On the DEWLine 2.0: Dwight Williams

Seeing squirrels keeping busy on the streets and in the yards here.

Chris Hadfield noticed this morning that the smoke from the Pacific coastal fires has indeed reached us in southern Ontario, and announced same on Twitter.

My training video focus this afternoon is on Adobe Acrobat Pro DC. ("Document Cloud"?)

More as it comes to mind.

Had a tough time picking the icon for this one.

On Chris Hadfield's cover of "Space Oddity".

https://arstechnica.com/science/2018/03/video-chris-hadfield-on-the-complexities-of-music-in-microgravity/

Much gratitude to Cdr. Hadfield, the Estate of David Bowie, the people at Ars Technica, NASA, the Canadian Space Agency, and probably a lot of other people I don't know about.

Some friends of mine in ByMUG will be pleased with this.



Future stations and ships will, one suspects, have their own "sweet spots" for such projects.

Okay.

I voted on Friday night.

Then I went to see Paul Gross's new movie Hyena Road, which was - as expected - disorienting. I don't know that it'll compare to the greats of the genre, but I did get a sense of what the latest Afghan War's been like for Canadians serving in the middle of it. Which, aside from making back the money spent on it, was all that Gross really wants out of it. I figured if I didn't see it ASAP - premiere night, as it turned out - I wasn't going to have much chance beyond that. I've mentioned before that Canadian movies tend to get short attention from our movie theatre chains, and fully expect this to be no different, even though it should be.

Hyena Road, people. If you've got violence-trauma triggers, be warned. The fight scenes are bloody. But I do believe it's worth the time and money to see at least the once.

Come to think of it, not being patient was exactly why I voted at the advance poll on Friday after work too. I just didn't want to cope with any more pressure to vote "strategically". One acquaintance has accused me of maintaining "purity", but I can't trust a party that turns its back on several of its best contributions to Canadian life to avoid the inevitable false accusations of terrorist sympathy. And those accusations were trotted out by the incumbents anyway on other excuses.

Anyway. A more positive note...

Today, I listened to Chris Hadfield's Space Sessions: Songs From a Tin Can for the first time, having picked up the album at Compact Music yesterday. As you might expect from Hadfield, there's more of a country/folk vibe off the album. You may consider that either ironic or totally expected given that this was the first ever album with the vocals recorded Up There.

There's a certain exceptionalist satisfaction I get from that. Admitted freely. It took a Canadian to do this. No one from anywhere else thought of it.

And now I'm headed off to see the 6 PM showing of The Martian. I bought, read and enjoyed the book after looking at the first trailer. I figure they've got enough good raw material to work with. If my brains are working properly after getting home again, I'll let you know what I got out of it later tonight.

Later, all!

And for the Canadians reading this? Please vote. I don't need to know for whom, I don't need to be able to approve of your choice(s) before or after the fact. Ever.

Just vote.

Chris Hadfield, known as much for his musical acumen now as for his exploration work, speaks to the legacy of Ray Bradbury.

And in respect to the start of the Pan An Games here in Canada tonight, I give you - with the help of CBC Music - Serena Ryder and accompanying musicians:



The essay and the song should be linked more closely in our minds than I have words for at the moment.

I'm reminded of something, Douglas Cardinal's comment at the National Gallery a week or so ago about computer tech in particular and how it had freed up his imagination to act and design and build. There is a parallel in those remarks to Col. Hadfield's comments on tech catching up to his ambitions to share his orbital experiences with us here on the ground in as close to real-time as he could.

Any chance of getting those two gentlemen together in one room for a few hours? Any chance at all?

Slate has cobbled together their (well educated) idea of the best in space photography for this year still in progress:

http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/bad_astronomy/2013/12/the_universe_in_pictures_the_best_space_photos_of_2013.html

Enjoy it when you can...

I just read the news.

Thank you for your Service. It's a pleasure and an honour to count you as a fellow citizen.

Whatever you're planning next, I wish you well with it.

With thanks to Col. Chris Hadfield, CF, CSA

https://twitter.com/Cmdr_Hadfield/status/285503660916617216/photo/1