I am (just) old enough to remember watching the moon landings live on my parents' black and white TV set. It was something I never forgot, and which deeply affected me. It may have been the defining moment that sent my life in this particular direction. I remember, quite clearly, as many children at that time did, wanting to be an astronaut, but also wanting to really know how all the stuff worked that made getting into space possible. I obsessed over it, actually.
Reality check. It's now best part of 40 years later. I'm living in California, working at NASA Ames. My *actual job* is working on getting mankind back to the moon, and later on to Mars. Often it seems as mundane as any other office job, but sometimes the reality hits, and I realise that I'm working on the actual stuff that is going to go into space.
Whoah.
I just wanted to say that there are a lot of people at NASA working very hard to rekindle the dreams that were laid aside at the end of the Apollo programme. We live and breathe it every day -- it's what gets us out of bed in the mornings. We're going back to the moon and beyond. This time around, it won't be quite so quick or quite so risky for the people involved, but we'll be back.
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Reality check. It's now best part of 40 years later. I'm living in California, working at NASA Ames. My *actual job* is working on getting mankind back to the moon, and later on to Mars. Often it seems as mundane as any other office job, but sometimes the reality hits, and I realise that I'm working on the actual stuff that is going to go into space.
Whoah.
I just wanted to say that there are a lot of people at NASA working very hard to rekindle the dreams that were laid aside at the end of the Apollo programme. We live and breathe it every day -- it's what gets us out of bed in the mornings. We're going back to the moon and beyond. This time around, it won't be quite so quick or quite so risky for the people involved, but we'll be back.