Lately I have been astounded by technology. Not that I am agog with the instant nature of social media. It is annoying to me that the ‘news’ is already old by the time I hear it. I rarely listen to it any more. Social media takes care of that for me. What I do miss is the in depth reporting that use to happen. Everything now is done in 30 second sound bites. Reading and learning about issues has become something of a dinosaur.
What does amaze me are tweets from Chris Hadfield LIVE FROM SPACE! This is stuff of my geeky dreams. A tourist destination to write home about! I know there are several of you who don’t use twitter or ‘get the point’ of twitter. It is about who you follow and what you search. I don’t banter much on there because A) my favorite funny friends aren’t there – they are on facebook and B) I am caught up reading news or events I don’t hear about on TV news, unless it is the BBC (for the record, BBC is proper news). Some days I prefer to read about what other readers are reading, or I like to laugh at Wil Wheaton who is hilarious, or find out about comic con. I admit to following geeks, humor and running stuff, but the other day I saw this tweet from William Shatner:
As my son would say, “I had a TOTAL NERDGASIM!” First of all a Canadian Astronaut was tweeting random stuff FROM THE SPACE STATION! Are you kidding me? How cool is that? He isn’t on Earth. Think about that, the DUDE is ORBITING the EARTH – not from a different country, he was in the space between the EARTH and the MOON. If that doesn’t impress you, then you need to think about why. Come ON! SPACE! Okay… then he clearly watched enough Star Trek to know the details to tell Captain Kirk. Classic Canadian Humor. Wiseass to the nth degree!
Then the next day two very cool things happen. 1) Commander Chris Hadfield tweets the following:
I’m proud of being Canadian, but after yesterday’s twitter conversation am starting to question wearing this red shirt.
pic.twitter.com/9iss6g0P
For those of you not in the geek circle, Wear a read shirt on Star Trek means certain death. They are ALWAYS the dudes on the ‘away mission’ that no one knows and had never seen on the show before AND they are wearing RED -always… well in the original series. This has become the secret inside joke, many other movies and shows make reference to it. No, really they do. Watch for it.
Then later that day, Commander Hadfield was in the SPACE STATION orbiting over Canada and he takes THIS picture:
This is Edmonton people! This isn’t black and white photography, this is colour. White stuff is snow, grey stuff is snow, dark stuff is river and ice. The grey stuff is delicious! HaHa … actually it is a sand/salt mix so I can drive around the city. If you squint you can see me running outside to wave at the Commander.
Commander Hadfield tweets daily. His adventures are incredibly interesting and you can talk to him yourself if you set up a twitter account. You can also visit his Pinterest page where he posts all his photos taken from the Space Station.
45 years ago the space program was new and fledgling. This was in my life-time. Can you just imagine where the future is going to take us? The geekness of my dreams may actually come true.
Thank you Commander Chris Hadfield, and may the force be with you or Live long and prosper or beware of the Bad Wolf. Take your pick, which ever is your favorite. Real space heroes get to choose their own favorite quotes.
Follow Commander Hadfield on twitter @Cmdr_Hadfield or click here on Pinterest
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