Very much excited out of my mind and face to say that me and my awesome illustrator friend Dotty are going to be the guests on BBC's Authors Live next month. It's going out live at 11am on 27th May and will stay on iPlayer afterwards. Schools can register to get involved and all the deets are below!
...and I did have this waiting up for me when I got back home...
Well *that* was a waste of time... Comet R3 was too low to see well and by the time it was a few degrees above the horizon the sky was so bright the SeeStar rejected *every* frame for lack of stars, so I have this screenshot and that's it! Oh well, at least I saw it a few days ago...
Jess would like it to be known that she has a new box, so she will be unavailable for some time. Thank you for your attention to this matter. 😊
That's excellent work. Curiosity - and her team - continues to show us the wonders of Mars :-)
On a more serious note I just want people to *read* it. I love my story (imagine Wednesday Addams sent to the Yellowstone ranch - on Mars!!) & think others would too. But the whole agent thing is now so soul-destroyingly difficult & cold it's like the Doctor trying to chip through that diamond wall.
Mesmerising...
I'm aiming impossibly, unrealistically high: get a response from one of the many agents I query, instead of being ignored and made to feel like I'm invisible. I know, I know. I'll wish for a dragon instead.
Wow. I've never seen that design before. It's amazing. Thank you!
*Rocky will watch over Jess while she sleeps*
I meant it was dumb the way the follow up *plans* to retrieve them - from the rover and from the "Depot" - have just been dumped, not the way the samples were deposited *for* collection. All that time, money and science just thrown away. It's beyond ridiculous.
Even if they are covered over their location was logged very precisely, so they'll be easy to recover by an astronaut with a good sweeping brush... :-)
Yes, some are still inside. But there are now no plans to collect **any** of them, which is just a criminal waste of very precious science.
Hardly littering. Half - the "reserves" - were left in one small, well-defined area, its location well documented, a back-up plan for sample collection if anything catastrophic happened to the rover. That was actually one of the most sensible elements of MSR.
Anyone else think it is one of the dumbest, most ridiculous, most insane things ever that Perseverance's sample tubes have just been... abandoned on Mars? The science in those tubes could be revolutionary & they're just going to sit there, watching dust devils twirling across the skyline.
Beautiful Cinematic of the Artemis II mission by melodysheep.
#Artemis
www.youtube.com/watch?v=SGxz...
De magnifiques images et une composition magistrale !
Par melodysheep
youtu.be/SGxz4LQfRpo?...
He'll grow on her - not *in* her, which I was a bit worried about... ;-)
J has a new friend...
How many times have I watched Jurassic Park? Must be over a dozen by now. Watching it again on a lazy Sunday afternoon and right from the start it's still fresh and *brilliant*. Not a line, not a moment wasted. And that John Williams fanfare! Masterpiece.
(cue every writer you know scanning your shelves to see if *their* book is on there...) ;-)
Couple of processed screenshots from NASA TV... these are just spectacular views, with Earth reflecting in one of the solar arrays in one, and the silhouette of the solar array cutting across Earth in the other... 🙂
Oh look at that... Earth reflected in one of Integrity's solar arrays... (processed screenshot NASA TV)
Given :-)
Managed to photograph Comet C/2025 R3 (PANSTARRS) at you're-having-a-laugh o'clock (03.30) this AM with my Seestar S50. It's a lot smaller and fainter than the lovely long-tailed comet we all enjoyed seeing and imaging so much last Autumn, but it's still a very pretty comet...
Jess, my rescue cat, approves of this.
A black and white cat watching live NASA TV coverage of the Artemis II mission, showing Earth as a crescent...
06.30 here in the UK, birds are singing outside, I'm going out to work at 7, but before then some quiet time with J on my lap, watching pictures of the Earth from Artemis II...
The spaceship "model" if you like is an Orion capsule. The crew have given it its own name, Integrity. Same way you might give your car - a Porsche, VW, whatever - its own name.
Thanks :-)
