been: one giant middle finger from society at its victims.
This full background article on the trial explains, among other things, how the plaintiffs were chosen and how the famous lawyers got involved. Olson is described as having "something folksy in his speech, which reminded me that he’s a Westerner, who grew up and was educated in Northern California." Curious, I looked him up, to discover to my surprise that we come from adjacent suburbs and actually attended the same high school, though at widely separated dates. (I am glad I did not know this when Olson was playing evil incarnate nine years ago.) I would not have thought that my home town would make "something folksy" about its inhabitants.
3. More of society's victims: The one comment I have to make about Haiti (or "Hatey", as the captioning on the TV news program had it) that hasn't been made many times already is a reminder of the lesson of earthquakes. It's not the ground shaking that makes earthquakes so deadly. What kills thousands is the buildings that fall down because the ground shakes. You can't prevent earthquakes; it's construction codes that save lives.
3a. Satan defends himself from calumny. (Second letter, viagerisullivan)
davidlevine is on Mars. That is to say, he is serving a hitch with a crew of this Mars habitat research station in the Utah desert, road-testing the sort of procedures and equipment that would be needed on an actual Mars base, and blogging about it. Living in cramped quarters, eating reconstituted food, fixing balky equipment all day, and zipping up a space suit (imitation, in this case) whenever you want to go outside is exactly the sort of thing that appeals to me least about space travel, imitation or real - as a kid I followed the Moon program and admired the ingenuity of the equipment, but never felt the urge to shut myself up in the front seat of a Volkswagen and pretend it was a Gemini, or to eat the freeze-dried ice cream and drink the Tang - but DL has the techy gene to do the work and is reveling in it. It's not my idea of a good time, but for him it's a dream come true, and I can vicariously enjoy his pleasure.2. I've been following with interest this trial going on in San Francisco on a suit to overturn the same-sex marriage ban. Here's a detailed liveblog and a newspaper following suit. Again this is a vicarious interest. I have no personal stake in this trial, as the bigots have nothing against my marriage (actually, as it's interfaith, maybe they would), but my empathy for other couples seeking to be legally wed is intense. One thing the trial has shown so far is how personally hurtful the ban has been: one giant middle finger from society at its victims.
This full background article on the trial explains, among other things, how the plaintiffs were chosen and how the famous lawyers got involved. Olson is described as having "something folksy in his speech, which reminded me that he’s a Westerner, who grew up and was educated in Northern California." Curious, I looked him up, to discover to my surprise that we come from adjacent suburbs and actually attended the same high school, though at widely separated dates. (I am glad I did not know this when Olson was playing evil incarnate nine years ago.) I would not have thought that my home town would make "something folksy" about its inhabitants.
3. More of society's victims: The one comment I have to make about Haiti (or "Hatey", as the captioning on the TV news program had it) that hasn't been made many times already is a reminder of the lesson of earthquakes. It's not the ground shaking that makes earthquakes so deadly. What kills thousands is the buildings that fall down because the ground shakes. You can't prevent earthquakes; it's construction codes that save lives.
3a. Satan defends himself from calumny. (Second letter, via
gerisullivan)
