Eat Your Vegetables?

Meals, Ready-to-Eat (MREs) or C-Rations or C-Rats, as most of us called them, were first introduced during WWII to provide our troops with a nutritional meal that was fairly easy to lug in a pack.  I got my first and only taste of C-Rats when I was in the Marine Corps.  As I remember, a meal was comprised of a can of meat, some kind of vegetable, bread of some type, crackers and a dessert.  I seem to recall some kits had a little can of sterno that you could use to heat the meal if you so desired.  I do know that I was one of the few that actually liked C-Rats; but then, no one has ever accused me of having taste.

Plus, it had this cool little John Wayne (P-38) can opener.  No idea why it was called a John Wayne, but this tiny piece of hardware had a variety of uses including can opener and screwdriver.  And tough?  I used that thing for tasks it was never designed for — it couldn’t be destroyed.  I’d still be using it if I hadn’t lost it in the move to our new house in 2001; but I managed to hang on to it for more than 20 years.

Obviously, nutrition is an important aspect of any endeavor and the MRE provides enough caloric intake to allow soldiers to perform their duties.

What do astronauts consume to maintain their vitality while on a mission?  If you asked me that question 40 years ago I’d of said Tang.  Ah, Tang.  I remember the commercials from my childhood.  I wanted to drink Tang because it’s what the astronauts drank.

Tang wasn’t invented for NASA.  According to “Today I Found Out” William A. Mitchell created  it in 1957.  NASA adopted its use in 1962 for the Mercury program to add flavor to John Glenn’s drinking water.

Astronaut meals have come a long way since the 60s.  In the early days of the space program, astronauts dined on food from squeezable aluminum tubes.  Nutritionally sound, but not very tasty.

The Lunar and Planetary Institute website details some of the dietary challenges astronauts face.  In space they lose bone mass so they need diets rich in calcium.  They might not get enough to eat because they’re just not as hungry, the food is not appetizing, or they are too busy to eat.  Most lose about 5% of their weight during a typical Space Station stay of four to six months.

NASA has a Nutritional Biochemistry lab with highly educated personnel and according to their website, they conduct a variety of studies including nutritional assessment studies, particularly in the field of bone metabolism and develop vitamins using HPLC-electrochemical detection methods.

According to Oprah.com, NASA also has a laboratory at the Johnson Space Center in Houston, which is a combination kitchen/lab.  Here, they’re developing food that could be used on a three-year mission to Mars.

I’m a pretty picky eater but I’d like to be one of the guinea pigs that tries the NASA concoctions.  Anyone else feeling brave?

Living the Disney Dream

Last week, my wife and I took our first ever cruise.  It was a four-day jaunt aboard the Disney Dream with a stop in Nassau, Bahamas and Castaway Cay, the Disney island.

Our first stop was Nassau, with an excursion to the aquarium at the Atlantis Resort.  The aquarium had been designed to resemble an archeological dig, chock full of artifacts from the lost city of Atlantis.  It was cheesy.  Our guide was very knowledgeable regarding fish.  She had the fictional details of the Atlantian history committed to memory, but her delivery was very wooden and unconvincing as if she were just reading from a script.

Our second stop was Castaway Cay.  There was a ton to do there.  You could parasail, windsurf, ride a jet ski, ride in a glass-bottom boat, snorkel, swim with the manta rays, bike or just lay on the beach.  They even had an adult beach which excluded anyone under 18 to provide a break for people like me whose children were already grown.

Don’t get me wrong, I knew going in that a Disney cruise would have kids so I’m not complaining about children being around.  But, it was nice to have the option to hang out in an area that was … quieter.

The Dream was a huge ship, though I really don’t have anything to compare it to.  The last time I was aboard any type of seagoing vessel was in the early 70s.  My older brother was stationed aboard the USS Dewey DLG-14 and they did a one-day family cruise out of Newport, RI.  I thought the Dewey was big but the Dream dwarfed the destroyer.

Of course, all things are relative.  In Nassau, we were docked next to the Royal Caribbean’s Allure of the Seas.  That’s a big ship.  It’s the largest cruise ship in the world – two inches (or so) longer then her sister ship, Oasis of the Seas.  The Allure looked to be at least 25% bigger than the Dream.

There was plenty to do aboard the Dream.  Live shows, swimming, eating and the piece de resistance, the AquaDuck water slide.  The AquaDuckwas 765 feet of water ridin’ twists and turns.  It was awesome.

For the money, I think a cruise is a great deal.  Lots of food, lots of things to do; if you walk away bored or hungry you’ve only yourself to blame.  Any dissenting opinions?

Wild Ride

When I was in grammar school I went to Riverside Park (now a Six Flags Amusement Park).  The adult who organized the trip told the older kids not to force the younger children to partake of any rides they did not want to.  My older brother, Matt, was one of the chaperones and what he heard was, “Make your little brother go on every ride until he’s so sick he throws up.”

