Wow! I had forgotten how really neat the space centre is! Today was our second visit and Kayte's first and I think it made as much of an impression on her as it did on us the first and second visits. The last time we were there was in the fall of 2008 on our first cruise south. It is clearly an unmitigated ad for the space program, but if you don't blow your own horn at least a bit how will others do it for you.

I remain flabbergasted at how much we have all come to view space flight as common place. I kept looking at pictures of people I have never heard of who have been into space on missions, not once, not twice, and in some cases not three times but four, five and six times! Who are these people and why aren't their names household words? There was even a whole building dedicated to encouraging people to consider a career in astronautics. Also what was brought home with a real thump was that in less that ten years NASA went from rockets exploding on the launch pad to Apollo 11 landing on the moon! Astounding! Then they went on with over 130 shuttle flights, building the manned space station and more, and now, in a weeks time they will be launching Orion, the carrier for the Mars mission which they expect to be underway by 2025. We will be watching that from the dock here in Titusville. What wouldn't I give to be able to climb aboard and blast off. They are talking about colonizing the moon as a preliminary step to the trip to Mars! What can I say? Wow!