Later, at the Outpost Tavern, the French student and Aaron have some international cooperation to staple our signed dollar bill to the wall (in the grand tradition of this astronaut hangout).  

Here we are with Danielle, who's the other half of the Goddard staff. We're plotting and planning, obviously. 

Reunion time! Graylan is half of the Goddard Academy staff, I'm the Marshall Academy staff, and Marshal is the Glenn Academy staff. This is at dinner when all our Academites meet for the first time. 

As everyone walks into Kemah from the parking lot, I run ahead and photo-ambush them from behind the tropical flora to get one of those walking pictures I love to take. 

Also in this part of SCH was a moon rock that you could touch. Which I'm doing in this picture. Brian's proud of himself for navigating the maze to find it.  

Once in Houston, I gave everyone some free free time at Space Center Houston where I saw a part I'd never seen before, including a full scale mockup (with oddly realistic model astronauts) of Skylab.  

And group flights always lead to photo wackiness. Note the tiny tiny airplane where we could be the aisle seat and window seat *at the same time.* 

Heading to Houston, the NAMSFC2K5 experiences the traditional airport waiting time. For Academies waiting + airport = free wireless time.  

The mockups in front of the Space and Rocket Center. 

Week 2, Part 1

The first two days of this week were typical work days. On Wednesday, we had the flights to Houston, and flying with a dozen other people is always a fun adventure, but it's especially fun when the flight is on a tiny plane (three seats across). Several of us got to sit in seats that were the aisle and the window at the same time. Fancy.

So we successfully rolled into Houston around 3pm, I successfully convinced the admin to let me drive in Houston (I love driving in H-town), and I got us all to the Hilton. We had enough time to spare that after check-in and carrying bags up, I hauled everyone over to Space Center Houston (where badges = free admission and gift shop discount) for about an hour of space-themed fun and shopping. I spent the least amount of money I've ever spent in a SCH trip (<$30), and got a cool new tank top.

After that we headed back to the hotel where I got to see Doug (O'Handley, Ames Academy Director) in the parking lot and Graylan (who was staff for my Academy last summer at Ames and is co-staffing the Goddard Academy) in the lobby. Like old times! After changing, we all headed over to Kemah to a delicious Mexican dinner on a dock/patio outside with all three Academies: Glenn (GRC), Goddard (GSFC), and Marshall (MSFC). Marshal (note the one "l") is the staff for Glenn, and was one of my fellow RAs at Ames (confused yet?). It was awesome to see him again when he showed up with his five RAs and Director from GRC. We're totally representing to the other Academies by having Ames folks taking over staff on ALL THREE other Academies.

There were about 50 of us total, which is a pretty impressive group. After dinner many of us headed over to the Outpost Tavern (as seen in space movies) for a couple hours of getting to know each other.

With a Shuttle mockup called Pathfinder that was used to test methods of moving Enterprise.  

I just loved wearing that flight suit.  

Further controlling the mission with Morgan, my CATO.  

Here's a few of my RAs and me in front of various pieces of space equipment in the Space and Rocket Center museum. 

Here's a shot of the trainers that Space Camp made. In the back you can see the Orbiter payload bay where we got to be in a horizontal harness attached to a track in the ceiling to do EVA practice. Very cool. Pics of that later. 

And here's my fabulous team of Flight Controllers. 

During our second two-hour mission simulation, I was the Flight Director in Mission Control. 

A teambuilding activity involving 13 very hungry and tired people, a tiny island (a folded sheet), shark-invested water (non-sheet-covered floor) and a requirement to flip over the sheet.  

I took this pic from a third floor balcony. The RAs are talented. 

Brian and Elizabeth and I did Space Station science during the first two-hour space mission simulation. We worked problems and mixed chemicals.  

Here I am in the Multi-Axis Trainer. It rocked.  

Here I am in the 1/6-G Moon gravity simulator. Very bouncy. 

Some of the gals strut around in the fancy blue flight suits we got to wear all weekend at Space Camp. 

Lisa hands out cool NASA stickers to the RAs. 

MSFC Associate Director Robin Henderson talks with the RAs at our first "fireside chat." 

Part of the group (with Dr. Six) walks toward their first tour of the Academy. 

Week 1 done, 9 to go

Week 1 has been a whirlwind. I really wish I had another staff member to share the stress burden, but one works with what one has. The alumni have been incredibly helpful in getting things done and helping me brainstorm and know the area, but it would have been awesome to have someone off of which I could constantly bounce ideas and plans. Oh, well.

There are some very strong personalities in the group, and some very laid back personalities, which is a different animal from Ames 04, where were were all very strong leaders with opinions, but most of us could follow when needed. I think there will be a lot of personal development in all of us over the course of the summer.

We had a big admin-RA meeting this morning, where we got a trip to Goddard approved, which rocks. One of the reasons I wanted this job was to visit other centers, and I sure have seen those same tours of JSC more than any human could ever want. There's still a far-off possibility of visiting KSC in Florida if we drive ourselves and do a bit of work on the schedule. I think it'd be worth it, and I've got support from most of the team.

Our first Wednesday tours were of propulsion areas, with a lot of cool nuclear things going on. Not a bad start. The "fireside chat" visitor was the associate director of MSFC, and she was very nice and the females in the group really enjoyed asking her questions.

In about an hour, I'll head back to the apartment to lead everyone off to Space Camp. A couple of the people have done it before, but it's new to me. Hopefully it'll be taylored for us 20-somethings, rather than for people still in single-digit ages. We'll find out.

They're here

All twelve of my RAs got here yesterday. Mostly engineers, it seems, rather than the half engineer, half scientist group we had at Ames. Dynamics like that made the summer very interesting, especially for me. I love studying and analyzing group dynamics. Also, 9/12 are girls, which is like my group, and still weird. The composition of technical fields is so dominated by males that's it'd odd to have mostly females around.

The way we're set up, three of the apartments are on one side of the apt complex, mine's in the middle next to the clubhouse and pool, and one apartment of girls is way on the other side of the me. I'm slightly worried that the grouped apartments will get clique-y and not remember to invite the gal who lives with me and the other three when they do their own things, but I'm going to try really hard to dissuade that.

At the end of the first week we get to go to Space Camp for 2.5 days, which is going to be awesome.

I continue to be in Alabama

All the organization folks (there's a giant team of 'em) are super stressed out in the last week before the Research Assistants (or Academites, as I'll be calling them) arrive. There's so much to do from buying plane tickets to arranging for food to making sure we get everyone checked in, and so very very much more. But I have the utmost confidence (as I keep telling the admin team) in the MSFC Academy. We can do it, and it will be great.

There is a slight difference of opinions in some basic underlying principles of the Academy. The MSFC folks are being torn between trying to make their own unique summer experience and taking the sage advice of the tried-and-true Goddard and Ames Academies. A GSFC alumnus and myself are trying very hard to keep with the true spirit of the NASA Academy program, developing leaders for the future of the space program.

Being in the NAA2004 was like being on a reality show without so many cameras. You felt very special all the time, like you really earned this place, and you were being given these incredible experiences in exchange for your future dedication to space. The directors and staff did such a great job that three of us from the Ames Academy last summer are staffing the other three Academies (Goddard, Glenn, and Marshall) this year (Ames was cancelled due to lack of funding).

I hope we can make Marshall be that inspiring. That's what my summer will be focused on.

But for now I'm alone in Alabama (until a friendly face gets here tomorrow to help me settle in...). Saturday the RAs start rolling in, and it'll be time to get this thing started for real. Rock on.