That trip to Riverside Park was my introduction to roller coasters.  Matt and one of his high school buddies coerced me into riding the Mickey Mouse, a coaster of dubious origins.  He and his evil crony made certain I knew two little kids had perished on the ride when a car overturned and plummeted to the ground, crushing the children.  In hindsight, I’m fairly certain they were just trying to scare me … they succeeded.

Understandably, as an adult, I avoided roller coasters.  I rationalized my decision by reasoning that roller coasters were dangerous.  And you know what?  Turns out … I was right.  There is evidence that frequent riding of roller coasters causes a host of health issues.  People with heart disease run the risk of having a cardiovascular event.  According to a 2000 article on the Science Daily website, roller coaster rides may trigger blood clots on the brain.  Lastly, in April 2010, Popular Mechanics reported that a rider suffered from barotraumas, major bruising of his ear canal and ear drum as the result of a jaunt on a on roller coaster.

I didn’t ride another roller coaster until 1999 when my family and I vacationed in Orlando and Disney World.  We’ve been back several times and I discovered I like Big Thunder Mountain Railroad, Space Mountain®, the Rock 'n' Roller Coaster® Starring Aerosmith, Expedition Everest™ and my favorite, The Twilight Zone Tower of Terror™.

But, I’m told by my children that those rides are tame.  I need to ride a “real” roller coaster like the Bizarro at Six Flags.  No thanks.  There are two reasons I find the Disney rides appealing.  They are at Disney, which automatically makes them safer (leave me my fantasies), and when you ride them you are enclosed in steel; your legs aren’t flopping in the breeze as you zoom around a track willy nilly.

There’s a coaster on the drawing board that I’m certain my kids would enjoy and I can guarantee you will never get me to ride – the zero gravity roller coaster.  BRC Imagination Arts is developing a zero gravity roller coaster, dubbed by some as a vomit coaster.  The idea is to allow the average person to experience zero gravity for about eight seconds.  Its inspiration is a NASA C-9 aircraft, the Vomit Comet, so named because many first timers lose their lunch on their initial dive.  The Vomit Comet executes steep dives which allow passengers to experience zero gravity for 23 – 30 seconds.  Not gonna happen!

I know where I stand regarding this forthcoming zero gravity coaster.  Is anyone interested in a controlled freefall?  Why?

Lake Vostok: Poland Springs – Eat Your Heart Out

There is a host of research bases located in Antarctica and they are run by a number of different countries, including the United States, China and Russia.  People at these stations study everything from weather to aeronomy, the study of the upper atmospheric regions of the Earth and other planets.  Antarctica is a chosen spot for research because the region is probably the most unspoiled area in the world with the cleanest air on earth.

The oldest station is Mawson Station.  It’s Australia’s oldest continuously inhabited Antarctic station having run since 1954.

There are hundreds of subglacial lakes of varying sizes under Antarctica’s miles-thick sheet of ice.  The Russians are the first to drill into one of those lakes.  Lake Vostok is under the Russian’s Vostok Research Station and on Sunday, 2/5/12, the Russians tapped into the lake.  There was a mixture of anticipation and trepidation within the scientific community leading up to the accomplishment.

The Russians used a combination of chemicals to prevent the five inch diameter drill hole from refreezing as they drilled.  Bear in mind, the coldest temperature ever recorded, -128.6 degree Fahrenheit below zero, was recorded at Vostok Station.  The use of the chemicals had some scientists concerned about the possibility of contaminating the lake.  To reduce the chance of contamination, the Russians completed the project, sans chemicals, by heating the drill.  The Huffington Post reported that the lake’s water pressure pushed any drilling liquids away from the lake.

Unfortunately, winter has arrived in Antarctica and the exploration of Lake Vostok has been suspended.

This is an exciting accomplishment.  The subglacial lakes are considered pristine environments because they haven’t been exposed to Earth’s atmosphere in millions of years.  Scientists wonder if life exists in any of these waters.  If so, they theorize there’s a chance that life could be present in the frigid waters of Jupiter’s moons.

I’m hopeful that life, even a single celled organism, is found in a sample from one of these lakes.  Maybe, that will help fuel some renewed interest in space.  If there’s even a remote possibility that there’s life “out there,” we need find it.

What do you think; does life in an earthly subglacial lake equate to alien life on a distant planet?

Russian Drill Penetrates 14-Million-Year-Old Antarctic Lake - Wired Science 2/6/2012

Stuck in Space

My delight with space isn’t a recent phenomenon connected solely with my employment in a space oriented business.  I’ve been enamored with space and space travel since I was a kid. 

Forty years ago, I did my 8^th grade year-long report on the history of the American space program.  I remember how jealous I was when a classmate wrote to the White House and received an invitation from President Nixon to attend the launch of Apollo 16.

I’ve made no secret of my distain for the United States’ lack of homegrown transportation to the International Space Station (ISS).  So, imagine my disgust when I saw it announced online that the Russian rocket Soyuz had another issue. 

