Today I wrote a letter to my sister and sent a couple of query letters off to editors. I kind of wish my sister would get on the Internet. This is the only physical letter I write anymore and the only reason I have to go to the post office. It does save on stamps though. A roll of stamps lasts me a really long time now.
Now that I've figured out how to use the star tracker, it just sits in the box. I really should take this thing outside and put it to the test. Too bad that West Texas is so far away. I miss my time at the observatory. Astrophotography in Dallas certainly has its limitations. Our back yard is way too bright with streetlights in the alley plus our own bright security lights. Exposures in the front yard would be ruined by the headlights of passing cars on our busy street.
I always worry that a drunk driver will come crashing through our front yard as well. It has happened before. Would you believe it has happened three times before. If the world was a nicer place the obvious solution would be to just drive to a nice dark area and set everything up. I've lost my nerve for that sort of activity though. The local news provides plenty of valid reasons to just stay home at night.
Luckily, I still feel safe when the sun is up. Long walks give a nice structure to my life. It's hard to fault walking. It's great exercise and provides plenty of time for reflective thinking. I often do my best thinking on my daily walks. Only a small percentage of my ideas ever turn into anything tangible, but I can tell that my mind is still working. It's hard to tell if your mind is working when you're home and the television is on.
I'm thinking that my experiences with the star tracker would make a nice, humorous article for Sky and Telescope. There aren't many humorous articles in the magazine though and anything I'd write would probably just make me look stupid. All I'm saying is that some of the other Kickstarter backers figured this thing out a lot faster than I did. Hey, I gave the idea a try though. We'll see what my editor thinks.
I really need to order the Hoka boots. They might not cure my foot pain, but they probably won't make it any worse. I've pretty much concluded that these boots aren't going to be available in local stores. I probably haven't done anything yet because I'm irritated at the Hoka company. Now that I've visited their website and looked at shoes they send me mail every day trying to get me to buy something else. Why won't companies just leave you alone? They are never satisfied and are relentless about trying to sell you more. I get mail from Samsung now after we bought the new TV. Hey guys, I'm never going to buy an Android phone. Every new purchase adds to the continual barrage of promotional mail you get every day. How did we get here? I've spent most of my working life in advertising and I was never this relentless.
I used to look forward to the future, but now I'm nostalgic about the past. I'm convinced that we are headed in the wrong direction. Maybe I should write a book about how civilization is going to end in 300 years. It would never get published though. I'm not a historian. I'm not an economist. I'm not even a pundit. You've got to have credentials these days.
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