The incredible preparation for an International Space Station, an ISS, orbit goes unnoticed by many.
First, I set the Mr. Coffee Bro to percolate black magic, precisely 15 minutes ahead of the flight plan over Texas. After buttering yesterday’s flour tortilla and sticking a space-ready-and-already wrapped banana in my pocket … and of course a few peanut M&Ms — that melt in my mouth, not in space — I positioned my observation station. I was in the backyard of the Planetary Headquarters of PingWi-Fi … just beyond the perimeter of the PingWi-Fi wi-fi network … (Thank goodness I purchased an excellent fold-up lawn chair at last year’s Oldham County Round Up, with cupholders mind you.)
So, with no further ado, I tilted my mug of coffee, with my neck craned with a slant toward my best estimation of 70 degrees. I was a few minutes early. The ISS would be passing over Fort Worth’s Lowell Avenue at precisely 6:21 a.m., first visible in the southwest sky over what is most likely Benbrook, Texas. For six minutes, the ISS was to be visible, moving at 1,750 m.p.h., or five miles per second across the sky, until it disappeared in the northeast sky, somewhere over Bedford, Texas. The altitude is 400 kilometers above the earth. I did the math. That is real high.
Party on or should I say “Beam me up. Scotty!”?
How do I know all this? Glad you asked. Yesterday NASA and company were kind enough to send to my handheld communicator a text telling the exact stardate information.
For any space cadets wanting to space truck along with the rest of us, sign up at:
Ha … it is probably military testing to ingeniusley geotrack bloggers via cell phone, way down here, from way up there … I digress …
So anywho … I am having my own little backyard space station sunrise services when a bank of cottonball cloud cover wafts over my head. It’s direction? Well it started northwest of my house and drifted in toward the southwest … a big ol’ crisscross.
Dang it. NASA … get your space junk together. Can’t you plan my flyover for a clear day!?!
“T-Minus 120 seconds before projected ISS sighting …”
I couldn’t believe it. When I first positioned my chair and my coffee there were no clouds over my backyard, just a long, low-hanging branch from my neighbor’s tree — which needs to be whacked off — because it will probably fall to earth and kill me someday … I digress …
Just as the baker’s dozen of space visitors were to enter my neighborhood, they were pre-empted by God’s plan to water his Earth.
Bummed, I was.
But what the heck. I had plenty of coffee. I sat and waited for a miracle.
I swear, I am not depositing bodily waste in your space suit — IANSY. Just as the ISS was due, directly over my head, there were a few slight portals in the bank of clouds, which was now hanging overhead, pretty much all the way southeast to Cleburne, Texas or so.
Faintly, the same unidentified, bright star that attends all of these sky watching events with me was visible in the south … on again, off again as the clouds teased me.
I looked at my cell phone and the time was perfect. I continued to peer up and yes … for just the wink of an eye, I saw a bright shiny object high above, almost directly above through a brief circular parting in the billowy curtain.
Funny … as I type this blog, Pandora is playing The Rolling Stones’ “Hey you get off of my cloud” … I digress …
It was like through a peep hole, I glanced up and watched as the ISS astronauts and scientists “reached out and touched the face of God”. A second later, it was over. #TWSS I moved around the yard, dodging my trees and the neighbors’ trees and then moved to my elevated patio. Nada. No NASA. No more.
But it was pretty special while it lasted, if only for a second.
Know what I sayin?