Back in August 2011, an unmanned Russian Progress cargo craft using a Soyuz rocket, which was destined for the ISS, crashed.  It didn’t even reach orbit.  As result, we had to wait for a thorough investigation before we sent any U.S. astronauts to the station.

Now, there’s another issue.  The return capsule of the Soyuz craft failed a factory leak test; it cracked.  I’m not a rocket scientist, but even I know a crack in a spaceship is a bad thing.  This was supposed to be the vehicle that would bring the astronauts home from the ISS.  NASA says this latest setback won’t extend the current mission an inordinate amount of time, but our reliance on the Russians makes me ill.

I know American have had our share of space related problems; I get that.  But that’s not my issue.  I’m peeved that we don’t control our own destiny in regards to space travel.  The fact we don’t have our own transportation to the ISS, and won’t for a number of years is extremely shortsighted.  It’s an ongoing issue.  We’re losing our edge in space!

What do you think about this whole debacle?

Geek Themed Spaces

What kid doesn’t want to decorate their bedroom in the theme of their choosing?  When I was a young'un I papered one wall of my bedroom with the Sunday comics.  I painstakingly removed the comic strips from the newspaper, prepped the wall and used wallpaper paste to permanently attach the funnies to the wall.  I had understanding parents.

In high school my chemistry instructor informed the class his son had taken six of his LPs, painted them gold and made himself transporter pads.

But I think I found the ultimate geek.  The other day I came across a story about Tony Alleyne who resides in a one room apartment in Hinckley, Leicestershire, England.  He has converted his apartment into a replica of the bridge of Star Trek’s Starship Voyager.  He estimates that he spent about $150K.  Unfortunately for him, his ex-wife owns the apartment and she wants to sell it.  But it is awesome nonetheless!

The following are five themed living spaces that I found intriguing.

1.   Tony Alleyne’s Voyager apartment

2.  The ULTIMATE Star Wars Themed Home.

Collector Cho Woong has turned his apartment into a Star Wars shrine.  He has an impressive collection of Star Wars memorabilia in every room of his abode; even the bathroom.

3.   Jules’ Undersea Lodge

Key Largo, Florida is the home of the Jules’ Undersea Lodge.  Located at the Key Largo Undersea Park, this hotel affords guests the opportunity to eat, sleep and live underwater in hotel-like comfort.

4.   Star Wars Tours in Tunisia

Visit the place that was Luke Skywalker’s home, Tatooine.  When the Star Wars filmmakers finished filming, they left all manner of Star Wars memorabilia, including Skywalker’s home.

5.   World’s First Hobbit Motel

Think the Hobbits had it made?  There’s a Hobbit motel in Waitomo, New Zealand.  Each unit has a shower, kitchen and can accommodate 6 people.

So what do you think, ready to redecorate?

Don't Blame Paula Deen

Obesity has been covered ad nauseum.  According to CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) statistics from 2007 – 2008, 33.9% of adults over the age of 20 in the United States are obese.  One third of Americans are overweight!  One third of Americans are at risk for various health issues including but not limited to:  heart disease, sleep apnea, liver issues and Type 2 Diabetes.

On Tuesday, 1/17/12, Paula Deen revealed she’s had diabetes for three years.  What a freaking shocker!  You might be asking, “What does this have to do with science fiction?”  My answer – I'm going to watch "Wall-E" again and get back to you.  I heard and read about MS. Deen’s confession and then followed the resultant fallout and I thought to myself, “DUH!” and I had to get my thoughts regarding this on paper, so to speak.

Most accounts I’ve seen and read have crucified her.  C’mon, really?  Is anyone that surprised?  Seriously, look at the way she cooks.  She’s been dubbed the Queen of Butter (though to be fair many seem to share this title).

Over the past week, I’ve heard numerous times she shouldn’t have been promoting her recipes when she knew they were potentially unhealthy.  In the words of an iconic television character from the 70s, “Shut … up … you.”

And I don’t care that she’s struck an endorsement deal with a drug company for a diabetes drug.  In my mind, the two (drug endorsement and chastised for unhealthy recipes) are separate issues.

If you duplicate her recipes, then you are fully aware of each and every ingredient you shove down your gullet.  You’d have to have been living under a rock for your entire life to NOT know the health risks of continually consuming food such as this.

To place the blame on Paula Deen is inane.  That would be similar to me striking a kitchen match, holding it until it burns down to my fingers and complaining because the Diamond Match people didn’t warn me that I could burn myself if I hung on to the match too long.  Jeez.

I think Paula Deen is the latest scapegoat in the war against obesity.  For example, have you checked out the price of food in the organic aisle at the local supermarket?  It seems as if the price of “healthy” foods has outpaced the price of processed foods.  It’s no wonder Americans are fat, we have to live within a budget.

That’s my rant.  What do you think?  Is Deen culpable?  Should she be taken to task for creating a multitude of unhealthy recipes?